The Luckiest New Hire Ever
As a fresh graduate with zero working experience, I did not bargain the salary when signing the Offer Letter. I immediately got a job right after I graduated, so thank goodness. Any salary should be sufficient, for a fresh graduate like me. What's more, I wanted to stay at my Grandmother's house while working as the Line Manager at the factory, so I could save even more.
The starting salary from this multinational company was already quite impressive for the Indonesian fresh graduate market. So, when I saw the numbers printed in the Offer Letter, without thinking a lot, I immediately signed it before they changed their mind.
After only two weeks of working at the factory, I was called by the Plant HR Manager. Initially, I was nervous about being called by HR. What did I do wrong?
As I sat on the chair in Mr. HR’s cubicle, he showed me a piece of paper. "What is this, Sir?", I asked. Mr. HR then explained, “We pay for performance. We also pay competitively. You are lucky because the starting salary in the market is increasing, therefore we will increase your salary too.”
I was initially nervous and worried, but then finally smiled. After saying thank you, I quickly returned to my place of work.
A week later, I was called again by Mr. HR. This time, I was worried that they may have made a mistake and that they might cancel the salary increase that was given last week.
After I sat down, Mr. HR explained again, “You are really lucky! Our starting salary standard was recalculated and we will increase your salary again!” I smiled even wider, haha.
The background story was when I just joined the company, there were several New Hires who resigned because they were hijacked by other companies. Indeed, New Hires from this multinational company was always easy targets to be hijacked by being offered higher salaries. For that, I was very grateful to my colleagues who resigned earlier, haha.
If they wanted, the leaders in the company could just keep quiet - after all, I was already inside and I didn't know about the change in starting salary. But it turned out that the leaders were fair, and my salary was adjusted to the new standard to be more competitive.
So even though I had not finished working for a month, although I had not received my first salary yet, my salary got increased twice already! The amount was also decent, a double-digit increase compared to the figure I signed in the offer letter.
If we are always grateful and set low expectations, sometimes luck comes from unexpected directions. Just like the saying of the Sundanese in West Java, “Rejeki mah, timana wae lah!”. It means, “Fortune could come from anywhere - even from the most unexpected ways!”.
