"If You Want to Earn More, Increase The Value of Your Work to The Employer"- There's No Other Recipe

The main reason for low wages is low labor efficiency

Look at high-wealth countries. Researchers concur that these are places with greater process automation than poorer countries.

I remember watching a movie where a guy flies in a hot air balloon and shows life in different parts of the world. And I also remember footage from Africa of a woman carrying water on her head for a kilometer.

At that point, the German resident just opens the faucet. While in Africa, things are washed by hand on the riverbank, the Germans turn on the washing machine.

It's the same at work: the one who automates processes earns, rather than spending person-hours on the same activities.

This is why a cashier, waiter, and driver earn less than an IT specialist. A cashier manually scans each item, checks the weight of products against the price tag, counts the change. An IT guy, instead, watches all this and comes up with a self-service cash register, which saves the supermarket chain a lot of resources. 

If you want to earn more, give up routine activities 

Employers don't mind raising your salary, if they can see that your work is helping to grow their business. It is useless to ask your boss for a raise if you offer nothing in return.

The other thing is to come to your employer with the question:

"How can I make more money?"

Be willing to develop skills or expand your area of responsibility.

This is how, for example, I raised my employee's salary. We opened an HR department, looked at what skills paid more, the employee mastered them and changed her position in the company.

Let's look at one case. Here are two companies that provide translations from English. What does Company A do? It hires a bunch of translators and makes them translate from morning till night, paying them a penny, squeezing the most out of them. And then there is Company B, which says, "We will automate the processes and increase productivity," hiring the best professionals, paying a decent wage.

It creates all the conditions for employees to figure out how to make sure no one else has to translate in this world. What this company does is not a bad thing. Well, yes, perhaps the problem is that when translations are fully automated, translators will lose their jobs. What we need to do, though, is just learn how to work with big changes.

A routine is something to be very wary of. If your work consists of repetitive actions, then you can be replaced by a machine at any time. What you can do is think of ways to improve the process, do it faster, get fewer people to do it, so as to save the company money. At this point, you become more valuable, and they are willing to pay you more money for that. This should be going around in your head all the time, "How can I speed up this process?".

To earn more, think about becoming useful

If you make more money, it means you are doing more valuable things for the world. Any business that makes a lot of money is doing something very useful.  Otherwise, such businesses close very quickly. And, accordingly, to earn more, think about becoming useful.

Always think about how to create value, and then the world will thank you. For example, when we at Osmi Pro think about how to grow our revenue, we don't think about how to squeeze more money out of customers; that's a mindset that won't get us results. We are always looking for how to give more value to our customers, and then, it somehow, miraculously, leads to good revenue, good profitability, and so on. 

To earn more, get rid of money stereotypes

“Getting a lot of money for your work is bad.”

For many people, it is stressful to think, not about making millions, but about increasing their income by 2 or 3 times. It is psychologically hard to accept that you earn not $200, but $2000. It helps to have a different attitude about money: if you earned more money, it means you did more good for the world.

“Big money only comes by unfair means.”

You can earn it honestly: improve your skills, get more practice, and, year after year, become a stronger specialist and ask for higher pay.

“The poor and the rich are different.”

Steve Jobs has a famous quote: “Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. You can build your own things that other people can use.” I totally share his point of view.

Eight years ago, I myself was a student and lived in a dormitory, in a small room for four. I had nothing behind me, but logic, a lot of work, and the gradual automation of routine led to fruitful results. I increased my income by 15 times because I used to automate even everyday life and learned to invest time only in what is important.

For example, I don't own a car. Instead, I take a cab and listen to audiobooks, take courses, and solve business cases without being distracted by the road.

On the way to a high salary, the main task is to use every hour of work and personal time as efficiently as possible. Just like a rocket, discarding everything unneeded and moving forward.