Storage Admin 3 years experience in field IT - salary in Poland

Hi Guys,

If i am a Storage Admin with 3 years experience in field of IT & i hold a masters degree from Europe, what kind of salary gross should i expect in Poland, what would be a good fair range ?

Thanks!

Somewhere between 12 and 20 thousand USD net. (3000 to 5000 PLN net, 4500 to 7500 PLN gross). Maybe less even, and I wouldn't count on the high range. Not very attractive if you're from a first world country, though the move may be worth it for experience if you are fresh out of school and are desperate. Poland ain't the place to make money. In any case, ask for 7500 gross and forget about it if you don't get more than 6000. (Assuming, of course, that you are single and willing to slum it for a year or two).

Some offers here have salary provided. It's net, PLN: 4programmers.net/Praca/Szukaj?q=administrator&city=&skill=&salary
Here is more offers, but usually without salary range: olx.pl/praca/informatyka/q-administrator/

Hi Guys,

Thanks for your reply. As i said i have 3 years of experience, so might 9000 gross per month be ok? And what is the total expenses per month living/housing/food?

Is Poland a nice place to live as well?

Thanks :)!

@DominicB was more realistic, but 9000 gross is also possible if you know some desired technology (Storage Admin? Have you seen any offers for that?). As for costs use search function and read before asking question.

With only three years of experience, it's a long shot, unless you are qualified in some arcane, exotic technology that is highly in demand.

As for living costs, assuming you are a single, non-drinking, non-smoking male in excellent health: and with modest tastes.

One bedroom apartment all inclusive (rent, fees and all monthly bills): 2200 plus in Warsaw, 2000 plus in Krakow and Wroclaw, and somewhat less in other cities.

Food, groceries and household supplies: 1000 PLN, a lot more if you eat out a lot, somewhat less of you can cook simple meals from scratch.

Entertainment and travel: that's a wildcard. Depends on how self-indulgent, lavish and extravagant you are.

Don't forget to include your airfare to and from Poland and the costs of your visa in your calculations, and also about 2000 PLN to set up your apartment. Don't expect to stay longer than a year, two at the most.

What do you mean by storage administrator? If it's 3 years of experience in Oracle administration for instance then you could probably get 8k - 12k gross in Warsaw.

For comparing different polish cities you can check Numbeo: numbeo.com/cost-of-living
Whether Poland is nice place to live or not is very relative it depends what are you main indicators for the quality of life...

Thanks everyone for your replies.

@ Dominic, can you elaborate a bit on why you mentioned 1-2 years max. to live there before wanting to move out again =D!?

And as a storage admin, i mean people working in IBM/HP/Hitachi storage systems and fiber channel switches for example.

does it get to -25 degrees in winter =D?

Thanks!

I haven't seen such temperatures for a long time. During the last winter in Wrocław it was around 0 all the time. We had snow with rain on 2 occasions through the whole season. Which is a bummer. So the winter is more wet and dirty than cold and snowy.. at least that's how it was last time.

So you're more of a hardware guy, I'm afraid I have no knowledge on this subject.

The best way to find out is to ask for a high ball figure, say 15,000 PLN gross, and see their counteroffer.


Because by then, at the latest, you will have found a much more attractive job at much more attractive wages in a much more attractive location, unless you are too stupid or lazy to continue looking for better jobs once you come to Poland.


Can it get that cold? Yes, it can. Not every winter, but it does and can happen from time to time. Winter temperatures vary enormously in Poland. There was one weekend one February where I was sitting on my balcony in Wrocław without a shirt sunbathing, and other years it was brutally cold the same time of the year. The most depressing thing in my opinion is not so much the cold as the slush- wet melting snow. And the dark. Winter in Poland is very dark and gray.

Thanks guys for all the info. Is bydgoszcz a good city to live in? and any idea if the "ATOS" company is a good employer with good benefits and as a career?

thanks again :)!

I think yes. And it's relatively cheap.

Cinek


Be prepared for at least 2 weeks temp below -20 each winter. But on the other hand, -20 C with snow in February is much better than +5C in darkness, fog and rain in November.

Cinek

thanks guys, any idea about city and company i mentioned?

The city is not bad, but it is not the biggest IT job market in Poland. I think that Atos is the only IT company employing bigger amount of foreigners there. About work there you can read there gowork.pl/opinie_czytaj,899407

reading 1 page tells me that it is typical outsorccing center with plenty of linguists working in support, not professional HR and sometes low wages.

Seems that biggest complaines are about low salary increases with time. So you should be better sattisfied with your entrace wage.

i can't understand polish =D! what is it saying guys ?

Basically that it's not a great place to work, wages are low, and paths to advancement are essentially nonexistent. In spite of the high unemployment rate in Poland, they have trouble retaining qualified Poles, which is why they are hiring less demanding and more naive and desperate workers from INDIA, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

A word of warning. NEVER accept a low wage on the promise or hope that you will be getting a substantial raise once you are working. These are outsorced jobs, and the company's highest, and actually only, priority is keeping wages low. So shoot for the stars and don't settle for anything less.

Basically, there are better opportunities in Western countries. I recommend that you spend your time and money researching those, and also building up your qualifications in the meantime. And it is probably best to do so in your home country rather than in Poland.

Some contracting IT companies take a percentage of what they agree on with the client - so it's in their best interest to negotiate the best salary they can for their employee, and renegotiate the agreement, if the employees qualifications raise.

In other cases Poland is following the UK. It gets more and more popular to change employers every 1,5 year or 2 years to get a bigger increase in salary. The number of IT companies rapidly grows which allows for such lifestyle.

thanks Dominic and Frd, btw what kind of contracts do they offer in your opinion, would it be like a yearly contract that they'd renew or would it be an open contract and therefore your job would be safe ?

have you even tried with google translate? You say that you're from IT and don't know how to use it...


I see no reason why the company couldn't get a lot of money and pay their workers little.


I think that your first work permit will be for max 2 - 3 years, so probably the contract too.

It's extremely unlikely that you will be offered an open-ended contract. Chances are that you will be offered a two or three year contract, as Monitor said, with an option of renewing at the end of the contract. Which you are not going to do, anyway, because by then you will have found better opportunities in richer countries, unless you are too stupid or lazy to aggressive pursue better prospects once you get hired. At best, this will add a couple of years of low-grade experience to your resume. Nothing exciting at your level. For a poor country with low wages, the cost of living is rather high, which pretty much rules out saving up a substantial amount of money.

Your time would be better spent exploring more promising job markets. Don't even think as Poland as a backdoor to the richer countries in the EU. That could set your career behind by years. Best advice is to find a job in your home country for an international company, work there for a few years, and transfer. Sorry, but working in Poland is rarely a rewarding a valuable way to further your career, and is often career suicide.

That doesn't have to be true. In IT it depends what project you are working on. If project is interesting, then country is irrelevant to progress career.

The bulk of IT work that foreigners can do is overwhelmingly outsourced or insourced. This means that the work is basically grunt work that the engineers in the home country don't want to do. Interesting projects are a rare exception. Also, the OP would be cut off form the corporate mainstream, and would find it very hard to advance within the corporation or even to make useful contacts. Working in Poland is generally like working in the basement, where nobody upstairs sees you or cares about you.

Linkedin.com is visible from Polish basement.

One live real-world contact is worth a million virtual contacts. Sorry, but REAL business is done in the REAL world by REAL people with a REAL handshakes and REAL word-of-mouth recommendations. If the best you can do in terms of career advancement is relying on internet contacts, you career has taken a major nose-dive.

You can get a lot of nice and interesting offers on Linkedin and not from your contacts but the HRs who are scourging the internet in search of IT professionals...

I guess in general DominicB is right. It's good to have broad network of contacts. But in current IT job market it's not necessary. Who knows how much longer it will last.

Merged: Work Salary for an data storage in IT?

Hi All,

I've been seeing mixed reviews about the salaries offered for IT people, from people saying it's avg. of 6000 Gross to others thinking it could reach 13,000 Gross per month. Seeing that much of a gap makes me confused with the reality out there. Would appreciate people sharing their points thinking that if you're living with a non working wife, and if you're a foreign then you'd need to save airplane tickets to go back home for visits.

When i calculated monthly expenses, it looked like there was a 2000 pln for rent + 500 for utilities+ 800*2 for food + some money for cinema + sports, ended up with around 5000 per month for 2 people to live in a normal life. That means, that until one gets a salary of 8000 PLN per month, only 600 zloty would be left, i bet that's not enough for plane tickets/clothing...

What are your thoughts?

Thanks

In the beginning you said gross salary.

So you are forgetting the main thing in your calculation: Taxes.

They will take at least 20% of your gross salary.


Actually that is not a huge Gap.

Someone with a degree from a top level french university and 5 years of experience deserve to earn 50% more than a fresh grad from an unknown university.

Your calculations are roughly correct. What is wrong with the fact that average for the country is 6000, but top earners get up to double that?

the thing is that doesn't make sense to be honest, cause people say you can live easily on 6500 Gross, but actually not if you have a wife and a kid for example, and as i said not enough money for flights/clothes....so what's the point of even moving there =) or them offering such money for foreigners