@occ – I have a slight difference of opinion on a small bit of your otherwise excellent advice to the pplufthesun. I made a similar statement at least one time before on Fluther.
I don’t react well to an employee’s comment or threat about looking for another job if he or she does not get a raise. It just grates on me and my gut generally tells me that there is going to be a problem down the road with this employee, and that problem is generally NOT going to be about money. Displaying that kind of dissatisfaction to me is a red flag.
The other consideration is that depending on where you work, you just may not get anything in the middle of the year. Corporate budgets and corporate rules and procedures may just be too rigid and managers simply may not have the ability to do something outside of annual reviews and increments which are generally tied to the end of a fiscal year. When I worked for General Mills, the fiscal year ended on the last weekend in May and your review would be in May and your raise came in June and your bonus, if earned, was paid at the end of July.
I just mean to say that even if pplufthesun is an A+++ performer, corporate beancounters like me might have tied up his manager’s hands really well, leaving the manager with no discretion and no wiggle room in the middle of the year.
SRM