We've negotiated many Box offers this year. Don't leave $100K+ on the table.
Box is willing to negotiate, but they tend to have narrower pay bands. However, like many companies, they've been struggling in the current hiring market, and we've seen some bigger increases than usual for candidates where we can create strong leverage.
- Base Salary
- Box Equity Package (see Box’s vesting schedule below)
- Box Signing Bonus (not included in all initial Box offers)
- Stock Refreshers
Box offers performance-based refreshers but they are not as consistent as other companies like Facebook. Most of the time only top performers (top 5-20%) get these grants. Recruiters at Box are generally hesitant to share this information, but you should ask about 1) % of people at your level that receive these grants and 2) average grant size. These stock refresher grants vest over 4-years just like the initial equity grant.
Box's total compensation doesn’t include cash performance bonuses unless you are at the senior staff level or above. When comparing a Box offer to other companies like Google that have very consistent performance bonuses, you should factor that into the total compensation of the offer.
Box is a remote friendly company. Though you should keep in mind that some roles might be expected to come into the office every once in a while. As for Box remote salary bands, they differ based on location, and base salary will even be adjusted if you move after joining.
Since Box is a remote-friendly company, not many situations require you to move and relocation packages are unlikely. However, if Box does need you to move, you should push for a 10k+ relocation package + corporate housing benefits.
Equity is the most negotiable component of the Box compensation package, which is quite standard in the industry. The next most negotiable component at Box is base salary. Normally signing bonus is the second most negotiable component, but the Box sign on bonus has narrow bands relative to top paying companies in the industry.
Box does not usually require proof of a written offer when negotiating. That said, it's important to make sure you are being honest as recruiters often ask for details like offer breakdowns, location, level, etc.
In the current hiring market it is possible for Box to go above band. However, it's very difficult and requires playing all your cards right during the negotiation.
It is always beneficial to have a strong relationship with your hiring manager. However, hiring managers at Box have less control over the negotiation vs. at companies like Amazon.
Box’s hiring process typically has 4 stages: assessment (not required for all roles), recruiter interview, onsite, and offer stage.
The difference in pay between the two companies is quite significant. As a general rule of thumb, Dropbox usually pays better than Box for every component. For instance, a Box Staff Software Engineer top of band is ~$410k per year and an IC4 SWE at Dropbox top of band is ~$500k per year.
A unique benefit at Box is unlimited PTO. This can often be a double edged sword as at many companies it's tough to take advantage of unlimited PTO. However, Box is known to have a good culture for this with many people reporting that they take more PTO than in previous jobs. The other benefits are pretty standard at Box.
Software Engineer
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Staff Software Engineer
Senior Staff Software Engineer
Principal Software Engineer
Equivalent Level at Google
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Our Clients Love Rora
Coming from a non-FAANG background, I was shocked to find out how much I could be earning. Before I signed up with Rora, I made the mistake of telling Amazon my current compensation. Thankfully, Rora knew exactly how to fix it and ended up getting me an offer that was 2.3X what I previously made and more than $600K higher than Amazon’s initial offer!
Through several weeks of interviews, Ganesh was always available to make sure I knew what to say for each conversation. I interviewed with start ups, Google, Facebook and Amazon and was really impressed that Rora knew the comp ranges and were able to give me tailored advice for each – even the start ups.
There ended up being two particularly complex moments in my negotiation. One of the start-ups I had a personal relationship with and I wasn’t sure how it would affect the negotiation. I like that there was a focus on my individual circumstances and that they were leveraged to get me a higher offer. The other situation is that Amazon made a mistake on my written offer and initially wouldn’t rectify it. Ganesh was able to guide me through a challenging conversation to get it resolved.
Thanks to Wilson and the team at Rora I got a ~$250K increase on my remote Facebook offer! I was initially worried I wouldn’t have much leverage because Facebook reached out to me, and I wasn’t interviewing anywhere else. Rora introduced me to an Amazon L7 recruiter and helped me get that process started. I didn’t even end up needing to finish the Amazon interviews, since we were able to use some early compensation conversations to justify our numbers to Facebook.
At one point I was also considering pushing for an E7 role, and they wrote up a great script for me to broach the subject with my recruiter. She ended up giving me the option to do an additional interview to be considered for the higher-level position.
The whole process was very smooth, and I wouldn’t hesitate to use the service for any future negotiations. I found the regular calls with Wilson where we walked through strategy and discussed the scripts to be extremely helpful. Not only did it help with this negotiation, but I also learned a lot of useful negotiation tactics that I’ve already started to use in other situations.
As an engineering leader with decades of experience and having now gone through the negotiation with the team at Rora, the only thing I can say is — get the help. Whether you realize you need it, or even if you think you don’t. Just because you have done well in engineering doesn't mean that you understand the tactics and limits of the recruiting process.
Rora helped me get a $200K increase on my original Facebook offer without any competing offers. It was clear that Rora was deeply familiar with Facebook's negotiation playbook. I’d honestly give the experience an 11/10.
In addition, Rora guided me on how to get the position switched to a revised remote role which was a huge deal at a personal level. They showed me how to redirect FB’s questions so that I could explore the possibility of not relocating, without ever having to say no to my original offer.
This is my first FAANG role and I'm so happy I worked with Rora (thanks again Annie!) for the negotiation. My goal was to increase my Google offer, but I was in a tricky situation where I only had 1 other interview (no offer yet) at a small startup. With their guidance, I managed to get a $240K increase on my Google offer, despite Google's policy of requiring cross offers in writing to justify an increase.
The mock negotiations were a big part of why I was able to get this increase. Going into the negotiation, I assumed the key factor was what to say but I quickly learned that how you say it is equally if not more important. This was clear when over the course of the call"no" turned into "I'll see what I can do" and eventually"I think we can make this work". A big part of this was also having someone with me on the calls to provide real time guidance. This took a lot of the stress out of the situation. I can't recommend this team highly enough!
After receiving several job offers, I needed to make a decision within a few days. I wanted to make sure I was getting the best offer possible, so I decided to use Rora. I was very pleased with their service. My coach, Sameer, was well prepared and had information about what compensation increases were likely possible. He provided detailed scripts covering a range of scenarios, and he did practice negotiations with me that helped me feel confident when I had the actual conversations.
With his help I was able to increase one offer by $45k per year plus get a $50k signing bonus and then use that to increase my offer from Square, which was my first choice. All throughout he was very responsive as I was dealing with some tight deadlines and looking to wrap things up quickly. Rora's fee was only a tiny fraction of the increase they helped me negotiate, and even though they would have made more money if I had taken the highest offer, Sameer always put my goals first and never pressured me to do so. I highly recommend Rora!
My friend introduced me to Rora and I’m so glad they did. I initially did some calculations to see if working with them would be worth it - my final increase ended up being ~3x higher than what I had estimated to be possible!
Their data is much more accurate than anything I found online. Without Sameer's guidance, I would have never known (and would have probably been too nervous) to ask for >$800K for anAmazon L7 offer. Of course, it's not just not enough to throw out a big number, you also need to be able to justify it. Sameer guided me through negotiating an up-level at another company, which I didn’t even know was possible at my level. With their scripts, I was able to leverage my competing offer to get exec approval for my Amazon offer. They also knew all the tricks Amazon would play (e.g., assuming 15% stock appreciation) and exactly how to counter them.
My total 4-year compensation increased by $570K. I don't think I've ever had a higher ROI – I’m very thankful that this service exists!
Box
has a unique set of negotiation policies. If you don’t have experience negotiating with them, you risk losing out on large amounts of money because of very small mistakes.
There are many of these rules you need to know to get the highest
Box
offer possible