Lawyers/salespeople: ML and quotas

[niq]

If you take, say, 3 months of ML, are you still expected to hit 100% of your quota/billable hours budget, or is your quota and bonus pro-rated to 75% of a full year? Were you, um, encouraged to line up your return to work with the start of a quarter?

A (male) friend and I were talking about the lack of gender diversity at his company even in non-tech jobs. They are very sales-heavy and we couldn't figure out how ML interacted with sales quotas.

[v]

At the two firms I worked at, billable requirements and bonuses were prorated to the day. My firms didn't care about months or quarters... If your leave straddled fiscal years, you would be prorated appropriately in both years.

But like @simpledogs said, a lot of new moms struggled with making hours because it is hard to have the right amount of work when you had a wind down period before leave and a ramp up period after.

[lurknomore]

At my firm I had a choice. Take paid maternity leave and still make my billable requirement for the year or pro rate my required bills and take unpaid leave. Both times I took 12 weeks of paid leave and came within 5% of my hours required without penalty for being a bit short (well, my raise was prob a bit less but I didn't have to pay back that years salary). I was also on bedrest for 5 weeks both times. I did some work while on leave both times in order to get some hours in. About 10-15/week. No bonuses to speak of, sadly.

[mlt]

At my firm your hours requirements aren't pro rated. You still have to hit 2000. But every day you are on leave they credit you a certain number of hours toward the minimum. Sounds great but in practice it means you don't hit your minimum in the year you are on leave. They don't credit you enough hours so you are in a deficit at a time when you are often slow/winding back up.

[pinkdutchtulips]

I was a paralegal who billed and my quota was pro rated.

[preppy]

I used to work in sales for my company and it was not pro-rated. You were still responsible for the yearly sales quota if you took maternity or paternity leave.

[lindsaymg]

I am not a commission employee, but my company gets their 12 weeks of maternity leave with quota relief. They get the 30% commission potion of their comp paid in full. they also get two months of "ramp up" when they get back to help with the lack of pipe they have and to let the people who filled in for her the full commission on deals they are still closing that they started while watching her accounts.

[pinotgrig]

Not a lawyer but my bonus was not pro-rated. My boss said she would have been furious if it had been and it definitely looks like I'm in the minority based on the replies here.

[hbomdiggity]

Sept 2, 2015 18:04:10 GMT -5 v said:

But like @simpledogs said, a lot of new moms struggled with making hours because it is hard to have the right amount of work when you had a wind down period before leave and a ramp up period after.

This is pretty much my fear. I was low before I left. And it's not like I will be able to work all 12 hr days to make it up with a baby to care for.

But yes, billable are prorated.

[patbutcher]

I'm in sales. My target is the same as though I was there all year which sucks because I was off for 5 months of our fiscal year. Someone covered my clients but they had their own clients to manage so my sales definitely suffered.