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Ketaki Vaidya joined Oracle in 2017 as a recent graduate in India.
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Vaidya developed from associate software engineer to AI product manager in seven years.
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She said there is more to remittances abroad than basic salary that needs to be negotiated.
Ketaki Vaidya had been working at Oracle’s office in Hyderabad, India, for about five years when she wanted a change.
As a software engineer, she wanted to be part of Silicon Valley’s innovations. She negotiated a move to California in 2022 and has since transferred to Seattle.
Vaidya shared how she went through two promotions, a career change and an international move during seven years at Oracle.
Associate software engineer
She started her post-graduate career as an associate software engineer at Oracle’s office in Hyderabad, India.
One of the first things Vaidya did was gauge what her entire team wanted from her, instead of just focusing on her supervisor.
“Managers always take 360-degree feedback, going around and talking to the whole team to get a sense of what your work is like,” she says. “If you keep your team happy, you automatically keep your manager happy.”
She also scheduled regular check-ins with her manager to get feedback and she emphasized her ambitions, such as working with certain software, so that her manager could reach out to her when the opportunity arose.
She earned about 900,000 Indian rupees, or $10,700 a year.
Software engineer
Vaidya was promoted to software engineer after two years.
She said she followed female role models who reminded her to give credit to herself, not just the team.
Casting her vote meant always discussing her next promotion and growth options with managers. She made sure to document and communicate her successes.
“They knew I was very invested in my career, and then my managers would really help me get better projects throughout the year.”
In this role, Vaidya was paid 1.2 million rupees, or $14,200 per year.
Senior software engineer and team leader
After four years with the company, Vaidya was promoted to senior engineer, where she led a team of seven.
By the end of her projects, Vaidya said she found ways to demonstrate her work to leadership, such as sharing what she learned in the team’s group chat.
She has also carefully completed her annual assessment documents and drawn them up several times.
“I’ve seen a lot of people not take that very seriously, but it’s something that’s in the system,” she said. “That is taken into account every time you climb the ladder.”
In this role, Vaidya was paid 2 million Indian rupees, or approximately $24,000 per year.
Changing roles and transfer to the US
As she progressed, Vaidya was drawn to product management. She used her free time during the pandemic to map out what a job with more business strategy could look like.
“I set up 15-minute sessions with about 200 people on LinkedIn to understand what this field entailed,” she said. “The more I talked to people, the more I realized this was something I wanted to do.”
She didn’t think she had all the necessary skills, so she applied for master’s courses specializing in product management in the US so she could better understand global work culture.
But when she tried to resign, Oracle “wouldn’t let me go,” she said. Her job was crucial to releasing a product, so the company offered her a product management role in the US instead.
She negotiated a new salary in light of the much higher cost of living in the US – even as Oracle took on significant costs, including her visa.
“You can’t show the excitement in the conversations you have with your hiring managers,” she said.
To gather salary data, Vaidya looked at Glassdoor and spoke to people who had made the switch before.
“I received this offer because of the credibility I had built in the organization. I felt like I had the upper hand in the negotiations,” she said. “I felt a lot more confident in asking for the things I deserve, so it was a very smooth transition.”
After negotiating her base salary up to $80,000, she discussed other compensation components, including the timing of her next review, sign-on bonuses, relocation expenses, paid time off and remote work. She negotiated a $15,000 sign-on bonus and a $15,000 relocation allowance, which were not part of the original offer.
“Everything under the sun is open to discussion and you just have to start with that mentality,” she said.
The 2022 move took her to Redwood City, California, where she is an artificial intelligence product manager.
She has since moved to Seattle and plans to work in other US states.
Vaidya said she has picked up two things from the work culture in the US: she has been inspired to work on projects outside of work, such as speaking at conferences and hosting tech podcasts, and she has learned how to create better work life boundaries .
Now her compensation is about $130,000 per year, including stock units and bonuses. Business Insider has verified her work history and current compensation.
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