I met up with an old friend yesterday. She's the same age as me (31) and works for Barclays. She's an associate director and when she told me her salary, I nearly fell off my chair. She doesn't consider herself anything special. I am so shocked. Put it this way - she earns about 5 times as much as I do. It's really made me stop and think what exactly I'm doing with my career. 5 times difference! I couldn't believe it. I'm now left completely wondering what on earth I want from all of this exactly. Any ideas for helping me get my thoughts straight after all of this?

You haven't told us what do you do?

IT strategy consultant. But not systems integration or anything like that.

If there ever is more concrete, unequivocal, indisputable and definite evidence of the spurious value of IT Strategy, IT SI, IT SAP, IT whatever.. then this is it. The reason why your Barclays comrade wage dwarfs yours is because he adds value (money) to Barclays whilst al you do is prepare turgid, verbiose and thoroughly uninteresting power points slides spewing out other-wordly stuff like business process optimisation, process control, process analysis or whatever crap you lot doZB

I'm with bad boy Brezinski on this one. Why are you so shocked? Yours is an ephemeral existence; no substance, no bottom-line value; just business-jargon waffle presented as reality. She tangibly contributes to the bottom line. Follow the Benjamins, homie.

You are both right.I do think I do a good and useful job, however it does not translate directly into the bottom line for the client. It is more about fixing problems than making money for them. That is probably why my efforts are not valued as much as I would like them to be.Not sure what to do.

Do the Bartman.

I don't want to comment on how pointless various kinds of IT consulting acronyms are but ZB and hip hop master are wrong in their analysis.... The IT consultant clearly 'adds value' to HIS company - the consulting firm - because he is charged out at whatever his rate is - he doesn't work for Barclays. Barclays don't necessarily 'add value' for all their clients (I should know, I have a mortgage with them) - so the argument used above is invalid. The actual reason the Barclays person earns more is because IB is a much more profitable industry. There are many industries where an IT consultant will earn more than the average employee of a client (e.g. retail, public sector) - even if that person is adding value. The answer to the original question is that IT consulting is not the right thing to do if you are only interested in the money, (IB is) and he should switch to something that either pays more, he believes in or he enjoys.

The real question is: do you contribute to the bottom line of your organization? if yes, ask for a raiseremember that everyone is a client

For those of us considering our options: what does your friend at Barclays do? Thanks

Associate Director is a much more higher level position than IT Strategy consultant. Try to make Associate Partner and the salary gap will close

"She doesn't consider herself anything special."Are you sure you don't mean you don't consider her anything special.Do you have comparable experience, education, attitude, ability?

Can you tell us how muchyou earn and how much she earns. Also please tell me what exact type of work she does.Barclays is a large organisation and she may not even be in IB.Please provide some detail. Assuming you joined consulting at 22 you and you are 31 now you should be earning circa £70,000 basic. Are you saying she earns £350,000?

Think about it, he earns 40K and she earns 200K. IT is that poorly paid these days!