Keeping high quality staff is difficult. The problem is that those of us who are high quality tend to know it because, well, it takes work to be high quality and we know we do that work.
Like everyone else, including all of you on this forum, those of us who are high quality often want the most we can get for the work we do. We know who much money we are saving our "masters" and we want a piece of it.
This, of course, is where the Economic Principles of supply and demand, the marginal principle, and the principle of dimishing returns all kick in. As the employer, you have to decide if the person asking for the raise is really worth it. Do they make you that much money? Do they save you that much money? How easy, or hard, would it be to replace this person should you say no and they leave?
I know many doctors who fail horribly to understand why their front desk clerk left for a job that paid 50 cents more an hour. I tried to explain to them that to someone who makes $9.00 an hour, a 50 cent raise is big money, but either they didn't want to understand or were just to bone-headed. Those docs I know with great practices have a great staff that is loyal to them. Surely, having a great staff is expensive, but there seems to be all kinds of problems these docs just don't have. Office drama, employees that are disrespectful to patients, employees with poor work ethic, and so forth are all on the list of issues they don't have.
In the world of economics, suppliers who need skills seek those skills from the public and those in the public who have skills seek employement from suppliers. The supply of those with skills contrasted against the demand of those who require skills is what determines wage, and who will survive.
JamesNT
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