Greetings,
First off, this will be long. I have been told by many people that I likely have ADD/ADHD, since I get caught up in and run away with explaining context.
I (36m) have been working with this company for over 6 years now. It's a small, family owned business which is soon to be passed from the parents of my boss to my boss. We build laboratory equipment which we ship all over the world.
The company is decent. My boss is a bit of a narcissist, but he's also progressive and does make an effort. The starting wage is $22 CAD, no education required, with $1 raises every 1300 hours. We have benefits, RRSP matching, etc.
Its arrogant of me to say so, but I'm basically running the shop that me and 6 others work out of, and have been for almost two years. My boss and his family moved to BC. We're on the east coast.
My colleagues are great, and we're all very self sufficient. We help each other a lot, which is why my previous statement is kind of arrogant. I don't run the place alone, but I do a lot.
I've had to fight him on a lot of dumb basics, like hot water and heat, but eventually he sees sense and chooses compassion over cheapness. This example was a few years ago, and since then I've been able to talk him into installing two more heat pumps, and we now have a kitchenette area for our lunches. If we need ergonomic tools or something along those lines, we get them. The point being that he is improving. He actually is becoming a better boss.
On to the main course. We have a machinist that he invested in which makes most of our parts for us. They lost money every month for 2 or 3 years and he's buying them out. They're 2 hours away from my home.
He wants me to move to the area and manage the machine shop.
I'll have to do purchasing of materials, scheduling, and most of the nine yards. It'll be me and one machinist guy that I haven't met.
I have no experience or training in machining or drafting, but I've been designing off and on for this company for a couple years now, and it's been going really well. It's also my first experience with drafting/3D autocad.
We still have much to discuss on this, he only wanted to put the bug in my ear, so there's a lot to hash out. And this is why I'm here asking you for your advise. How do I negotiate with him about this opportunity?
Neither myself nor my colleagues are receiving any extra money for the managerial duties we've inherited. I do all of our purchasing of custom parts, as well as checking/modifying drawings and designs, quality testing of parts received, assembly of 75% of our main sale items, maintaining inventory counts on most of our parts, training, problem solving almost every single thing that comes up, expanding our infrastructure (ie, carpentry, electrical, plumbing (I'll be replacing two toilets soon), etc) the list goes on.
If you're a good worker, you're rewarded with more work. I've always been a good worker, and I've always been punished with more and more duties. Duties that are never accompanied by increased pay, but always accompanied by increased responsibility.
Now, I'm sure he justifies this with the fact that we get dollar raises every 1300 hours. It's nice. And it's hard to complain. But what he's asking of me is going to be a lot more than I'm currently doing, and I'll also have to continue assembling equipment, which I'll probably drive and deliver to our shop once a week.
He mentioned giving me a stipend to accommodate travel and rent.
Now, for why I'm very anxious.
I've been in a similar situation before. I worked for a man for 4 years growing fish for him on one of his aquaculture sites. I lived in a house he owned. I drove his truck. I was treated like his property. It was possibly the most damaging experience of my life. It ended with me telling him to go fuck himself, and saying a lot of nasty (but true) things to him. I honestly hope that this man gets a serious form of cancer and dies a slow, agonizing death, and I mean that sincerely. This is a man who laughed at Rehtaeh Parsons rape and claimed that the boys who raped her “did nothing wrong. That stuff happens all the time.” Verbatim quote from a man who's likely trying to justify his own past actions. I was diagnosed with PTSD from the 4 years that I spent with him. It's been almost 10 years since I quit, and he still haunts my thoughts.
I will never be in that position again. So this new opportunity leaves me with much ambivalence and trepidation.
I've never negotiated for anything in my life. At least nothing serious like this. I could really use the advise of some of the awesome people I see posting here.
If you've made it this far, I thank you for your patience. It's long winded because this is my life, and it's very important to me. I like my job and I want to continue with this company.