Everyone is watching the implications of remote working closely as we emerge from the pandemic, so it’s no surprise that one of the most read stories on GeekWire this week – right behind the missing tub of the Titanic and Facebook’s potential name change – was a story on tech wage trends.

Two major trends stood out in the report of the hired job site:

• Average salaries for technicians in Seattle rose 4.6% from a year ago, to $ 158,000, just behind the Bay Area, which saw its average drop slightly to $ 165,000.
• Nationally, the average tech salary in the United States fell 1.1% to $ 152,000. With the shift to remote work, “employers are expanding their pool of addressable candidates, filling jobs faster, and paying lower average salaries,” Hired said.

What is happening here? This is our first topic on this week’s GeekWire podcast.

Guest commentator: We get a real-world perspective on tech hiring, remote working, and salary trends from Bill Richter, President and CEO of Qumulo. Cloud File Management and Storage Company Joins Seattle Unicorn Ranks with $ 1.2 Billion Valuation in his last round. Richter was previously a venture capital partner at Madrona Venture Group and a leader at Isilon Systems and EMC.

“We’re a lot more open to remote places,” Richter said. “It doesn’t really matter where they are when they appear on their video conferencing screen. And that opens up a lot of new talent pools. “

For its remote work policy, Qumulo’s management team has delegated decisions to its functional leaders, with a plan to learn and adapt as you go, adopting an Amazon-type policy before Amazon.

“So we’re definitely approaching things differently,” he added. “It’s not a temporary state for us; it will be the future of the way we do as a company.

What does this mean for the salary? The Hired survey shows that new hires in remote locations might not order as much as those in tech centers. But unlike other tech leaders, Richter, who has an accounting and finance background, doesn’t see much point in trying to adjust wages when existing employees move.

“It’s a global market for talent. And in return for the talent and impact that the individual brings to the organization, they will be compensated, ”said Richter.

He explained, “All the micro-tweaks of things like location and that sort of thing, it might work in the short term. In the long run, what we will see is market compensation for remuneration in exchange for talent. “

Other topics this week

• The boom in unstructured cloud data, which is fueling Qumulo’s business. My colleague John Cook is doing his best to get Richter to disclose Qumulo’s financial data and IPO plans. Richter shares some insight into which industries are seeing the greatest increase in data and thoughts on how businesses view Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform in this environment.

• The home debut of the new Seattle Kraken NHL franchise on Saturday. Our colleagues Kurt Schlosser and Kevin Lisota visited the Climate Pledge Arena this week. To verify their story and their video. We remember John meeting Pittsburgh Penguins mascot Iceburgh during GeekWire’s 2018 stint at Steel City, and we wonder if he’ll have a similar run-in with the Kraken mascot. We will find out soon.

Listen above and subscribe to GeekWire in any podcast app.

Produced and edited by Curt Milton; Music by Daniel LK Caldwell.