[campnic]

Its not wrong for you to approach everything so skeptically, but I think you have to see it from the authors perspective:

1. He clearly has an altruistic bent (he'd just returned from the Peace Corp. in Kenya)

2. He liked his position for its flexibility and variety as noted throughout the article.

I think the point of the article is that many people approach salary negotiations as an optimization of just salary. But his real desire was to be happy and money was only one component of that. The boss found ways to make him happy without meeting his salary demands.

The story isn't a story of a 'clear win' for him, its an analysis of how to approach negotiations. Salary negotiations aren't always about maximizing your salary, you can make them more flexible by maximizing for your happiness. It presents more flexibility to both participants.

[MatthewPhillips]

I don't disagree with that. The author flipped a bad situation and found a way to get out. That's exactly what you should do in that situation, rather than standing your ground to make a point.

Perhaps where I disagree with you (and others who have responded to me) is in how important it is to keep good employees. If the author really is worth more than the more senior staff, the company has failed itself tremendously by losing him. If he is worth more than the others today, what will he be worth in the future (what is his growth potential). Putting up roadblocks for growth in your employees has to be one of the worst things HR can do.

[Evbn]

You may be reading a lot of a extra meaning into a generic negotiating tactic / ego stroke comment from a boss.

[prawks]

I'd add that as with any "advice" articles, it's worth being mindful that one size does not fit all. They should be taken only as advice, no matter how assertively stated.