Questions about training hourly rate

[DontBeTachy]

Hello my fellow smarty pants,

What have you guys seen/heard/been offered for training hourly rates?

I have a pending offer with a celebrated & renowned plastic surgeon in a major city. This position would train me in cosmetics, plastics, as well as medical dermatology. I'm a new graduate and I know this industry can be difficult to get into right out of school, and I know they would be investing a lot of time teaching me. I know there will be complete shadowing & observation for a period of time in the beginning. 

As I'm waiting for his team to write up my contract, I wanted to know if anyone has any insight as to the dollar amount they've heard of/been offered/received...

Thanks!

[greenmood]

There shouldn't be a difference in pay. Training a new employee is part of the business.

I haven't ever been in this position but my gut says I would not accept a "training" rate. I had three months of orientation when I started four years ago, and I was paid as an employee because I WAS an employee.

[charlottew]

I started with a 'training rate'. It was maybe 15% less than the starting pay, was in effect during the 3 month training period. I know the conventional wisdom is never to accept one, but for me I felt this was acceptable as it was a small difference in salary, for a short period (when I was not billing, or filling a slot on the schedule). The job was full benefits during that time, the only difference was salary. 

If I had held out and said, 'full salary only', they might well have passed me over, and given the job to someone else.

Edit: also, at the end of the training period there was a bonus paid, which made up a bit less than half the difference.

[camoman1234]

I would not take a training salary, to each their own. This comment from charlottew: "If I had held out and said, 'full salary only', they might well have passed me over, and given the job to someone else." If they "passed on you" then that means they don't really care about their employers, just more about money. You will never know as you didn't try, but this is my outlook. 

[charlottew]

Well actually it's a little more complicated than that. It's true that some bean counter somewhere is trying to save a few bucks, and that bean counter sits somewhere above me in the hierarchy. However, my immediate/proximate boss and team are great. Critical care is difficult to get into, especially for someone like myself with limited prior experience. And, guess what, hospitals tend to be run by bean counters.

It was my first job out of school, for me it was worth taking the couple thousand $ hit, in order to get my foot in the door. I was able to make up the $ anyhow, by taking a couple of extra shifts once I was off training.

[DontBeTachy]

Thank you @greenmood , @charlottew , @camoman1234 for your insight. I figured I'd see a lot of "don't do it" posts, but I'm still considering the pending contract because it will get me into the plastic surgery & dermatology world, right out of school, with an awesome company that I could see myself actually staying in until I retire. I say this because I've worked with them in the past... I see it as an extremely rare opportunity. ...  I do have another offer I could take, but it's general practice, which is definitely not high up on my list of areas of practice. I'm just worried I may be blindsided a little because it's my dream job, so thank you for all your opinions

[MCHAD]

I personally wouldn’t accept training pay because I have in the past and it was a mistake.  The mistake I made (besides agreeing to training pay)  was not getting in writing how long the training pay would last.  I was only in the specialty (oncology) 9 months and it was only a $2 an hour difference but it was a mistake I feel.