Negotiation is just such an important part of business, and it benefits YOU because a lot of people (including companies) don’t know how to negotiate properly, and it throws them off guard when you do. Not only that, you are negotiating for yourself, so it’s always a win-win situation.
Besides, it’s just asking. Where’s the harm in that?
This will be a Negotiation Series that I’ll post in a series, or else these posts are gonna get mighty long.
My situations that I’m going to go over in detail can be applied to men as well, but I’m doing a female focus on it because women just don’t negotiate as well as men. And it’s not to say that they CANNOT negotiate as well, it’s more of a confidence thing with negotiation.
Women just aren’t confident asking for what they’re worth. Even if they know someone else is pulling in double or triple amounts of money for the same amount of work, they still feel bad asking for more money.
I felt like that once for a small amount of time. I got over it pretty quick though, because I just kept repeating to myself: Look, you’re worth it. Sounds like a sick L’Oreal ad, but it’s true. I had to just tell myself a couple of times that I thought my work was outstanding, I knew I deserved more money, and I also knew that no one else would negotiate for me. If they did, they’d take a margin or a cut of the money and I’d feel like a tool.
I don’t know what other techniques there to ‘get over it’, but that was what worked for me.
Well ladies, here’s a couple of things I’ve learned. I may be young (mid-20s), but I’ve done 3 hefty negotiations over salaries, one of which I’m not totally proud of because I felt like I backed down too much, even though it was justified.
Disclaimer
Keep in mind – these things worked for ME in MY situation. They may not work for you. Use your judgment and assess the situation correctly.Don’t try and do this to your boss and then come back to me bitchin’ that you got fired. I ain’t responsible, yo.
Negotiations before Working in the “REAL WORLD”
I’m not going to really bother writing about my negotiations before University because quite frankly, I kind of didn’t have any. I once earned $7/hour at a job, working 20 hours a week (true hours = 1 a week), and the President just happened to see my work, and asked me how much I was earning.I told him $7/hour, and he gasped, horrified. He told me that was a “clerk’s wage” and he promptly increased it to $10/hour.
Sweet. He negotiated FOR me. But he was a nice, elderly gentleman about to retire, and he must’ve felt bad for my ramen-eating ass.
So, no FB brains there. I was just kind of surprised he wanted to give me more money. I just thought it was a sweet deal to be earning that kind of cash for only working one true hour a week (at home, nonetheless)….. so I didn’t want to push my luck.
Ahem.
The First Negotiation
It was when I came out of school and was gunning for a job. The guy offered me $50,000, and I told him the offer was interesting but not as interesting as what other corporations were offering because he was REALLY late in the game. I ended up getting $65,000 as a starting salary.
So where did I start?
1. Had an upper hand graduating from a business school over other graduates
I was about to graduate from a business school, so I knew I had an upper hand over the rest of the University graduates who just had a general business degree.
Sounds elitist, but it’s true.
I went to a good business school, I paid through the nose for it, and they paid a quarter of what I did, and probably got about 50% of the education I did (although all of that doesn’t really matter after you get your first job but it does help you get the first solid job).
This means, I knew I was worth more and my degree was worth more to a corporation since it was more specialized than a general business degree.
2. He went to my business school.
This one was a no brainer. It doesn’t mean that I’d get more money just because he was alum, but it did mean that I pretty much had it in the bag unless I f*cked up royally or I asked for something ridiculous.
3. I had offers from other corporations
Mind you, they were around the same salary range of $50,000. Fine. But the one job wanted me to move to another city which was a negative for me, and the other job wanted me to work for a company that didn’t really have a big name.
As a general observation, it’s really true that the bigger the name you start off with, the better. Because if you can at least get into a large corporation that everyone knows, if you quit them after 2 years or so like I did you can always say that you once worked for that corporation, but then you left and struck out on your own.
Trying to strike out on your own or working for a small company off the bat makes it a lot harder to climb the ladder in terms of job hopping. It just makes it easier if they knew who the employer was without Googling them.
This particular job that I accepted, was in the same field – Information Technology (IT), and it was in the city I wanted, but the salary was the same as the others.
To be fair, I could’ve accepted any of those jobs, but they all had ‘problems’ that money would have to fix.
So with the other 2 companies, I asked for more money. The one company said NO WAY, and the second one said: how about 15%?
I went back to the third company (the one that I actually really wanted to get a job with), and told them I was entertaining offers.
This is a fabulous position to be in. 3 job offers, all around the same salary, and you just had to juggle around the offers until you got the best fit.
4. I had my poker face on
This is where a good poker face comes in. I told the company I actually wanted that I wanted more money, and if I got more than the other companies, I’d sign.
I also reminded him that I needed an offer within 2 weeks since I had 2 other companies were waiting, that he was late in the game to grab students since most of us had signed with other consulting companies and investment banks, AND they were offering me more money so he needed to beat their offer.
But I didn’t tell him how much more they were offering.
He came back with $65,000 and I calmly told him I needed a day or two to consider it. I talked to the other company that was willing to go up 15%, told them that I got a 30% increase on my original offer and that they had to beat it to get me.
They declined.
And I joined that company at $65,000.
Now I realize it’s an unusual situation to be able to have 3 offers with the same sort of salary range, however you may very well come into the situation of staying at your old job versus going to a new one. Weigh the options, tell your old company that you are getting headhunted (which is true), and see what they come back with.
5. Do your homework
By the way, I had also Googled and asked around for the general starting salary of an IT professional, and Payscale.com gave me a good, rough idea of what I would be worth with 0 years of experience.
Key points to remember
ALL corporations are going to try and hire you for the lowest salary possible. Their first opening salary is always lower than what they are willing to pay for you.It’s just business. Don’t take it personally or be insulted. If you were a company, you would want to limit expenses as much as possible as well!
No one likes paying more than they should. It does NOT totally reflect how much they think you’re worth, keep that in mind.
If you have the job “in the bag”, they’ve already decided to hire you. Now it’s just a matter of for what price and for what benefits.
It doesn’t always have to be about salary in negotiations. You can ask for another week in vacation time, or some other perk you’d like.
Just be clear that you are NOT going to really be able to screw it up unless you ask for something outrageous, because they already like you and want you.
Connections help. I came from a business school, the guy was an alum, it helped. So if you have similar connections like your mom plays bridge with the secretary of the VP at some fancy corporation, try and get connected.
Next: Negotiating with my (ex) employer after 2 years of earning $65,000
- Negotiating for a higher salary
- Interviewing: At the end of an interview (Part. 4)
- Negotiating for your salary – Men Vs. Women
- FB’s Negotiation – Part 2
- FB’s Negotiation – Part 3
marisol
on Nov 2nd, 2008
@ 4:12 PM:
Great advice and so timely as I am in the process of looking for a new job. When I changed to my current position, I was sort of not sure how to handle the salary question. I had been with my previous company 8 years so I hadn’t interviewed in a long time. I did my research for the position I was interviewing for and when it came time to discuss $$, I confidently asked for a 20% increase of what I was making. At first, I thought it was too much. But I ended up getting it. I as ecstatic. The worst thing they could have done is said no and then I could have negotiated a bit more.
Now that I am out interviewing whenever the $$ question comes up I answer with the following: I know that you have a range in mind. I hope that my skills and what I can bring to the company would make you consider me at the higher end of that scale.
I often try not to give them a specific amount because you never know.
mia
on Nov 2nd, 2008
@ 7:06 PM:
Your negotiation room, like all things, depends on supply and demand in that industry. Let’s take the case of job seekers right out of school.
Your room for negotiation is *much* higher if you’re in a field where supply of recent graduates is exceeded by demand. In the USA right now, certain fields of Engineering, IT, and Tax Accounting are good examples of such fields–there aren’t enough US graduates in these fields, and firms tend to need a lot of entry/junior level people for the type of work they do. If you are in these fields, you generally have a lot of negotiation room if you have a strong academic background, and many of my friends have been able to successfully negotiate raises and salaries in these fields right out of college.
On the other hand, your room for negotiation is lower when you work in a field right out of college where demand is far exceeded by supply. For example, do not expect much wiggle room if you try to negotiate before you take an editorial job at Vogue magazine out of college because there are (literally) well-educated kids with family money who take jobs at Vogue for free. There are also just far, far fewer jobs (a mere handful compared to thousands in fields like engineering) at well-known magazines compared to reputable firms in the fields described above, and tons of kids who dream of working there. Even if you have multiple offers, the top magazines can afford to pay less because they can easily hire someone else with your credentials out of college if you turn them down (even if you have amazing credentials). (Note this applies to entry level out of college, NOT experienced editors who DO have negotiation room).
Finally, before you attempt to negotiate, you need to understand your industry’s practices. While starting lawyers at other types of firms should be able to negotiate salary, first year associates at the “biglaw” (a group of firms that is highly ranked by Vault) firms in the United States generally don’t negotiate salary right out of law school. This is because these firms have a firm policy of offering every first year in the firm the exact same starting salary which is made known to everyone and every first year who is around an year later collects the exact same bonus providing they bill x amount of hours. This bonus amount is made known to every member of the firm. (Again, this applies to starting people right out of law school, not experienced applicants).
Anyway, my point (if anyone is still bothering to read this long-winded rant) is that every fresh-out-of-school job seeker should understand supply and demand dynamics in their field as well as ask around about generally accepted practices.