Salary negotiations

Over at Starting to Melt, Cee asks whether she should negotiate her salary.

I wrote her a long comment (with a resounding YES), but here's my personal story. I didn't negotiate at one of my early jobs because a friend who worked there told me it was a small company and they probably couldn't afford much. I just asked them to match my previous salary and was happy they did. I really wanted the job and didn't feel I had a lot of leverage to negotiate anyway.

I was one of the few software engineers at this company, which was moving toward a mainly web-based model after years of producing print materials. That meant I got lots of responsibility very quickly. After a year or two, we started interviewing more engineers. My manager was careless and left an offer letter in the printer. I happened to see it when I was picking up my printout. The offer was for $13,000 more than I was making.

I had interviewed this guy. He had similar qualifications to me, but two years less experience. Meanwhile, I had worked my way up and was now in charge of one of the major product lines. I was furious and felt that I had been taken advantage of. (Which was true in a way, but I had also never asked for more.)

I scheduled a meeting with my manager and, without mentioning that I had seen the offer letter, outlined my accomplishments and told him that I wanted a $13,000 increase over my current salary. He pointed out that this was a large percentage. I said that I knew, but felt I was being substantially underpaid.

He came back with a counteroffer: an $8,000 raise now with an additional $5,000 raise in 6 months. I said I felt this was fair. He said, "You do? I mean, uh, that's great." (Did I mention he was careless?)

I learned that it's always worth it to negotiate salary. Negotiating doesn't mean making a demand and threatening to walk away. It's a request for more. If they turn you down, no big deal. If they give you everything you want, you probably should have asked for more.

Salary follows you for a very long time. At your current job, every raise and bonus will be based on a percentage of your salary. If you start out lower than others at your level, you'll end up a lot lower at the end. The fantastic negotiation book Ask for It by Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever(reviewed here) makes this point over and over -- not negotiating in the beginning has a huge effect later in your career. At subsequent jobs, your new employer will always try to find out your previous salary as a starting point.

There are lots of tips out there for how to approach this negotiation, but in a nutshell: build up your case with your own qualifications and some objective standards for what the salary should be, then state your case matter-of-factly without apology or ultimatum. Remember that this is a business transaction. It is intimidating, but don't be scared because you're afraid they'll think badly of you. As long as what you ask for isn't totally inappropriate for your position, negotiating will show that you're capable of asserting your worth.

(P.S. - My story isn't meant to be a how-to -- I put myself in a bad situation, and while I'm glad I tried to get out of it, I probably could have handled it better. The story was just my wake-up call that I had to stick up for myself because nobody else would be making sure I got the best deal.)