Getting reasonable compensation as a professional is essential for a fulfilling career. Learn the best ways to negotiate salary and earn what you are truly worth.
Negotiating salary and benefits can be an intimidating task for many professionals but it is necessary for a fulfilling career. Whether you are starting a new job or looking for a promotion at your current workplace, you should know how to negotiate the salary to maximise your compensation.
As per a survey done by Salary.com, only 37% of people always negotiate salary, 44% negotiate occasionally and more than 18% never negotiate their salaries. When asked about the biggest reason for their hesitation, they responded that they lacked the self-confidence and necessary skills to properly negotiate during the interview or appraisal process.
As I have observed over the years, strong negotiation skills and deliberate preparation are crucial to ensuring that you are receiving what you deserve according to your education, career level, and the skills and strengths you offer your employer. Salary negotiation can be scary, but you need to seek the right ways to overcome this undesirable state of your career.
Tips for Success in Negotiating Salary and Benefits
Negotiating salary can be a life-changing conversation for you as a professional. Learn to negotiate the right way to make sure you don't leave money on the table. Here are eight highly-effective tips for negotiating salary derived from my experience as an Executive Coach while helping 200+ professionals improve their career growth rate.
1. Know Your Precise Value
You must determine and know your precise value before going into salary negotiations. Explore the standard pay in your industry with your education, skills, and experience level. Extensive preparation is crucial and that information not only makes the hiring manager or your HR aware of your expectations but also helps justify why you want a higher salary.
2. Be Specific and Concise
Always be specific and concise with your terms while in conversation regarding salary. Ambiguity can be harmful in any kind of conversation; avoid it. Make sure that your email for salary appreciation is crisp and concise, like any other business communication. A similar approach should be followed if dealing face-to-face with a hiring manager or your HR.
3. Prepare and Focus on Valuable Points
For successful salary negotiation, you must be able to explain why you feel you should get a higher salary than what the employer is offering. Organize all of your thoughts and research in one place, vet them thoroughly, and put together a few valuable points from that data before you proceed with the salary negotiation.
4. Be Confident
Always approach the negotiation process with a confident mindset. Express a physical sense of confidence that will help you make your case and be heard. Some common ways to display confidence during your negotiation are:
Maintaining eye contact
Keeping an upright posture throughout the conversation
Putting your statements in a clear and deliberate manner
Emphasizing key points with subtle yet clear hand gestures
Conveying a sense of openness and flexibility through your body gestures
5. Start Higher and Negotiate Down
Always pitch a salary that is higher than your target salary, so you can have a chance to negotiate down to it. By doing so, you will be able to dictate the terms and direction of the conversation. That approach improves your chances of getting the salary and benefits you desire or maybe more.
6. Be Patient and Take Time to Respond
Stay calm and patient if your employer takes more time than expected to answer your salary appreciation request. Also, don’t rush to accept the offer right away. Take some time to evaluate whether the offered salary meets your expectations, then respond. Also, sometimes silence at the bargaining table leads to a better deal than you may have initially thought.
7. Be Ambitious but Adjust If Necessary
It’s important to set a goal that’s a bit challenging to achieve but it should not be impossible. While proceeding with the salary negotiation, aim for a specific outcome in mind, with a limit on how far you’re willing to compromise. Identify your priorities and consider where you could make mutually beneficial trade-offs. Negotiating on non-monetary benefits is an alternative if the employer has expressed their inability to increase salary further.
8. Don’t be Afraid to Walk Away
An employer may not always be able to fulfil your minimum salary requirement or provide you with sufficient benefits that make it worth your while. In some cases, a potential (or current) employer may even increase the salary but it may not match what you have asked for. In such cases, you need to decide if the job is worth continuing for the offered amount or not. If it is not, you should consider walking away and seeking other opportunities.
Negotiating is a skill that can help you throughout your career. Strengthen your career prospects by learning the best ways to negotiate salary. This approach will accelerate your career growth and make your future brighter.
Are you in the right job? Take the Free ‘Are You in The Right Career Assessment’ to identify whether you are in the right job and discover what type of jobs you will excel at. The results of this test will be your guide towards a successful career change.
Smita D Jain is a Certified Life Coach, Executive Coach and NLP Practitioner. Smita’s ‘Empower Yourself’ Personal Clarity Coaching Programs enable busy professionals unhappy in their jobs to tap into their passions and transform them into professions so that they work because they want to, not because they have to.
Before her journey as a coach, Smita had extensive experience of 14 years as a corporate and business strategy professional with Fortune 500 companies. She is also a speaker at various public forums, a published writer, and an Amazon bestselling author.
You can learn more about Personal Empowerment Life Coach and Executive Coach Smita D Jain’s ‘Empower Yourself’ Coaching Programs by visiting www.lifecoachsmitadjain.com and book a strategy session at https://www.lifecoachsmitadjain.com/booking.
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