How to negotiate your salary

Are they just not that into you?

An important part of being happy at work is being paid what you’re worth.  Not only is it important to optimise our earnings to help us reach our financial goals – but we want to be wanted!

Have you seen the film “He’s just not that into you?”. It’s about a group of women navigating the dating scene, assuming their feelings were reciprocated with their love interest only to later realise said love interests just didn’t feel the same.

This isn’t too dissimilar to our work life sometimes. We’ve all been there. The carrot has been dangled time and time again; “We want to give you more responsibility”, “We can see you have leadership potential” only for us to be laden with extra work and extra responsibility with no financial reward or promotion.

Let’s remind ourselves – companies expect us to negotiate our pay – so go into a negotiation not feeling like it’s a conflict or something controversial – it’s a business transaction.

This is the year for you to take control of your earnings – here are our top tips for negotiating the pay rise and / or  promotion you deserve:

Get your job role and description right

Does your job description truly reflect what you do? Are you over-delivering on what was originally agreed?  Have you taken on more responsibility?

It’s time to dig out the job description, make some suggested amends and go through it with your employer. The employment contract you signed and salary you agreed at the start of employment was based on your original job description – review the old and new side by side and discuss the opportunity to be paid for the role you’re doing.

Benchmark

Once you and your employer are fully aligned on your job description and role, it’s time to start benchmarking your role. This means researching the wider marketplace outside of your organisation to work out “the going rate” for your role.  You could always reach out to people in your network to gauge salaries in your shared sector. Websites such as Glassdoor or job listing marketplaces such as Indeed or LinkedIn are great ways to establish up to date salary rates.

Go above and beyond

A big frustration for employers can be when people request a pay rise due to their own personal circumstances, or because they’re just “due one”.  Now, inflationary pay rises aside, which are rises we would want as employees to keep up with inflation, are you surprised an employer wouldn’t want to pay more for doing the minimum required (or less)?

Some people even ask for an increase in pay due to personal circumstances, e.g. “We want to buy a home” or “We’ve got childcare costs now”.  Whilst we get it – why should the employer pay you more (outside of inflationary pay increases) because your budget is tough?

However, if you can demonstrate that you are delivering above and beyond your role by taking on extra projects, extra responsibility or smashing your set targets –  this is the time to approach your employer about a pay rise.  

Put yourself in your employer’s position: what value can you bring that helps the company hit its goals?  What help do they need?  What problems do they have and can you help solve them?  The reality is, in most companies, people do the bare minimum – it isn’t too hard to stand out by delivering genuine value to your employer.

If you’re doing the above and it results in no pay rise – it may be time to accept “they’re just not that into you”.  And this doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t value you!  There could be budget restraints, competition for roles, policies and procedures that delay progression.  It could be them – not you.

So how can you navigate how to find a new job and secure a pay rise whilst you’re at it?  

Take the time to dream up your next role.  Is it the role you’re doing now?  Is it a step up?  Is it a change of role? Browse LinkedIn for ideal roles, speak to mentors in your life you trust – work out the right role for you.

Invest in yourself – and sell yourself!

So it’s time to update your CV – be objective, what is missing from yours?  Highlight your qualifications, the projects you’ve delivered and supported on – what have you helped your team / company achieve in the past few years? 

You need to make sure you’re selling yourself effectively.  If you struggle with that, pretend you’re selling the skills of your best friend!  Another option is to invest in the help of a professional.

CV and Cover Letter writing expert Lo Constantinou from @goodcopyuk says 

“I usually come from a place of empowering your employability and I think honestly my best tip would be that an investment in yourself is never a waste of money whether that is investing in a CV writer like myself to support you with your applications, or a development or coaching course, money spent on maximising your employability will always pay off tenfold in the future!”

Benchmark again, or let a recruiter do the work

Let’s say you get to interview and you find the idea of talking salary daunting.  Many people, but mainly women, feel embarrassed when it comes to negotiating hard on salary. Studies show that men apply for roles when they meet only 60% of the qualifications where women only apply when they are 100% qualified for the role. 

If you find the idea of asking for a significant salary increase from your existing role daunting, use your benchmarking work, be confident to ask for what you’re worth and if you’ve worked with a recruiter,  be sure to lean on their expertise and guidance. It’s sometimes worth having the recruiter manage salary expectations up front – so that’s the starting point for negotiations.  

You do not need to share your current salary – focus on salary expectations and steer conversations towards the value you will bring to your new employer.

Your income is your tool

As a reminder, the gender pay gap in the UK amongst all employees is 15%.  Whilst everyone needs to be paid their worth, women especially need to support each other to be paid fairly for the work they are doing.  

This trickles down to paying down more debt, increasing savings and closing pension gaps.  The world benefits when women have more money in their hands.

If you want to leave a job you’re unhappy in we’re officially prescribing a f**k off fund – check out this blog on how to build one and take control of your future.