Help! How Do I Negotiate a Job Offer?

You’ve gone through your first, second, and final round of interviews, you’ve met your potential boss and teammates, and now you’ve even received the job offer. Awesome! Now, read through the terms of your employment. Not too crazy about it because your salary is not enough? Is there anything you can do?

Of course there is! You can try to negotiate the terms of your employment with your employer.

Understandably, negotiating your job offer can be scary and intimidating. There are a lot of fears that come up when considering salary negotiations. Would it be held against you that you asked for a bigger salary? Will they think you’re being greedy? Or worse, what if they rescind your offer altogether? How do you express that while you do like the job position offered to you, you would like to be paid more?

Fear not, Kalibrr is here to help you out with this conundrum! Here’s how you should prepare to negotiate a job offer.

Do your research

Before you even ask for the salary that you want, do some digging on the pay grade that you should get.

While every single person would probably want to be paid more, it would be sensible to be realistic about the salary you want to negotiate. Get a good baseline of what people in your city, age range, industry earn on average. Talk to people in your job industry to see what the ball park figure is for your job position. Also ask peers who are in the same position level and those who have more work experience. They can give you a good idea of what is a sensible rate to negotiate for your position. You need to be able to justify the salary you want and if it’s within the industry’s range, you’ll have an easier time negotiating.

Understand their side

The negotiation process is a two-way street. You’re trying to make a case for your side of the deal while the hiring specialists are making a case for the company. Just as there are personal factors that are compelling you to ask for this negotiation, they also have certain restrictions that affect their offer.

They may have salary caps or other conditions that affect their ability to grant you that pay you want. Just as they’re opening their side to salary talks, you should also be open to give and take. Be flexible enough to understand their side of the situation and be open to alternative solutions or options that they may present to you.

Consider the entire compensation package

You may be tempted to be stick to your guns when negotiating for the salary rate of your dreams. But like mentioned above, some companies have certain constraints that they just can’t adjust for you. Review your job offer and see if you can get a trade off with your other benefits.

Can you get a transportation allowance? Maybe you can get a few more days of vacation leave? Some companies cannot give you the salary that you want but may be incredibly generous with their benefits. If your company is open to negotiating your other benefits, then be open to being compensated in other ways as well.

Prepare for tough questions

Going into a salary negotiation, you should prepare yourself to answer difficult or uncomfortable questions. In particular, prep for “why should we give you this raise?” Remember, they are investing in you as much as you are investing your future in them.

They want to know why your credentials merit a higher salary and as well as the circumstances behind the negotiation. Do you live three hours away so extra money for transportation is necessary?

Get ready for questions that will probe your work experience and accomplishments so that you can concretely show your value to the company. Always give an honest answer to their questions but never give too much information that would compromise an advantage in negotiations. As is the norm for interviews, try to practice answering tough questions before you go to your negotiation.

That’s not so scary now, is it? Now that you’ve done your research and prepared for negotiations, you can now enter that meeting armed with the knowledge to help you negotiate wisely. Enter that board room, put on your best smile, and confidently go for your dream salary! Good luck!

Photo by: GenPhysLab – CC