Negotiate Your Career Growth

8 Dos + 6 Don'ts of Salary Negotiation

February 09, 2023 Jamie Lee Episode 19
8 Dos + 6 Don'ts of Salary Negotiation
Negotiate Your Career Growth
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Negotiate Your Career Growth
8 Dos + 6 Don'ts of Salary Negotiation
Feb 09, 2023 Episode 19
Jamie Lee

Text me your thoughts on this episode!

As a coach, I've helped my clients negotiate and earn $2MM+ in additional income. 

But before that, as a young professional, I bungled my own salary negotiation and found out I'd left $50K on the negotiating table. 

I felt so disappointed in myself. 

I want to help you avoid disappointment and to avoid costly mistakes I made. 

In this episode, I walk you through the 8 DOs and 6 DON'T's of salary negotiation that I learned the hard way. 

You'll learn: 

  • What you can say, when you go beyond online searches and talk to real people to expand your salary expectations
  • Key questions you can ask your employer or client, so you can laser in on the value of your contributions and make your ask a no-brainer 
  • How to make use of a key communication skill that FBI hostage negotiators use to create rapport in high-stakes conversations, so you build, not burn bridges, while growing your income
  • What you can say when you want to set a positive tone to your salary negotiation without getting defensive when they offer you something below your expectations
  • Why inflation is not a good basis for asking for a raise 
  • Why checking boxes doesn't move your career 
  • How to avoid setting a low bar for yourself so you don't end up leaving money on the table 


If you want expert 1:1 guidance in your corner so you can generate genuine self-confidence to speak up, negotiate, and lead in your career, you're invited to book your free consultation with me today. 

Come to 
https://www.jamieleecoach.com/apply to learn about my coaching process and philosophy and to book your free consultation today. 

Enjoy the show?

Connect with me

  • **You want to get promoted and better paid with best tools possible. That's what I offer inside my Executive Coaching Series, and you can learn all about it here: https://www.jamieleecoach.com/apply **
  • Connect with me on LinkedIn
  • Email me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com


Show Notes Transcript

Text me your thoughts on this episode!

As a coach, I've helped my clients negotiate and earn $2MM+ in additional income. 

But before that, as a young professional, I bungled my own salary negotiation and found out I'd left $50K on the negotiating table. 

I felt so disappointed in myself. 

I want to help you avoid disappointment and to avoid costly mistakes I made. 

In this episode, I walk you through the 8 DOs and 6 DON'T's of salary negotiation that I learned the hard way. 

You'll learn: 

  • What you can say, when you go beyond online searches and talk to real people to expand your salary expectations
  • Key questions you can ask your employer or client, so you can laser in on the value of your contributions and make your ask a no-brainer 
  • How to make use of a key communication skill that FBI hostage negotiators use to create rapport in high-stakes conversations, so you build, not burn bridges, while growing your income
  • What you can say when you want to set a positive tone to your salary negotiation without getting defensive when they offer you something below your expectations
  • Why inflation is not a good basis for asking for a raise 
  • Why checking boxes doesn't move your career 
  • How to avoid setting a low bar for yourself so you don't end up leaving money on the table 


If you want expert 1:1 guidance in your corner so you can generate genuine self-confidence to speak up, negotiate, and lead in your career, you're invited to book your free consultation with me today. 

Come to 
https://www.jamieleecoach.com/apply to learn about my coaching process and philosophy and to book your free consultation today. 

Enjoy the show?

Connect with me

  • **You want to get promoted and better paid with best tools possible. That's what I offer inside my Executive Coaching Series, and you can learn all about it here: https://www.jamieleecoach.com/apply **
  • Connect with me on LinkedIn
  • Email me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com


Jamie Lee:
Welcome to Negotiate your Career Growth. I'm Jamie Lee, and I teach you how to blend the best of negotiation strategies with feminist coaching so you get promoted and better paid without burning bridges or burning out in the process. Let's get started.

Jamie Lee:
This coming Tuesday -- yes, on Valentine's Day -- at 3:00 PM Eastern Standard, I'm hosting an open negotiation workshop, and y'all are invited to attend for absolutely free. At this interactive workshop, you're going to learn how to bust three myths that keep smart, competent women overworked, but underpaid and under promoted.

A dead simple, but super effective way to articulate your professional value in one sentence so you can feel confident in both negotiation and in networking. I wanna invite you to attend live so you can get my help with your one sentence value statement. You're also going to get my mad lib style -- it's like fill in the blank style -- negotiation script along with the framework that explains the thinking behind the script. And when you implement this well, you will have your manager, your client, your boss, nodding their head in agreement and thanking you for advocating for your growth.

The link is in the show notes, sign up, show up live if you can, and get my help or ask me questions live. And if you cannot attend live sign up anyways and watch the replay on your own time. If you know anyone who can benefit from learning how to negotiate for herself, please be a friend. It is an act of love to send the link and share that invitation that is in the show notes. Today I'm going to talk about eight DOs and six DON'TS of salary negotiation. And some of them I'm going to provide you with some sample scripts so you can borrow, you can steal, you can adapt into your own voice. The live negotiation workshop I'm giving on Tuesday, February 14th is a masterclass. And by the way, if you are listening to this in the future way after February, February 14th, please do not despair.

There will be more invitations. Just come to jamieleecoach.com so that you can stay up to date on the latest webinars, workshops, and free invitations. I wanna come back and tell you that today's podcast is itself a masterclass. If you're thinking, "Hey, Jamie, aren't you being a bit grandiose?" <laugh> Maybe. And I'm calling it a masterclass because in the past I used to deliver exactly this content, by which I mean the eight DO's and the six DON'Ts of salary negotiation, when I was asked to give talks at universities, at conferences, at employee resource group workshops around the country. So if you are a note taker, you might wanna get your pen and paper ready. And if you are driving now, or maybe you are out on a walk and you prefer not to turn back around and go home to sit down at your desk to take notes, do not worry at any time.

You can come to this url podcast.jamieleecoach.com podcast.jamieleecoach.com, and I spell my name, j a m i E L E E. So podcast.jamieleecoach.com. To access the full transcript, you can just come to podcast.jamieleecoach.com and read the transcript. Before I dive into the eight DOs and six don'ts of salary negotiation, I like to preface by saying that when I first composed this list a few years ago, I kept in mind the whole negotiation process, starting with research and preparation ahead of the conversation, as well as incorporating the ideal approach to discussing your salary with your current or perspective employer. And these are lessons I learned the hard way. These are lessons I learned by messing it all up. These are lessons I learned by having not done what I suggest you do. And having done some of the things that I suggest you DON'T do <laugh>. Early in my career, uh, about goodness, oh my goodness, this is more than like 14 years now.

I found out I was making 50% of the going market range as a hedge fund analyst. I had this amazing timing in my career. I joined an Asian equities hedge fund in 2008. That's right, 2008, three weeks before the Lehman brother collapse. And then I somehow survived. I didn't lose my job, they didn't lay anyone off because it was a very small boutique firm. And a year into that job, I found out I was making 50% of the going market range in an industry report. And I felt devastated. I felt so bad because I hadn't learned any of the tools that I teach my clients. I hadn't learned how to apply practical neuroscience to change my brain. So I was always feeling a ton of self-doubt. I was always beating myself up in my head. I was the only quote unquote girl. Of course, I wasn't a girl, I was a woman, but I was called a girl by everyone else, all the other men at the trading desk.

And I was so miserable. And I found out I was making 50% of the going market range. And I'll, I'll tell you exactly what the figure was. I was making $50,000 in base salary, and I read in an industry report that the going market range, the average for a hedge fund analyst is a hundred thousand dollars. And that's when I was like, oh my goodness, I messed up. I shot myself in the foot. I left $50,000 on the negotiating table <laugh>. That was not a great feeling. But you know what, it's kind of like this, it's kind of like, you know, all of the superheroes in the Marvel and the DC comic world, you know, there's so many of them now, I can't keep up, but there's a common thread among all of the superheroes. They all start from trauma. They all start from this point of like, oh my gosh, it cannot get any worse. <laugh>.

And for me, when I found out I was making 50,000, when it was a hundred thousand dollars job, it was, it was kind of like that. Okay, I know that's not really fair. Um, I know, you know, I'm hearing myself talk out loud and I'm noticing that is a very privileged thing to say. And I acknowledged that it was a privileged thing to say. However, it was so disappointing. And that's when I said to myself, I gotta figure this out. I gotta learn how to communicate. I gotta learn how to advocate. I gotta learn how to negotiate. This is the thing that I hadn't learned for myself in all of my stellar education, even though my mom had encouraged me to speak up and be sassy and advocate for myself, I had to learn how to do it in a proper way in the workplace.

And so with that in mind, I'm going to address the eight DOs and the six Dons of salary negotiation. Number one, find out if there's a standard and transparent salary for your job and whether a salary is negotiable in the first place. I know there are companies, there are some really progressive forward thinking companies. Take for example, Kara Loewentheil. In the most recent episode, the one before this, episode 18, I shared, uh, an interview that Kara Loewentheil did with me and Jenn Deal and Annie Framand. And in Kara Loewentheil's company, she shares, she's very transparent about the salary of each position she hires for. And there is no negotiation because you know exactly what you are going into and it, it is what it is. You take it or you leave it. And I understand the mindset of that. The mindset is, you know, our culture has privileged those people who are not socialized as women, uh, to be more equipped, to be more confident.

It's a, it's a huge generalization, but you know what I mean. People who are not socialized as women tend to be more comfortable asking, negotiating for a higher salary. And when we allow that, it does result in what we have now, the gender pay gap, right? Men tend to make more money. Again, huge generalization, and I know it's not true for all men, but in general, we have observed that men tend to get paid higher salary when there is no pay transparency. Now, this is the reason why I do this work, because I want to level that playing field. I want to help you be equipped with the skill and the mindset of a confident negotiator. So number one, find out, is there even room? Is there even possibility? Is this something that you even are allowed to do? Because some employers take for example, uh, consulting agency, large consulting agencies, they don't allow for salary negotiation.

I have heard you just start the job and you just go into a pay band. So find out if there is a standard and transparent salary for your job and whether salary is negotiable in the first place. Okay? Number two, browse sites like google.com, <laugh>, wait, let me put this into more accurate language: Research the going market range. This is the thing that I didn't do 15, 14 years ago when I was a junior hedge fund analyst. I was so naive, I just figured, Hey, I'm just gonna go work for this guy. And <laugh>, yes, the hedge fund manager was a man, and I just figured he's gonna take care of me. I just figured they're gonna do what's right for me, it was almost like the student mindset that I had brought to the salary negotiation. And that exposed a huge weakness on my part because I hadn't gone to the salary negotiation prepared with data, with understanding of what an average, what the going market range for a hedge fund analyst is.

So Google it, and there are wonderful online resources available. There's so many. payscale.com, glassdoor.com, there's getraised.com and make sure you check out 81cents.com. 81 cents.com is a company that provides you a comprehensive, it's like 25 page report of I guess the competitiveness of your salary. And if you have an offer and you wanna find out, hey, where does this actually fit within the going market range there? 81 cents actually has real people who work in those industries. And then they give you real feedback. This is an amazing service. I know my clients have often used 81 cents.com ahead of their own salary negotiation. To have that confidence have like that, like oomph of like knowing, hey, this data has been vetted by real people. I am not endorsed by 81 cents.com. There's no affiliate marketing. I'm just sharing real information from my real clients who have used 81 cents.com to help them feel confident ahead of negotiation.

Number three, here's what you want to do ahead of negotiation. Reach out to your alumni. Reach out to people that you know, reach out to people who've already gotten promoted into the role that you want. Reach out to your acquaintances. Reach out to former or current colleagues and ask them, ask them like, Hey, what do you suppose is a reasonable pay range for the senior director or the VP role, right? I'm supposing that you are going to aim for a senior director or VP role, or maybe senior manager role. And if you know somebody who's gotten into that role, just ask them, Hey, what do you suppose is a reasonable pay range? And if I were to go for the senior manager role, like what do you think would be a good range to aim for? Is it a $20,000 bump?

Is it a $30,000 bump? And the reason why I love this question is because you are not asking anyone to expose their salary information. I know some people feel uncomfortable with, you know, sharing, being transparent about how much they make. And some companies, uh, have these rules like, please don't share salary data with each other, right? As far as I know, it is totally legal for people to share their salary information with each other. 

However, if there is this like made up rule at your organization, you don't have to break it. You could just ask them, Hey, what do you suppose is reasonable? What are your thoughts about that? Yeah, I think it's a really smart question, is the question that I suggest all of my clients ask their acquaintances, their colleagues, people in the network. And I added alumni because when I thought back to how I had bungled, completely failed a salary negotiation for my hedge fund job, I realized I had access to this rich network of smart, ambitious, driven women.

I went to Smith College, I should have reached out to my alumni association. And there are plenty of Smith alums who work in finance. I could have just called one up. I could have just asked her for some advice or asked them for some advice, but I didn't do that because it was so naive, <laugh> and I didn't know any better. So reach out. There are people in the know, there are people in your network who would be willing and happy to provide some advice, some information. And here's another thing, make sure you ask people of all genders, women, men, non-binary. Because as we know, the, the gender pay gap does exist. And there is a tendency for women to have been underpaid. It's not always true. But there is this tendency and there's this tendency... agaim speaking in generalizations, that men tend to set higher expectations in terms of pay.

Just ask all the genders, men, women, non-binary people. And then you get to collect data points. And then from there, you get to decide. You get to decide, based on all of this information that I have collected, what feels like slightly uncomfortable, but a doable reach for me in terms of when you set that expectation for what you want, Talk to real people, talking to real people, it creates that possibility in your mind. Like it's such a bigger impact. When I talked to real people that I know and they tell me they're making more money and they were able to do it, and then my brain is like, you know what? This is a person. I know this is a real person who also has limbs and eyes and brain, and then they're human just like me. And it probably means I can do it too.

I can do it too. So, just to recap, number one was find out if the salary is negotiable in the first place. Number two was browse sites. Google it, check out 81cents.com. And number three is talk to real people and ask them, what do you suppose is a reasonable pay pay bump or a pay range that I can expect? Collect real data. All of this research, all of this preparation is going to help you feel more confident when you go to negotiate your salary and ask for a pay raise. Okay? So number four, here is something that you want to do. Find out how success is defined and how you can add even more value. And if you have questions about what this means, please check out Value Articulation Clinic. That was an earlier episode where I went into detail explaining how value is not necessarily created by more time, more effort, more work on your part.

It's about thinking very strategically and also very, um, I wanna make sure I say this word right, empathetically, right? Empathy is being able to imagine the perspective of another person. Empathy is about being able to imagine yourself in the shoes of your employer, your manager, you know, your, um, decision maker. And thinking about, okay, what are their key pain points? What are they thinking is success? How are they defining success for themselves? Cuz that's a very subjective thing. It's a very, it's not something that is always black and white. And then you wanna think about, okay, what can I offer and what am I bringing to the table? What are the skills, strengths, contributions that I'm already bringing that is helping them achieve that success, their version of success. And you wanna be able to articulate that. So again, if you want help with this, come to my workshop on February 14th.

I'm going to walk you through my simple framework. I'm gonna help you articulate your value in one sentence. So simple, it's gonna be a little like, whoa. The whole crux of the salary negotiation is about articulating to your employer, client, manager, whomever, that you're bringing so much more value, so much more value than what you're getting paid for. Your pay is just the fraction of the value you are offering to them. And your value isn't just what got done, right? I mean, you've already been paid for, that's water under the bridge. You wanna paint a picture of future success. You wanna be able to tell them, Hey, this is what I'm going to help you do. And that is why I'm asking for a higher raise, a higher pay. Number five. What you do is, again, I'm sort of reiterating, you wanna find out what their top challenges are and offer solutions to their problems.

Here's a script that I wanna offer you. What are some of your biggest challenges? Or you could also ask your boss, Hey, I wanna work with you to make this happen. I wanna work with you to, you know, ensure that my promotion or my raise, you know adds even more value, right? And so what is in the way of you achieving that and how can we work together to make it happen? And then number six, do this really well. Number six itself could be like a whole masterclass. You want to listen actively. Active listening is a huge, huge skill, and it will create so much leverage in your negotiation when you are able to listen, paraphrase what you're hearing, right? And what this creates is, it creates that sense of rapport, that sense of connection, so that it's not like you're negotiating and you're just putting your foot down and being defensive and putting up a fight and demanding things.

Sure. If you wanna do it that way, you can. I just don't think it's very effective. I don't think it's something that you want to do if at the end of the day you do not want to burn bridges. Like you genuinely care about these relationships and you want to build bridges as opposed to burning them. And that is something that you can do really skillfully when you learn how to listen actively. The reason why this is such a major skill is because when we are negotiating for our pay, because of our social conditioning, our brain would want us, would tempt us into making things personal. I mean, the root of that is associating our pay with our sense of self-worth. And so when we mistakenly assume that our self-worth or our sense of self-value is at stake, then of course it gets like, oh my gosh, my fight flight freeze reaction is coming up and I don't know how to engage.

I'm just like, I feel like my back is against the wall. And it feels like an attack, right? And so when you listen actively, when you paraphrase, you are front running that, you're preventing that stress reaction, you're saying, okay, what I'm hearing from you is, and then you just paraphrase it, you paraphrase, starting with, I hear, it seems, it sounds like. So what this does is that you're able to facilitate the conversation from a more neutral perspective. This is so powerful. This is something that Chris Voss talks about in detail in his book. Never Split the Difference. And this is a skill that FBI hostage negotiators use. And you can use in your salary negotiation as well to help you build not burn bridges as you position yourself as somebody who's willing to sit side by side, position yourself as somebody who's willing to listen, but at the same time, not be a pushover, not completely concede, not give up your ask at the first sign of a pushback. That is the power of active listening. 

So let's go to number seven. You wanna consider all moving parts. It's not just about the dollar figure. It's easy to get sort of distracted by that base salary figure or the figure on the annual salary or however you quantify your monetary compensation. But when you work for somebody, that's not the only way you get paid. You get paid through benefits, you get paid through resources and perks and 401k and so much more and equity. You want to make a list of all of that. All of that is compensation, equity, perks, benefits, uh, insurance paid, pay time off. These are all resources. So then you want to make a list and then rank in the order of importance or rank them in the magnitude of, uh, value to you so that you know what you're willing to give and take.

You know, what you're willing to prioritize or deprioritize in the conversation. Again, you're being strategic and you're gonna go to that conversation prepared. And here's the final do, do stay positive when you're asking for more, approach it as mutual problem solving. So you can say, you know, I'm really excited to work with you here and I'm sure we can get to an agreement that will make both of us happy. Here's another, uh, sample script. If you have gotten an offer and you're like, okay, but I think this can be better, here's what you say. You say, I appreciate this. This is a great starting point. This is a great place for us to start our conversation. It's a little cheeky, but it's also upbeat, it's positive. We're like, Hey, this is good place to start. Now let's talk now let's negotiate. It's like saying, now let's negotiate without saying, now let's negotiate <laugh>.

I should probably add that as a don't. Don't say, can we negotiate? Because that was the mistake that I had made, uh, 14 years ago when I joined the hedge fund, I was very naive. I hadn't done any of the things that I just told you to do. I had not researched, I had not, uh, looked into going market ranges. I had not talked to people who work in finance or at hedge funds. <laugh>. I hadn't asked the hedge fund, how do you define success? How can I, how can I add more value? How do you see me adding value and succeeding? I hadn't asked those questions. I hadn't listened actively. I hadn't engaged in, uh, tactical empathy as Chris Voss calls it. I hadn't considered all of the moving parts. I was so naive. I was also very, very young. And uh, when they just offered me the, uh, the salary, it was just incrementally more than what I had been making in a completely different role in a completely different industry.

This was way back when New New York had not, uh, enacted the salary transparency laws. So I was asked, what were you making? And I told them that was another mistake I made, right? I told them, and then they just figured, oh, she'll just, you know, settle. She'll just accept something that is incrementally more. And guess what I did? <laugh>. So I made mistakes and I'm learning from my mistakes. And now I am so passionate about helping as many people as possible avoid the costly mistakes I had made. I wanna help you get bolder, braver, and better paid. So let's talk about the don'ts. Do not make assumptions. Do not consider just one option only. Yeah. So number one, don't make any assumptions, right? I had assumed this hedge fund manager <laugh>.

Now it's just, now that I'm saying it out loud, it just sounds so silly how I had been under this misconception, this assumption that they were going to pay me. Well, because I was going into finance <laugh>, I'm laughing at my own naivete, okay? I had made some big, I'm sorry, I was going to say, um, the, the butt word <laugh>. But yeah, I have made a butt out of myself by assuming, and I didn't get clarity on details, big and small. Here's a second don't: don't sell yourself short. Do not say, you might not think I'm worth this <laugh>. I was coaching somebody who is legal counsel at a global tech company, a woman who is, um, I guess lawyer by training and working for this tech company. And she was asking me, so, so I should say, you know, here's the reason why I deserve this.

And I said, pause, pause, pause. How do you feel? How do you genuinely feel in your body when you tell yourself, this is something I deserve? And she's like, I don't know. We, we gotten so used to thinking about salary and talking about it as a matter of something that you deserve. But I'm here to tell you like how you think about it and how you talk about it influences how you feel about it and how you feel about it actually has a huge impact on what you do about it. And the result that you create, your salary isn't something that you personally deserve. Your salary has nothing to do with your self worth. It is nothing to do with your personal deservingness. It has everything to do with your professional value. Your professional value, you're able to shape the perception of that professional value, which is something that you create something that is outside of you, something that is not internalized, something that is not about your sense of self-worth.

I hope I am being clear. Do not say this is something that I'm worth. Cuz it's nothing to do with that. Your self-worth, your worth is so, so big. It is, it is always going to be beyond and above whatever amount of money you make. Do you make millions? Your worthiness is beyond millions. Do you make $10 an hour? Your worthiness is like $10 billion. There are trillions of cells working together right now to enable you to think, to conceptualize, to breathe and digest or maybe walk and drive a car all at the same time. The human body is a freaking miracle. You can't put a price tag on that. Your salary has nothing to do with what you are worth. Has nothing to do with your deservingness. It has everything to do with what you create with your brain, with your effort, with your skill.

And then you get to talk about it like it is a thing that you've created. Here's a here's another DON'T: don't set a low bar. It will become your starting salary. This is the mistake I made. They asked me, what's your minimum requirement? And I said, 50,000 <laugh>. And that's how I ended up making $50,000 at a hundred thousand dollars job. Do not set a low bar. Do not set a low bar. If you have a number in mind, go a step, go one more step higher. Think of it like yoga stretch. This is something that my negotiation mentor Lisa Gates, the co-founder of she negotiates, taught me to think about. She said, it's like a yoga stretch. We go for that stretch and it's like uncomfortable. And the yoga instructor says, no, you could go just a little bit higher. You could, you could lift your leg one inch higher.

You're like, I can? you sure? And then you do, and it's a little uncomfortable, but at the end of it, you're like, oh, I feel so good. I have this like, amazing sense of exhale. Think about it that way. Whatever money you think you're gonna be okay with, go a step. Go one more step higher. Think you're gonna be okay with 35,000. Go for 50,000. Think you're gonna be okay with 200,000. Consider 250K. I actually coached a client who was transitioning from one job at a life, uh, major life sciences company to another life sciences, uh, startup. And she was like, I make really good money. You know, I think, I think I've compensated well. But I challenged her. I said, you know, most people who change jobs, they go for at least about 20% more than what they were making now. So I suggested if you were making 200, go for 250 at minimum, okay? Do not set that bar low for yourself. And guess what? When she advocated for herself and she negotiated for 250, it turned out the the startup that she was going for, they offered her even more <laugh>.

So yes, the lesson of the story, maybe when you think you are going for that yoga stretch, when you are going a step or two higher, you could, you could be, you know, it's, it's not all that aggressive, it's not all that high <laugh>. It could be, right? It could be not exceeding the doable range for that company. All right? So next DON'T: don't make demands, don't make it personal, right? This is how we burn bridges. This is how we have negotiations that end up creating blow back or, or situations that blow up in your face. Do not say, I need to make $150,000 so I can pay off my student loans. That's about you. That's about you personal. It has nothing to do with the value and how that value is impacting the company and how that value is driving the company goals. A client asked me yesterday, should I make my case based on inflation?

And the short and swift answer was, no, do not make your case for pay raise based on inflation because it says, again, nothing about the unique value that you're bringing to the table. It does not set you apart from everyone else. And in fact, when I shared this little tidbit on LinkedIn, somebody chimed in and said, yeah, this is a great advice because when you make your case for a raise based on inflation, you end up having the employer lump you with all of the mediocre workers. And if you are listening to this podcast, you are somebody who is driven for growth. You have ambition, you work hard, you are smart, you don't wanna be lumped in with all of the mediocre employees. And here's another pushback that you can reasonably expect. If you make your case for a pay raise based on inflation, the manager can say, well, guess what? I'm impacted by inflation too. That's you, me, everyone in the world who, whoever has to use currency, we're all impacted by inflation. Do we all get raises? No <laugh>.

See what I mean? So again, you wanna make the case in a very strategic way that is going to help you prevent this sort of pushback. Don't make it personal, don't make demands, don't make it about the inflation. Make it relentlessly about the value and how what you're bringing to the table is helping the company achieve what they want to achieve, right? The impact of your contributions. We will talk more about this at my workshop, and yes, I will be just as fiery and just as passionate. By the way, one more thing that I wanna share with you. In addition, addition to not making it personal, don't, don't approach the salary negotiation or the, or the raise conversation based on the fact that you checked off boxes. Let me give an example. I coached somebody who worked in finance and she had completed her mba.

And so she advocated for her pay raise and promotion on just the fact that she completed her MBA and the sh and the, and the swift and the short answer to that was, no, not from me, but from her employers. In fact, she found out that she was getting sort of, um, pushed out of conversations and you know, there's so many things that go into how these conversations play out. And a part of me does agree that there could have been some unconscious bias, you know, um, sexism in that response. And, and at the same time, she didn't make the case for her pay raise and promotion based on the additional value, how it helps the employer and what specific goals and, and visions of success that she's going to help them achieve. No, she didn't talk about any of that. She just said, Hey, I finished my mba, so I deserve a pay raise and promotion.

So yes, it's kind of tricky, but you want to be very mindful. You wanna be, again, just like be laser focused on articulating how what you bring and the additional skills and the knowledge that you now have will help the company achieve what it wants to achieve. There has to be a discussion. You'll have to tell them more things about how they get what they want. How you advancing in your career creates so much more advantage for the employer, for the other side, for your client. That's how you make this negotiation a no-brainer. And I will tell you more at my workshop. So let's bring this home. Don't use gossip or lie. Don't say, you know, I heard you offered Steve, you know, X amount more and I'm better at my job. Again, don't make it personal, don't gossip, don't lie. Don't compare and despair, um, in your salary negotiation.

And don't make threats. Don't tell them, Hey, if I don't get what I want, I'm gonna quit. Even if that is your truth, sometimes it is exactly what you're going to do. If you know you ask for a pay raise or a promotion and you don't get that, you know, for yourself, that's a clear signal that I am not valued here and I'm going to go look for different employment. That's great. Just don't make that a threat. In the salary or in the, in the raise conversation, you could say something really subtle like, Hey, you know, the outcome of this conversation is going to inform the decisions that I make.

The outcome of this conversation will inform the decisions I make, right? So you could, you could tell them, but they already know that everyone is looking, everyone's, uh, mostly everyone's jobs are at will. So there's no need to make threats. There's no need to beat them over the head with like, Hey, I'm gonna quit this job if you don't give me a pay raise. It's kind of always on the back of people's minds, especially managers most of the time. Okay, so there you go. Eight DOs six DON'Ts with scripts. I hope you found this helpful. I hope you'll implement what I'm sharing with you. I think I've reiterated and reinforced the notion that it's about value and how it impacts the employer's goals. You wanna make that super clear, articulate it and if you have any questions, if you want my help articulating this, come to my workshop on February 14th. Yes, it's going to be on Valentine's Day because I think there is no greater self-love than when you equip yourself with the tools, the skills, and the confidence to be able to take good care of yourself, to be able to advocate for your professional value and get better paid. I will see you there.

Jamie Lee:
If you enjoy this podcast, come to jamie lee coach.com, j a m i e l e e c o a c h.com to get your free ebook. How to ask for big pay Raise and get it. And if you want expert guidance in your corner to help you achieve greater self-confidence and greater career satisfaction as you grow your skills in negotiating, leading and influencing as a woman professional, I invite you to book your free one-on-one sales call with me to find out how executive coaching can help you do exactly that. The link is in the show notes, talk soon.