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I'm super excited about this lesson. We're going to talk about negotiating your salary. Who doesn't love negotiating their salary? I don't know if I've met anybody who actually enjoys this part of the process, because as exciting as it is, it's confusing. I get you don't do this for a living. You don't do it very often. Hopefully you don't do it very often. What I want to give you in this lesson is ... I've written a lot about this. There's a whole how-to in Interview Intervention. I've got a little checklist here in the notes for you. I really want to give you the philosophies around what makes a good negotiation a good negotiation. I don't even love the word, but the one thing I think is really, really important is, I would almost throw out the window everything you've heard about sales negotiations. This isn't about a sales negotiation. You are both coming together to come to an initial agreement, because that's all it is, it's an initial agreement, of what they're going to pay you for your services. This isn't you selling somebody a product who's going to go off and use or selling your services, which are going to be over in a finite a period of time. You are a team and this is something we're going to talk about. I want you to understand this takes on different characteristics than just a sale. Now if you've done your job in the interviewing process, they like you. They love you. They want to give you a great offer, so let's just run through some of these philosophies. The first thing I talk about is when to discuss this. I'm going to mix in some dos and don'ts along the way as it relates to each one of these, but one of the first things that I would suggest to employers and to job candidates is you never, ever talk about compensation in the beginning of the process and here's why. You, the job candidate, want to talk about it when your stock is highest. It's not highest before they have interviewed. It should be highest at the very end. The more information they know about you, the more they should like you, the more they should want you, the more they're willing to pay. At the beginning of the process you also don't know them, so for them to say, "Here's what the job pays," in most cases there's flexibility and ranges in what the job can pay. Not all, but most, so I don't know why employers would share that with you either. I also don't know why they would want to ask you, "What is it that you want in the way of compensation?" I'll tell you why you don't want to answer that. Because you have absolutely no idea what the entire package, and by package I don't mean financial package, I mean the entire package of working at that company, entails. You may love the fact that it's across the street from your house. You may love that you get to travel internationally or you are going to be working with fantastic people or you are going to get to learn new skills that you otherwise wouldn't have. These are malleable pieces of your pie and the financial component is one of them, so for you to give them an answer, it's completely uneducated. Whatever you do, do not, I repeat, do not. The biggest mistake people make is talking money at the beginning of the process. What would strongly suggest is, if they do ask you about money upfront, just provide them what you're currently earning or what you most recently earned. Then just say, "I am sure that if we are right for each other, we will be able to come to something amenable toward the end of the process." I just want to make sure that you know that. Don't do that upfront, but now you're here, you're at the end, so I wanted to get that out of the way. Now we're down at the end. I want to give you some things to think about, just the mentality of negotiation. It's a compromise. You both want to be happy. A compromise doesn't mean I sacrifice and you don't or you sacrifice and I don't. A compromise is really bringing you both together so that you're both happy. We want you to get paid fairly and in a value that makes you feel appreciated and we don't want the employer to overpay. If the employer overpays, their expectations are going to be a lot higher. If you feel underpaid, you're going to be disgruntled. If you feel overpaid, you might be a little bit nervous. Ringing every last dollar out of the employer is not always a great thing. I know more money is always better, but sometimes it comes at a cost. You don't get anything for free, so to speak. You got to think, "Okay, it's a compromise. It's a compromise." I also want you to think in terms of the entire package. We talked a little bit about this a few minutes ago. What I get to do, who I get to do it with, how it matches all of my requirements. Am I going 20 for 20? Oh my goodness, this is such a great place to work. I'm willing to sacrifice a little bit. Maybe you're trading some certainty dollars for performance dollars. There's a lot of different ways, but you need to look at it holistically. Don't just get down. This is an analogous situation to when you are deciding whether or not you want to work at the company, and I mentioned in a previous lesson, a few lessons ago, that you abandon your whys and your reasons. Go back to those. This is the same thing. You don't want to throw away all of the different needs that you have just because a few dollars are missing. Okay, so that's another element. Along with compromises, I think the other thing you got to think about is you are a team. You both win if you accept and you both lose if you don't accept. You've both invested a tremendous amount of time. Some of these interview processes take a long time, but you're a team. What do teams do? They work together. They share a common goal. They communicate with each other, so you got to be sharing rationale, and why you need this and why you're willing to trade that. You listen to the other persons or other parties or the company. In this case company's position. Some of these compensation packages can be very complicated, so you need to understand what restrictions that they have and they also need to understand your rationale. The other thing is I think you need to remain flexible. Be open-minded. That's a big thing. That's a mindset. The other thing too, I always say, and I've written a few articles about this, I call these the six most important words in a salary negotiation. Assuming you're at this point and assuming you want the job. You want the job, but maybe you're just not quite happy with what it is that they're paying you. I always suggest opening up the discussion with these six words. I want to make this work. If you let the employer know, "I want to ultimately accept your offer" but there are maybe a few elements to it that you want to understand better or you would like additional concessions or more money, whatever it is, I want to make sure that you are letting them know as early in the discussion that you want to make this work. As a matter of fact, I'm hoping these going to be the first six words you say, but that is really, really important because what that will do is that will put them in a welcoming posture as opposed to a defensive posture. You want to make sure that if you truly do want to make it work, you let them know that as soon as possible. Then just ask them the questions. Maybe you offer up some suggestions of what it is you want to alter or what's missing or what you're willing to trade them back for other things. Sometimes people are willing to trade salary for vacation days. Sometimes they're willing to trade vacation days for salary. Sometimes they're willing to trade salary for more bonus potential or stock if that's appropriate, or stock options or restricted stock. There's many, many different things so you want to make sure that you are offering that up. I always say take your time, but answer quickly. If you've been through a lengthy interview process, you should know by the time you get down to the end whether or not you want to accept the offer, assuming that the compensation is in order. If it's been a rather quick interview process, days or a week or something like that, you might not know because you need some think time. Either way, what I would do is make sure that when you're given an offer, the employer is likely, most of them, will likely provide a date that they want your response. That's great. You should reply to them verbally, not in an email, that the date that you will give them your answer or the date that you need to speak with them or whatever it might be ... Sometimes the employers email the offer, which I still can't believe. Most times they will want to talk with you about it. Sometimes they email it in advance and then they speak with you. You should give them a definitive date by which you will respond irrespective of what it is that they're asking. Sometimes they'll put two weeks out there. Sometimes they'll put one day out there. Sometimes it'll be a week. Either way, you should let them know what your date is that you'll reply with an answer and stick to it or beat it. If you have any questions or a rebuttal or a counter offer, whatever it might be, then I would respond to them sooner than the date you provided, and ask them or share with them how you're feeling. I think it should be done according to a date that you give them. It should be within the confines of the dates that they've given you. Most of them will give you a week or two, depending on how senior you are maybe even longer. The point is, if you've been through an interviewing process for any length of time, you should know by now, so it should be a matter of assembling the details. Whatever that date is that you give them, just make sure you stick to it. These are a few pointers. I'm sure that there are going to be a lot of notes or comments or questions that you have regarding how to handle particular situations. You're welcome to zip those down in the comment section. I will have a coaching call about this topic alone or something similar. Maybe this will be lumped in with something else. I know there are many, many variations, but I hope that these philosophies are something you can take with you and just apply them to your own needs. You might need to use a few of these techniques. Some of them might not apply. Sometimes the employer might just give you an offer and say, "Hey, this is it. Take it or leave it." In that case, you have to decide whether all the other elements are for you. These are some things that I don't think a lot of people think about and you should always think about them whenever you get an offer. I hope you enjoyed this. Let me know. Give me a shout-out in the notes. Let me know you're still here. I congratulate you for going through this. I'm assuming if you watched this module, you probably are at a sport where you are getting an offer or will be getting an offer, or maybe you had offer and you're wondering what you should have done, but either way let me know what you're thinking. We'll see you in the next lesson. Until the next time.