7 tips to successfully negotiate a job offer

Last week, one of my clients decided not to put out a job offer to their preferred candidate because he lied about his current package. To them, it was a breach of trust that could not be repaired. Needless to say that this left all concerned parties frustrated: my client because they had lost valuable time, my candidate because he missed out on a great opportunity and me because I had to restart the search.

Negotiating a compensation package is an essential part of a job search.

And the way you handle salary negotiations, may prove to be critical to successfully closing the deal, both from your side as well as from the side of your future employer.

So here are 7 tips that may guide you to get the right package for the job that you aspire.

·       Focus on the job

Your long-term satisfaction depends less on getting your negotiation right and more on getting the job right. The content of a job, the team that you will join and the leadership displayed by your future boss are much more important than the particulars of an offer. The start of any salary negotiation is knowing that this is the right job for you and clearly transmitting this message to your future employer.

·       Be prepared

Know up front all the elements of your compensation package, not just your annual base salary. Make sure that you communicate the bonuses that you are entitled to, representation allowances that you receive or details about your health and pension plan before an offer is made.

There is no room to pull any ‘forgotten’ items out of your head once the offer is on the table.

·       Be open and honest

It would be stating the obvious that you are looking for a salary increase when you decide to change jobs. Nevertheless, it is not necessary to include that desired increase into your current salary.

Some employers will ask for proof of your current package. If that happens and you have been dishonest about your current package, you are hung out to dry and there is a large chance that the job is lost.

·       Be realistic

Preparing an offer is quite an analytical exercise where your current salary is compared with the benchmarks and compensation guidelines a company uses to grade its employees. Usually an increase will be added to make the offer attractive but increases of 15 to 20% are rare.

Experience shows that offers tend to be well balanced, offering you a fair compensation for the results you have to achieve while at the same time leaving some room for future increases.

When you work through a headhunter or a recruitment agency, use them as an intermediate to test the waters and to check how much room there is for negotiation.

·       Don’t negotiate for the sake of it

Resist the temptation to prove that you are a great negotiator. You are not on a Moroccan market where they enter as low as possible and you aim as high as possible. Determine whether battling it out over 100 EUR gross per month will truly make the difference.

·       Don’t use an ultimatum

Tempting as it may be to use another job offer to ‘increase the price’, employers don’t like to be put hostile. If this is really the job that you want, why would you make your future employer believe that there are in competition with others.

·       Keep a broader perspective

Much of your satisfaction from the job will come from other factors you can negotiate—perhaps even more easily than salary. Don’t get fixated on money. Focus on the value of the entire deal: commute time, flexibility in work hours, possibility to work from home, opportunities for growth and promotion and so forth. 

Obviously, you want to get the offer you deserve. But to successfully close the deal, you need to find the right balance between the content of the job and the financial gain that you want to get. I hope that these 7 tips will allow you to professionally negotiate any future job offers.

I look forward to hearing from you

Isabel

Through a personalized and tailor-made approach, Ingenium Executive Search aspires to assist you in attracting the right talent that matches the DNA of your company

Check out our website http://www.ingenium-search.be

Follow me on Twitter @IngeniumSearch

Good girls go to heaven...bad girls go everywhere...

Last week was ‘equal pay day’ in Belgium, a symbolic day that illustrates how far into the year a woman must work to earn the same amount made by a man in the previous year.

I was appalled that we need such a day but recent studies indicate that the wage gap between men and women is still over 20%. Little progress has been made over the last few years.

Glass ceilings and part-time jobs left aside, why haven’t we been able to close the gap, even after so many years of feminism?

According to Danielle Moens, from the Center of Balanced Leadership who was interviewed by Radio 1 on the subject, we may be partially to blame ourselves. Contrary to men, we lack the guts to ask for a salary increase or a promotion. And although it may not be politically correct, she is right…

Unconsciously, we are raised to be kind and never to ask for anything. As a little girl, we listen to fairy tales about the beautiful princess who waits for her prince to ask her to marry him. Boys on the contrary, are raised to bargain for themselves. They are the ones who invite the girls for a dance, they are the ones who go down on one knee to propose. The concept of winning or losing is part of their daily life.

We unconsciously transmit this attitude into our working life. Although women often excel in negotiating for others, we forget to negotiate for ourselves. We believe that delivering tangible results will automatically allow us to process in our career.

When you look at male colleagues, they prepare and advocate their case.

They start by building an internal network that will sponsor their request. They exhume self-confidence and act as if they deserve the desired promotion or salary increase. They emphasize their added value and actively promote themselves.

So maybe it is time that we move from being a good girl to being more assertive in getting what we think we deserve.

Does this mean that we have to become masculine? Not at all.

However, it is possible to apply some of these masculine techniques to promote ourselves, without thinking that we will automatically be labeled as bitches. Focus on your own unique, feminine qualities and the added value they bring to the business and combine it with the mental preparation to actively promote yourself.   

Who knows, becoming more of a ‘bad’ girl will allow us to close the gap. And we can finally leave the sexist concept of ‘equal pay day’ behind us.

I look forward to hearing from you,

Isabel

Through a personalized and tailor-made approach, Ingenium Executive Search aspires to assist you in attracting the right talent that matches the DNA of your company

Check out our website http://www.ingenium-search.be

Follow me on Twitter @IngeniumSearch