Hi my name is Pat Goodwin with Pat Goodwin Associates. The question for me today is how
to negotiate a salary during the job offer. And the way that that question is worded I
am assuming that this is an offer on the spot. The salary is being discussed without a letter
being mailed so you can think about it. So this is being a salary that is being offered
for the job that you are being offered. I would encourage you to be prepared for that
conversation. First of all you want to always start the conversation off well first of all,
I'd like to thank you for the offer. You are telling me this amount. Prior to having that
discussion you should have done your homework, knowing what amount you can accept which is
the least amount. What you have been making and what you would like to see in the form
of an increase. You need to do research to look at salary dot com. Or wizard, salary
wizard to make sure that you are in the range of knowing if they are going to be fair with
the offer. If there is a salary base plus commission with sales you need to clearly
understand what the expectations are for you to make bonus. But lets just focus on the
base salary. And they offer a salary that is a little bit lower then what you had expected,
you could afford to take it but it's still a little bit lower then what you expected.
I would encourage you to begin, first of all I like to thank you for the offer, the amount
is just a little bit lower then I had expected, I'd like to ask what flexibility there is.
And pause. If they really want you, think about this, the offer is made to you the power
shifts to you. So if you do not ask for a salary increase at that point in time you
wont' get it. So you've got to be prepared to ask for the flexibility and then pause.
And if they come back with what amount do you have in mind, then you need to then have
that amount to go back and say, well I was hoping the amount would be, instead of in
the range of would be. And so add the two, three, more five more thousand. He may not
be able to go as high as you're asking for, but if you ask for too little then he's not
going to go up. So add, you might want to ask for a little bit more so then he can say
I can't do four thousand but I can do two and two is really what you wanted. So there's
some finesse about that, you don't want to try to trip them up, you want to be very honest
and you want to be real clear about what you need in order to make your bills or what you
need in order to work for them and not fret about what your salary is. If you are receiving
bonus or commission then you want to understand what the formula is and make sure that you
know what you, when it's going to be paid ,what parameters you will be paid in, is it
quarterly, weekly , twice a year. And make sure that you have a clear understanding of
when will you receive the bonus and hopefully that will help you to negotiate your offer
when offered.