As my sister made a flying visit last month, she left the New York Times bestseller, 'What Color is your Parachute' on my bed, and when I went to inspect it, it opened on page 118. The print in italics that bounced off the page read:
'The purpose of salary negotiation is to uncover the most that an employer is willing to pay to get you."
I was instantly drawn to the print, but I did not start reading with full interest until I spotted this:
"During the salary Discussion, try never to be the first one to mention a salary figure."
It all seemed so simple. I was for some reason thankful that my sister had dropped this book on my bed. And then I had that self-loathing, arrogant moment that I tend to rejoice in as I get older: Here am I, a guy who has completed the Cambridge negotiations course, a guy who has dissected BATNA from the oil barons in Abu Dhabi to the warmongering North Koreans in the East, here am I learning rules of negotiation from this book. Yes. I had accepted the strategies of this book, and without rhyme or reason I have employed them without any active questioning.
This New York times seller planted a further seed of vindication for this feeling of angst: pg 121 "You can speculate from now until the cows come home as to why this is; all we know is that it is. -in negotiation, whoever mentions a salary figure first, generally loses." Empirically, if anybody can get some data on this, I'd be very happy to see the results. My only seminal addition to this school of thought is in the secondary - every time I have met for interview or had to fill out an application form - there is a blunt request for a salary figure. It seems that there is a broad consensus that his New York Times observation is indeed being accepted as truth.
I am just off the phone from my headhunter who has decided that they have worked out the best way to negotiate for me on salary with a particular job I am considering at this present moment.
There is a classic agency problem at work here. As the agent is paid a percentage of the total monetary package that I receive, they are inclined to bargain as hard as they can for every cent they can scrounge out of the Company on my behalf.
This simple agency problem aside, I have been led to understand that there are several clear rules that one should bear in mind when entering the negotiation phase of any job offer. In this blog I will attempt to lay out what the experts say - me personally, I can understand why you would want to get paid as much as you can get, as a matter of a few thousand dollars extra may help you wipe off your mortgage or pay for that end of year holiday, and at the same time is less than pocket change on a business trip in the scheme of things.
In this article, the author lays out some valid points that I have not covered so far. The first issue is that negotiation should ONLY start when there is a clear offer on the table. Secondly, there should be further consideration of strategies to be the last to propose a price, and to also understand the market and how far the Company will be prepared to go to meet your request - ie, how reasonable is reasonable at market.
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