7-minute read
Unless you are trained in the art of negotiations or have purposely tried to upskill yourself in this area, you can easily get lost when it comes to attempting to negotiate.
Where do you start, how far do you go, and more importantly, when is it time to walk away.
These are all aspects of negotiating that you likely haven’t had too much practice in, especially if you are working in tech or design.
Recognising this, we helped develop an extremely simple method to negotiating that anyone can do with a little preparation. This method has helped hundreds of people to date negotiate a fair job offer, or renegotiate their current during a performance review.
This article will teach you exactly what to do, how to do it, and help ease any fears you might have around negotiating, to help you get a fair job offer from the beginning.
Before you partake in any form of negotiation, no matter how big or small you should be absolutely certain on what you actually (1) need and (2) want.
You do this to analyse all your options, allowing you to be fully equipped to handle the majority of situations that can arise during negotiation talks.
If you are not clear on what you need as a minimum, it will be difficult to know when a job offer is fair in your opinion. Similarly, if you do not know what you want, you might find yourself negotiating on areas that long term does not serve your best interests.
A job offer negotiation is different from salary negotiation, it is good to define the two as people often believe they fall into the same category:
A job offer negotiation is when you consider the full package (which we will break down in a moment for you).
Salary negotiation is when you consider only the salary (and this can be negotiated at an offer stage or whilst employed).
Job offers come in all shapes and sizes. Depending on the size, age and industry of a company you may receive all of the below or only a few, however, just because a company doesn’t offer something on the list, doesn’t mean you cannot ask for it still.
Areas to consider in an offer:
Title
Salary
Working hours
On-site / Remote
Vacation days
Stock / Shares
Bonus (sign-on or annual)
Car / travel allowance
Education budget
Using the list, first rank them in order of importance to determine the core areas of negotiation for you. You might decide that the job title you are offered is most important, and therefore rank it 10/10, the same with Education budget, this might only score a 6/10.
We recommend doing this to give yourself focus in the negotiation, it allows you to negotiate on the areas that matter the most to you at the beginning, and not get side tracked on areas that the company might increase to make the offer seem more attractive.
Once you have ranked all possible areas to negotiate out of ten, you now need to allocate what is a (1) need and what is a (2) want, for example:
Title - (1) Frontend Developer for my visa application, (2) Senior Frontend Developer for the increased title.
Vacation days - (1) 27 as I look after my parents occasionally, (2) 30 to allow for extra time to myself.
Stock / Shares - not important.
The idea is that by going through the list, you understand what your minimum job offer acceptance would be (1) need, and what your ideal job offer would be (2) want.
If something that is important to you is not on the list, you can still ask for it, such as day care support. The above list is simply the most negotiable area we see in job offers.
Job offers are becoming more individualistic these days, what works for you might not work for me. By and large there will be similarities between offers within an organisation but the benefits of a tailored job offer are making companies listen with intent to ensure satisfaction and retention.
Completing the Need/Want checklist will help you negotiate from a position of clarity. It will make the whole process less scary, as you are already aware of what you actually need to see and then what you want to see. We advise you do this list even before you start applying for a job, that way you are informed from the beginning, but worst case any time before the offer is produced will still have the same impact.
We hope this method of negotiating is simple enough to help you on your journey today. The good news is that if you work with Peritus Partners, we will negotiate for you, so if you’re looking for a new job, check out our latest vacancies or sign up to be informed as soon as new ones come live. As always, if you feel someone could learn from this article, we would appreciate it if you could share it with them.