The Definitive Guide to Negotiating your Salary
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Compensation decisions are a mystery to most employees.
Decided behind closed doors, comp offers are crafted with information only employers are privy to and offered without explanation. This leaves every employee at a disadvantage when it’s time to negotiate a job offer or higher pay in a current role.
- 53% of employees say they avoid salary negotiation because they don’t feel comfortable asking for more money.
- 48% of employees say they avoid salary negotiation because they are afraid the employer will decide to not hire them.
- 38% of employees say they avoid salary negotiation because they don’t want to look greedy to their new employer.
How the Cards Are Stacked Against You
❌ Negotiating a job offer is an emotional experience.
Finding a place where you feel valued, fit in with your team, and can take care of your monetary responsibilities is high stakes. It’s about where to spend your most valuable resource — your time — and making money to survive. For employers, not emotional—it’s about filling necessary roles to reach goals under budget.
❌ Comp data available to employees is inaccurate.
Free online comp data websites don’t verify salary information and too many employees have reasons to inflate or under report their compensation (anonymity, pride, etc.). But for employers, there’s a billion dollar industry that helps companies figure out how much to pay each new hire.
❌ Employees lack comp negotiation experience.
Most employees only negotiate job offers 5 - 7 times in their career. Stack that against recruiters who interact with dozens of candidates per month and the balance of negotiating skills, information on salary, interviewing experience, and simply having comp discussions is wildly tipped toward the employer.
Learn the right way to negotiate a higher salary.
Don’t get left behind. In this guide you'll learn how to find out the right way to negotiate a fair salary. See how employers make comp decisions today and how you can use the right strategy to earn more: In this guide, you’ll learn:
✅ How companies decide your compensation.
Learn how a company’s compensation philosophy, your total compensation package, the cost of labor, and market dynamics play into how companies craft an offer for every new hire.
✅ How to negotiate an offer the right way.
Find out the right strategy to negotiate a higher offer with tips and tricks from the experts. See example responses to common recruiter questions and learn what you need to ask to make negotiating more effective.
✅ How to increase your chances of a better annual raise.
Get a clear, step-by-step plan to improve your chances of a higher annual review rating and raise. You’ll see a behind-the-scenes look at how most organizations rate employees and find out how you can use these systems to your advantage.
What's included in this guide?
- 4 key components employers look at to make comp decisions
- 3-step, proven process to negotiate a better salary
- 7 critical questions everyone should ask in a comp negotiation
- 6 ways to increase your chances of a higher annual review rating (to earn a higher raise)
- 3 key questions to ask yourself if it’s time to find a new job
- 2 huge impacts of not asking for more during a comp discussion
- Plus, 6 additional tips on how to negotiate (pulled from our combined 50+ years of experience in recruiting, hiring, and negotiating at companies like DoorDash, Carta, Tesla, and Netflix)
The new way—using accurate compensation data to get paid fairly.
Negotiating pay is scary. Employees have limited information, limited experience, and a lot on the line. It’s a black box. Companies have unlimited resources: data, compensation experts, recruiters, and thousands of repetitions. They have nothing to lose and everything needed to win.
At FairComp, our mission is to level the playing field and help people realize their true value.
That’s why we’re building a trustworthy source of pay information, by employees, for employees.
You shouldn’t have to wonder if you’re being paid fairly.
Need More Resources? Check out these links:
Are you being paid fairly? Let's find out.
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