When a HR person asks you this, what do you say? I was asked this question today and gave a wide range(a range of $70K) with the bottom range being what my salary is current at.
did I f up?
I make in the low $100K range.
First of all the most important thing is to know your market.
Secondly, that spread seems too wide.
Normally, if you want to provide a range, then use the market average as your absolute “downside case” and then provide a 20-25% spread.
For example, let’s say that the market average for the position you want is $100K. You believe you’re an above average employee. If I were to throw out a range I would say my desired salary was between $110K-125K.
That way you’re close enough to what the market is willing to pay but set yourself up for a more successful negotiation by aiming higher.
what if the “market average” varies widely. The role is to manage the investments of a non-profit org.
I would always benchmark myself to the people in similar roles who I find most successful. Go find these people or talk to headhunters and try to get a sense of what the top performers are making, and if you are similarly good then you can make a case for getting paid something similar.
Say I’m negotiating a salary for a new role, and they ask what my current salary (for this example I make $100k), and I tell them I make between $100-$125k, would this be against the code of ethics? More importantly, during the interview process, would a future employer have a way to check what I’ve attested to is accurate? I’m wondering because an employer could potentially look down on this even if you technically did not lie to them. Can they check your previous salary once I hypothetically landed the new job?
^ I’ve been asked for my paystubs/W2s contingent upon the offer being accepted.
^ Don’t lie. That’s bad news. But you can give a range with your salary at the bottom. Or, alternatively, answer saying it will take $x-$y for me to make the move. A company that asks for your stubs to pay you the bare minimum isn’t a place I’d work. Shows me they are incapable of determining your value and want to rely on your previous employer to figure it out for them
^ I think they asked for the sake of identifying the market range. The company that asked what I made, I told them, explained what I wanted, and they came in right around there. I even nudged it up with some negotiating. All in all the move proved a 20% increase from my prior job. If they gave me a 5% increase, I would have passed.
do you include bonus or just base salary…lets say u make 100k base and bonus is about 50% do you say 150 or 100
also if u have rediculous 401k match or company pays for insurance or other stuff, should that be included in salary?
^ I mention total compensation. That includes benefits.
In the end you can tell them truth and even if it varies greatly from what you will accept to take the job, so be it. It is your decision to take what they offer or not so it seems if you dont love what they offer you dont have to accept. These other points of insurance and 401K, etc can certainly be used to help explain why you think you are worth XYZ, but still it is your call in the end of what you will take.
For this Glassdoor’s salary reviews are very useful and genuine tool, specially when time is a constraint.
Include bonus. That way if they do ask to see payslips later and call you up on the fact that you said you were on 150 and not 100, you can say with a straight face that you thought they meant all in comp.
When I moved from my 1st job to my second, I exaggerated what I was earning at the time and subsequently got an offer almost 20% above that (which was 50% above my previous crappy grad salary). The new employer never verified my claim, but if they had my prepared answer was that I was including my expected bonus.
The whole interview process is a game from start to finish and no part more so than the dance over remuneration. You only get to that point if they have decided they want you - usually at least - so you do have some power here. Ultimately if the new company is happy to employ you at 150, it shouldn’t matter to them whether your previous sallary was 50,100 or 150.
I just finished up a round of interviews in the last week, and was told yesterday that I should expect an offer early next week. I have no idea what the number is going to come in at. The HR recruiter for the team asked me about desired salary and I told her a number that was 25% above my current number, and she didn’t try to imply the target range was any lower, so that could be a good sign. When she asked me what my salary was, I told her that I didn’t feel my current salary was material to this process. I explained that compensation is one reason I’m looking to make a move, meaning my current salary isn’t a number that I feel represents the value of my skills and experience. I felt like a dick saying that out loud, but it’s certainly true, at least to an extent. Every step I’ve moved up the ladder at my current company, my salary has been artificially limited by the transparency of my previous income. When I was making $45K and got a job that hires other people on at $65-$70, my offer was only in the mid 50’s. It was explicitly stated to me that the offer represented “a nearly 25% annual raise.” It’s no secret that the most effective way to increase salary is to jump companies, so I’m certainly not going to limit my potential income by telling them what I make now.
Can we get the Numi rating on this strategy? I’m curious to know what others think of it
Sample size of 1, it seems to have worked. Just got an offer that ups my base by 35% and moves me into a position with a 10% bonus target vs the 2% in my current role. I had no real intention of taking this job when I interviewed, but between how impressed I was with the hiring manager and a few of the people on the interview panel, and the offer coming in quite a bit higher than I had anticiapated, I’m just waiting for the official letter to confirm the terms of the verbal offer and I’ll be getting a 2 week paid vacation soon.
^Congrats man
Sample size of 2 now. I just accepted an offer and negotiated the same way. Previous salary being irrelevent. I also had other points to make my case. Ended up bumping the base salary a little bit from the original offer. Everybody won.
Congrats to both of you.
Twice the Man - How did you manage to swing a 35% increase when you had already indicated you’d be happy with 25%.