Career Tips: How to Ask for More Money After a Job Offer
One of the hardest questions to deal with at a job interview is about your salary expectation. It becomes even harder when you want to ask for more money after the interviewer gives you a job offer. It’s difficult to find the right words to use because you want to let the interviewer know you expect better pay without coming off as too greedy.
If you can’t figure out the best way to go about it, this article offers you tips on how to ask for more money after a job offer.
How to Ask for More Money After a Job Offer: 10 Tips
When you finally get the job offer you’ve been eagerly waiting for, you may lack the courage to ask your employer for more money. After all, you’ve not started the job yet, so you may feel like you lack the moral authority to ask for more money. But this is the opportunity for you to negotiate for better pay before you agree to take the job.
In most cases, employers will give you an offer that is slightly lower than the actual pay that’s commensurate to the job. But the fact that they’ve already made their intentions to hire you clear means you are at an advantage to ask for the right pay before you accept their offer. This also means that the employer, who has spent money and time conducting interviews, is eager to close the deal and get you started.
Therefore, it’s the right time to discuss your salary expectations. Unfortunately, many interviewees are so uncomfortable talking about the salary that they end up accepting the first offer presented to them at the interview. Don’t fall into the same trap. Your employer will give you a smaller number expecting you to negotiate.
So, don’t waste the opportunity by rushing to sign the contract without pushing back a little to see if the employer will crack and review their offer upward. If you don’t know how to ask for a better offer at a job interview, here are practical tips/ rules for asking for higher pay.
1. Outline the Reasons Why You Deserve More
Since the employer already wants to hire you, your biggest task isn’t to convince them to hire you but to let them know why you deserve higher pay. So, even as you present your salary proposal hoping it will speak for itself, you have to provide an explanation that justifies it. Provide reasons why the employer should offer you higher pay than anyone else they may have hired.
For instance, if the job requires you to work from home on weekends, or if you have to commute a long distance to and from work, you have to include the extra costs in the counteroffer. But don’t just include it without letting the employer know about it. This also means that you shouldn’t make a counteroffer without a justification for it. It’s unwise.
2. Remain Likable
An employer is only going to consider your counteroffer only if they like you and what you’re likely to bring to the company. So, avoid making any statement or acting in a way that will reduce your likability. This includes remaining polite and being able to manage any tensions that might occur during negotiations.
But even as you remain polite and avoid a confrontation, don’t shy away from asking for what you believe you deserve. You can do this without sounding greedy or dwelling too much on the deficiencies in the offer presented. The trick is to be persistent without becoming a nuisance or sounding petty. You can easily avoid these pitfalls by practicing your negotiation skills with friends and relatives before the interview.
3. Show Interest in the Job Offer
It’s downright rude and unprofessional to let your employer waste their time trying to explain an offer knowing that you’ll reject it after all. So, even as you exercise your negotiation skills, let the employer know that you’re genuinely interested in the job offer. If they get the impression that you are serious about taking up the job, they’ll be flexible in their negotiations.
For instance, you can mention other job offers you’ve received recently and let the employer draw a comparison. But don’t stop there. Make it clear that you are willing to forgo the other offers and accept theirs under specific conditions.
4. Study Your Interviewer
The only way you’ll influence your interviewer with a counteroffer is by understanding them well. So, take time to figure out their interests and main concerns. For instance, negotiating with the boss is different from negotiating with a hired human resource manager. It’s easy to pepper an HR manager with questions about the offer, but you’ll feel a little intimidated by your potential boss.
On the other hand, the HR manager may have more time to negotiate with potential candidates. Therefore, they could have over ten interviewees who are eager to accept the offer. Since the HR manager isn’t going to benefit directly from your services, they may be reluctant to increase their offer. But a potential boss, who stands to gain directly from you, is more willing to break the precedent to give you a better offer.
5. Understand their Limitations
Be alive to the fact that your potential employer may like you and believe that you deserve to get the amount you are asking for, but still be unable to give it to you. This normally happens when the employer faces ironclad constraints like salary caps. Your offer won’t exceed this cap no matter how hard you negotiate.
For instance, if the company is hiring 30 similar experts all at once, it’ll be very difficult to convince the interviewer to pay you more than the rest. But you can ask to be given a different start date, vacation time, off days, and bonuses. Conversely, if you are interviewing for a new position at a small company that has never employed someone else in your position, you can ask for a higher offer.
6. Be Ready to Answer Tough Questions
When you’re going for a job interview, expect to get any kind of question. Therefore, when you make a counteroffer, be ready to answer as many questions as possible regarding the offer you give. Be armed with the right answers so that you don’t end up saying inelegantly evasive.
Never lie in a job interview because it might come back to bite you. If you don’t know the answer, just say you don’t know instead of being deceitful. Nothing will catch you off-guard if you prepare thoroughly. Your objective should be to answer as many questions as possible honestly without being defensive or dishonest.
7. Understand the Interviewer’s Intent
When you focus on the interviewer’s questions so much, you fail to understand their intentions. Always remember that the questioner’s intention matters more than the question. Keeping this mantra at the back of your mind will help you to stay calm when you’re asked a question you don’t like. Instead of becoming angry, try to understand the intention of the questioner and answer it accordingly.
8. Analyze the Whole Deal
Many people understand a job offer to mean a salary. Therefore, they’ll base their negotiations solely on the proposed salary. They don’t take time to analyze the entire deal.
Don’t fall into the same trap. Although the salary matters, you shouldn’t ignore other aspects of the offer that could benefit you more than the salary, including flexible working hours, advanced responsibilities, medical cover, promotion, training, etc. Negotiate these issues simultaneously, not serially. Remember to explain the importance of each item in the offer.
9. Don’t Negotiate for the Sake of It
It’s very easy to fall into the trap of wanting to prove a point to your interviewer by raising irrelevant issues. You don’t have to negotiate if the offer you got is already more than what you had in mind. Only negotiate for the most important things that are relevant to the job offer. Don’t try to prove that you are a tough negotiator by haggling over every little item.
10. Don’t Delay Your Response
When you’re receiving offers from different potential employers, you may be tempted to hold on a little longer before you respond hoping that a better offer will come your way soon. That’s well and good but you need to understand that when an employer gives you a job offer, they expect you to respond within a certain period.
So, don’t waste the bird that’s already in your hand waiting for the two that are out there in the bush. It’s a balancing act that requires your intuition and zeal. Don’t ignore or downplay deadlines because you might create the wrong impression.
