Salary...of course!Okay, I'll try not to make this too long. I worked full time in an industry that I loved prior to having children. Before having kids, I made a decision to take a job with a company that is notorious for under-paying because the job that they were offering was one that I thought would be great experience (I actually had a higher offer at the same time for a position that I wasn't as thrilled about and turned it down). My full-time salary before having kids was $50K. In the past six years, I have worked part-time for my previous employer (the underpaying one) and then worked as a part-time consultant for two different companies making $40/hour. Last week I got an email from an Executive VP of a company that remembered me from like 10 years ago and wants to talk to me about "opportunities" at his new company. I'm pretty sure, based on his title, what position he wants to talk to me about. I've researched the salary for the position and everything tells me that the going rate is $75-100K. Now here's my question...I obviously don't want to under-sell myself by asking for the lowest end of the range. But how would I go about justifying the mid-point of the range considering my history. By the way, the last job that I made $50K was the same title as the one that I am pretty sure I am interviewing for. And how would I handle the salary history if they ask for it? I am compulsively honest, so stretching the truth might be difficult for me. However, if there is a way to "spin" it, I would be grateful to hear ideas. My first telephone interview, since we are on opposite coasts, is Monday morning. I'm trying to prepare for anything that comes up, so I thought I'd get this out of the way. Thanks to all that reply! Well, first of all, I'm not sure where you did your research, but if it's salary.com or similar place, they are almost all high across the board--by quite a bit. If I were you, I'd base my salary requirements on what you're getting as a consultant. $40/hr is low, and I'm sure you know that, due to the lack of benefits. However, extrapolated out into a full-time job, it's a tad over $83k per year. Now, since you weren't consulting full time, you didn't need/want benefits, so you can figure that your rate didn't reflect your need for them. But a f/t job with this company will likely come with a benefit package; I'd consider it a "wash." So, when asked what you're looking for, you might want to say, "I currently make $40/hour consulting, and expect a comparable salary, somewhere in the range of X to Y." You can make your range $75 to $85k, or $65 to $75k, or whatever, with the low end the least amount you'd be happy with. However, I'd be very careful if I were you to price yourself out of the market. Assuming the salary calculators are high, $75k might be mid range, and not low end. And how high have salaries risen in your field since you were last employed? Salaries overall have not risen much in the last few years, so be sure to see if you can find out what simialr real jobs in your real area are paying. Basing your range on a hypothetical salary range may backfire! I just went through the interview & hiring experience for the first time in 5 years, having worked out of my home as a freelancer so I could be home for my kids, too. My own experience was that I was not going to get as much as I did 5 years ago, regardless of my qualifications. I'm making $1.50/hr less, but in my case, the job is with a non-profit with a commendable goal, and I like the job and the people--which made it worth it for me to go back to work. Thank you for the insight. My research did include online work, but also, I have maintained relationships with quite a few people in the industry that have helped me out. I have a friend who had the same position with the same company and I know he was making more than 100K. But of course, he's been working full time in the industry while I've been doing part-time consulting work...so his experience level is obviously much higher. I'm hoping to throw the ball back into the interviewers court if salary requirement comes up by saying the standard "it's negotiable based on the responsibilities of the job" but want to be prepared just in case. Thanks again!
Good luck! And, clearly it will help if you can get them to throw out a range first. You may not even need to worry about offer/counter offer if their range is well within yours!
You might be jumping the gun a little, but it's certainly to your credit to want to be as prepared as possible for your first interview. Frankly, my expectation would be that you'll be told - at some point - what the salary offer is, not asked what your anticipated salary is. However, I think you need to be prepared with an anticipated salary range - just in case it comes up during your telephone interview. Since you were earning $50K before, I don't think it's out of the way to suggest that your anticipated salary will be negotiable within the $60K to $70K range. Most people feel that salary surveys tend to run higher than the actual salaries being paid in the marketplace, and there are a ton of variables that can impact salaries offered by individual employer - too many, in fact, to list here. There's really no "spin" required on an anticipated salary range in the $60K to $70K range, based on what you wrote. Just be honest about what you've been doing lately. But you also need to realistically consider what level of income would please you and which you'd be happy to accept if it were offered. If you were earning $40 bucks per hour as a full-time consultant, your annualized earnings would be about $83K , so if you're offered $60K with benefits, allowing for the value of those benefits to be around 30% of your salary, the total value of your compensation package would be right around $80K, so an anticipated salary range that's negotiable in the $60K to $70K range sounds reasonable and realistic to me - and you won't have to "spin" your salary history. Zat help? Paul W. Barada The Negotiation Expert | |
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