They Want Me! Can I Negotiate?

I regularly get the call for job seekers that are in the latter stages of the hiring process and the conversation goes something like this:

Job Seeker: “I just got offered the job with ABC Company.” (excitement in their voice)
Mike: “Great job! Congratulations. Tell me about it. I want to hear all the good stuff.
Job Seeker: “It is great job. The people are great. I have great responsibilities. But (long pause) the offer isn’t quite right. The ________(fill in the word: Salary, Bonus, Title, Vacation, Benefits) isn’t what I was hoping for. In this job market, can I negotiate?”

When job seekers ask me for my thoughts on negotiating, I always say, why not? This is the time to negotiate if you want to. You won’t be able to negotiate after you start. If the offer doesn’t have some of the key things you are looking for, it can’t hurt to ask.

I typically will get the response from the job seeker that if he or she tries to negotiate, it might anger the company resulting in the company pulling the offer. One senior VP level job seeker asked me this question a few months back. After we discussed it for a while, he went home and shared my suggestions to his wife. A half hour later, he calls me. He proceeded to tell me that his wife asked him if I was nuts. Does he realize what the market is like out there right now? I am sure there were a few adjectives thrown around to describe my craziness.

It is my experience that most companies and hiring managers have spent hours upon hours sourcing you and vetting you to make sure you are the right fit for the company, their department, and their team. Once they have made the decision to offer you the job they don’t want to lose that investment in the time and money it took to find you. At that point, they have determined that you are the right candidate.

I have found that most of the concerns by job seekers really stem around a fear of how to effectively approach it. They realize that they haven’t honed that skill and aren’t comfortable trying it at the point of the offer. Here are a few things to consider if you are considering negotiating your offer.

Ask for the Offer in Writing: Always ask for the offer in writing. It is a good practice to understand all the components of the offer. If something is not in your offer letter than you don’t know if it is truly going to be a part of your total package.

Prepare and Compare: Do a comparison analysis of your offer with your prior job compensation and benefits. Divide a sheet of paper list out the components. Translate your benefits in to dollar amounts. For example a week of vacation is worth 1/52 of your annual base salary. What are the differences in the 401(k) match? What are the differences in premium contributions to the health plans? Once you have listed everything out and summed up the totals, look at what the variation is between the offer and your past comp/benefits package.

Understand What Is Important To You: Think about what it will take for you to say “yes.” What would the offer look like for you to feel completely excited? You need to determine what is minimally acceptable to you. What will you compromise on? Will you tradeoff a lower salary with a higher bonus? Do you want four weeks of vacation but will take three weeks if that is what is offered? Sometime companies are able to tradeoff in one area to compensate for another area.

Show Excitement: Start your discussion with by reminding them of how interested you are in the role and your excitement about starting. Thank them for the offer and the opportunity. Reinforce this message throughout the discussion. Set up the meeting to be in person if possible. It is easier to read the body language, face expressions, and general tone of the discussion.

Use Questions: Share with them that you have questions about the offer and the total compensation package (the compensation and benefits). Express to them that you have reviewed their offer (remember to reinforce your excitement) in comparison to your prior company and that you what to know if there is some room for movement in a few areas. For example: Is it possible to move the base salary by $200 per month? That would bring me closer to the total compensation package that I am accustomed to and I would be willing to start next Monday. You are not trying to corner them.

Follow up: If you get changes to the offer, ask for the revisions in a revised offer letter. Remember to thank them for their time and interest in you.

The Networking Light Switch

It was an interesting and exciting week in the job search front. Three people that I have gotten to know while helping out with job search groups landed new jobs this week. Also, I met a new person who is just launching her job search. All four have something in common: their networking efforts.

The first three individuals were well into their job search when I first met them a few months. They were making new connections through networking. As I met them individually I asked them all the same question: “Who are you networking with? Be specific with the names, levels and companies.” I was looking to see if they were networking in the right levels based on the types of jobs they were looking for. With these three, they all seemed to be penetrating the right networking circles. In fact, based on how aggressive they were with their networking efforts, I felt it was just a matter of time before opportunities presented themselves to them, and they would be getting interviews and eventually a job offer. They had flipped on the networking light switch. They got it. They understood that focused, structured networking was going to be the key to them landing their next job. Sure enough, just like the fall weather in Western Oregon, when it rains it pours. All three moved into the interview process with not only the company they got offers with, but were also in serious interview discussions with other companies as well.

The fourth individual was just starting her job search. She had been out for about a month and had networked with a few people. As we talked I began to ask her questions about her job search process and networking efforts. Okay, I am sure my probing questions probably felt more like an inquisition than a casual coffee chat. I was asking questions like:

• Who are you networking with?
• What are your networking goals?
• How many networking meetings do you have lined up for next week?
• What trade or professional associations meetings and events are you attending?
• Are you following up with the people you meet at the professional association meetings to set up face-to-face meetings?
• Are you networking with mostly people who are currently working or with others that are seeking work as well?
• Are moving past your first generation of networking connections?
  

After my rapid fire round of 20 questions, I turned the spotlight off, took off the bad cop hat and put on the good cop hat and we discussed her job search plans. I shared my ideas and suggestions about setting networking goals of have at least five face-to-face meetings a week and one professional association event a week. We talked about how most people will be glad to meet with you if you ask. I shared that most people will connect you to others if you ask. As she tried to soak it all in she finally paused for a moment and then said to me: “This isn’t going to be easy is it.” At that point, I knew that she had seen that networking light switch on the wall. The question that she will have to ask herself now is, will she choose to flip it on.

Is the Traditional Resume Dead?

Is the paper resume and its MS Word version dead? That is the question I am asking myself after being introduced to the site VisualCV.com.

This past week Joshua Waldman, a social media expert with Career Enlightenment, made a presentation to the job search group I facilitate regarding leveraging social media sites to find a job faster. In Joshua’s presentation, he introduced the group to the site VisualCV.com and explained how to capitalize on this new technology with other sites like LinkedIn or Twitter. VisualCV is a dynamic site that allows you to post documents, videos, links and logos to reinforce your experience and skills that are found on your resume. For example, you could post the PowerPoint marketing presentation to VisualCV to reinforce your marketing project accomplishment that you have listed in the resume.

You can create customized versions of your VisualCV to send to particular companies or positions and make them private so that only the appropriate people can view their respective customized version. You can link your VisualCV to your LinkedIn profile. You can respond to a Twitter job posting instantly with your VisualCV. Imagine having a conversation with a networking connection and passing your VisualCV via your iPhone to him or her right there.

Since a picture is a thousand words, I encourage you to check out Joshua's VisualCV site as an example.

While the old MS Word version may not be dead just yet, in the near future it will be time to consider listing it on the Federal Endangered Species Act.

A Recruiter's Story of the Job Search Process

Sometimes it is interesting to hear the experiences of others who are moving through the job search process, through their own words. I came across this story by an agency recruiter that was laid off. Here is a guy who helps other companies find their talent every day, and now he is on the side trying to convince companies that he is the right talent for them.

Check out his story A Story From The Job-Search Trenches. He covers all the elements of his job search process. His words speak for themselves.

The Golden Bullet in the Job Search

I previously wrote about silver bullets in the job search process (see May 31, 2009 “Job Search Silver Bullets”). These are networking connections that become advocates for you and lead you to connections and jobs that you might not otherwise have had accessed without them.

Recently I had a networking lunch meeting with my former HR colleague and I observed that she was truly disengaged with her current company. She has a long history with her company of steady growth in responsibilities over the years. However, the company was recently acquired by a bigger company headquartered in a different city and the new company has a different set of values and decision making authority for employees. She no longer felt empowered to make decisions. As we talked she finally revealed that she was thinking about initiating a job search. She hadn’t yet pulled together her resume and she wasn’t sure what she wanted to do next in her career. She indicated that she might look at changing industries or even moving to a different type of role in human resources. Then she said something even more significant. She thought about immediately reaching out to her former CEO to get a reference and network with him.

As we discussed things regarding this CEO connection I thought about the silver bullet concept. This was a huge and powerful connection for her. He was someone that in just one phone call could swing wide open doors for her that she normally wouldn’t have been able to crack open. That is when I shared with her that the CEO was not a silver bullet but really a golden bullet. On a few occasions we may meet a person that may be an even more significant and powerful connection than any other one.

I suggested to my friend that she take some time thinking and preparing herself first before she ever approaches the CEO. Knowing this CEO, I would fully expect him to pepper her with questions and she would want to be ready. Being unprepared could diminish the impression she was trying to make and lose some of the potential impact of the opportunities that might come from the meeting. He would be such a tremendous asset for her as a reference and advocate that she would want to do everything to make sure she was prepared. I asked her to think about the differences between the successful meetings and unsuccessful meetings she had with him when they worked together. She quickly indicated that the successful ones were where she had done her homework.

After we parted from lunch I received an email from her that evening indicating that she thought about our conversation and she was going to begin preparing for a job search. She also indicated that she wouldn’t reach out to the CEO until she answered the questions to herself that she would expect the CEO and others would ask.

While a lot of us may not have a golden bullet like my friend has, we are likely to encounter people that will provide us tremendous value and even advocacy in our job search. You may not even recognize it in that first meeting. You want to prepare yourself for each of the connections. Do the homework.

How Did You Find Your Past Jobs? It Probably Wasn’t Through The Front Door

This past week I facilitated a two-day job search techniques workshop that focused on penetrating the so-called “hidden job market”. We had 30 very active participants in the workshop that on average have been out looking for about five months.

I opened the workshop with an exercise asking the participants to review how they learned about their past five jobs, starting with their most recent position and then working backwards. The worksheet asked them to tally their responses by the following categories: Friends/Family, Co-workers, Managers, Staffing Agencies, Others, and Online Posting/Advertising. The participants consolidated their data together with the others at their respective table and then each table recorded their data on the master flipchart to reveal the entire class’s results. Drum roll please: 73% of the jobs were found through friends/family, co-workers, managers, staffing agencies, or some other connection. Only 27% of the jobs were found through advertised postings– the front door.

We have all heard that roughly about 10 to 15% of all jobs are ever advertised. That means that the other 85% to 90% of the jobs are filled through other methods, the hidden job market. The hidden job market is the jobs that are found through friends, family, co-workers, managers, connections, and networking and to a smaller percentage, through recruiters. The Department of Labor provided results that revealed that only 5% of jobs were filled through advertised posting. 48% were found through referrals, 24% were found the direct networking, and 23% were through agencies.

When I happen to get into a job search discussion about job postings and networking with people that I meet, I regularly ask them the same question that I asked the workshop participants, how did they learned about their past jobs? Inevitably, they pause and say that it was a friend, co-worker or some other type of connection that introduced them to the job opportunity. Typically they will say that 4 out 5 of their past positions were found that way. It surprises them after they say that, because they never really have thought about it from that perspective. One job seeker that I recently spoke with indicated that she hadn’t really searched for a job in the past because she always just put the word out to her friends and they always connected her to her next job. I pointed out that she was actually job searching, and that she was leveraging her network of friends as connections.

I asked the workshop participants a follow up question: Where are you currently spending the majority of your job search time looking for work? Is it searching job boards and responding to ads or is it out networking and trying to make new connections? Most participants nodded and raised their hands to the first option, searching job boards and responding to ads. They were spending a disproportionate, and typically the vast majority, of their time on the smallest slice of the pie.

As I shared with the workshop participants, I recommend that you spend less time trying to get through the front door of the company (applying for jobs that are advertised) and focus the majority of your time on getting through the back door, side door, patio door, hidden door, trap door, cellar door or any other crack or opening that you might find. That is how they found their past jobs and will likely be how they find their next job. The same will be true for you as well.