Negotiating a Job Offer

You have a job offer! Now what?

My client “Noel” just received an exciting job offer. He texted me in all caps: I OFFICIALLY HAVE THE OFFER! And it’s exactly the salary that he requested in his interview, plus a bonus package and flex time.

And now he’s faced with a choice: Does he negotiate further? Or accept the offer as is?

He wants to advocate for himself and leverage this step up as much as he can, but he also wants to cultivate trust with his new employer.

There are two schools of thought here:

1. You always, always negotiate, even when it’s a great offer. If you don’t, you’re leaving money on the table. Your employer expects you to ask for more. In fact, if you don’t, it says something about who you are and how you’ll perform on behalf of the company. You should always ask. If it’s a yes, hooray! You’ve won! And even if the answer is “no,” you graciously accept the offer, knowing you did the most you could to increase your earnings.

2. If it’s a great offer, then you’ve already succeeded. You named a number and they met it. You already demonstrated good market sense and they responded with respect. That’s a healthy dynamic, and a good sign for your work ahead. You express your gratitude and enthusiastically accept.

I think you’ll find pretty even advice in both of these camps, so it’s a personal choice which route you go. Neither is “wrong.”

To decide what’s right for you, here are four things to consider:

1. Market Research

The biggest question when negotiating your salary is: How appropriate is the level in the context of the market? This requires some research.

Use sites like Payscale, Glassdoor, Salary.com and Linkedin Salary Insights, or ask discreetly within your network to get a clearer sense of the appropriate salary level. You’ll need to use multiple sources, not just one, to put together an accurate picture for yourself.

Knowing this key information helps you to respond from an informed place. Even a “great” offer in your eyes can be below market rate, and if you’ve been underpaid in the past, this is your opportunity to make up for that disparity. If the offer truly is at or above market rate, that’s a signal that the employer values you and wants you to feel genuinely supported.

2. Total Compensation

As you review the offer, keep in mind that salary is only one piece of the compensation puzzle. All of the pieces of the offer are meant to come together to bring value into your life—including direct pay like salary and bonuses as well as indirect pay like benefits (health, life, and disability insurance, retirement contributions) and perks (like gym memberships and tuition assistance).

One of my clients worked at a company where the retirement match was unusually generous, so considering that as part of her total compensation changed how she looked at her role in comparison to another offer.

Be sure to zoom out and look at the whole package together to fully understand the offer.

3. The Pay Transparency Era

Some would say that “always negotiate” is outdated blanket advice from a time when companies lowballed as standard practice.

These days, many organizations lead with competitive offers because they want to attract the best talent. Salaries are also less secretive than they used to be—we have many more tools to gain access to real salary numbers, and it’s becoming more common to include salary numbers in job postings (some states even require it). (Have you seen this ad from Indeed about a “competitive” salary? It makes me laugh and cringe every time.)

Still, people are undercompensated every day—especially those of us who hold racial, gender, disability, and sexuality identities outside of the dominant norm. Some would say that companies are more selfish than ever and less concerned now with caring for the real humans who work for them.

You’ll have to decide for yourself how hopeful or cynical you feel about it all, and a lot depends on your interactions with this particular employer during the hiring process. Did they seem up front and human? Did they seem secretive and squirrely?

4. Meaningful Alignment

What matters most here is not haggling for sport or checking a box. What matters is how aligned this offer feels for you.

What do you need to feel supported and valued through your work? What does your family need? What would make this offer not just barely “enough” to make life work, but abundant for you?

If you’ve coached with me before, this is a good time to look back at your core values and consider how they align with this job offer. Sit with these questions and do a brain dump of your answers on paper.

Evaluate your offer & respond

Now that you’ve reflected on these considerations, it’s time to evaluate the offer and respond.

Evaluate the offer by asking yourself:

• Is every part of the package aligned with what I need?

• Is anything unclear or missing (title clarity, start date, remote policy, professional development budget, relocation, equity)?

• Is there anything that would help make the first year smoother (working with a leadership coach, for example!)?

If you decide to accept with enthusiasm, you can say something like:

“Thank you again for the offer. I’ve reviewed everything, and it aligns really well with what I was looking for. I’m excited to accept and to join the team. Please let me know the next steps.”

If you decide that you want to negotiate further, you can say something like:

“I’m thrilled about this offer. Before I formally accept, I want to check in on two small things…” and bring up your questions or points for negotiation. You can use phrases like, “according to my market research, the salary level for this type of position for a person with my level of experience should be X. That’s where I’m hoping to be.” Or, “I happen to know that someone with this same title at [competitor company] makes $X.”

And then—get this—SHUT UP. Stop talking. Stop typing. It can feel awkward to have silence there. Many of us want to fill it in, and when we do, we start backtracking or negotiating against ourselves by saying something like, “You’re probably not in a position to offer me that kind of level…” or “I’d be happy with even a little bit closer to that…” or some other nonsense. Negotiation coach Alexandra Dickinson once told me: Speech is silver, silence is gold. Let the employer feel the awkwardness and fill the silence. You sit there, strong, and wait.

One strategy that I recommend in that moment is to imagine that you are not sitting alone and negotiating on behalf of yourself—you have a whole group of people behind you. Maybe that group is your family, and you’re advocating for all of you together. Maybe that group is an identity you hold, and you’re advocating on behalf of all women. Picturing the group surrounding you can give you that sense of strength and conviction that is so important in big moments like these.

And finally, when the negotiation is over—celebrate. Don’t wait until you’ve given your notice or left your past role or started the new one or have your firm footing. We’re always trying to delay our celebrations! Celebrate right now. You did an amazing thing. And you’re walking through the threshold to your next chapter. Congratulations!