How to get a raise at work
August 25, 2008 by Jennifer Chait
Filed under Workplace
There’s no hard and fast way to know if you can get a raise at work. Your contract may be set in stone, or you may have a lame boss, or company issues to deal with. However, if you get a meeting and a chance to negotiate you could try the following…
Before hand: Visit Salary.com, check out similar pay for other same-type positions in your area, and look at the Department of Labor website. All of these can give you fair wage info about your particular position, which means you’re ready to present those figures and negotiate smartly.
Be a decent employee: If you’re a nice, happy, and valued employee 90% of the time, you’re far more likely to get a raise then some other guy who acts like a jerk most of the time. You don’t have to be Pollyanna, just be better than most of your co-workers. This means avoiding gossip, co-worker confrontations, and making sure you’re polite and get your work done.
Be willing: Offer to take on a special project or learn a new task that can help boost your worth to the company.
Use new employees: If your workplace hires on new folks, and you can find out their salary, you can use it to win a raise. Say you’ve been there a while doing the same work the new employee is doing, but you’re making very little more $, point this out.
Don’t: Threaten to quit; unless you mean it. Even if you don’t mean it, threatening to quit if you don’t get your ideal raise, sort of puts you in a bad position. If you get the raise, your supervisor will wonder about your commitment and negotiation tactics, which doesn’t exactly set you up with the company in a positive light. The only good way to pull this off is if you can somehow nicely and casually mention that you’ve been offered another position for more pay, but you just love your job so much you’d hate to leave.
Have you ever asked for a raise and got it? What did you do?
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