I want to share a recent success story about Joe, Director of Manufacturing (ME):
“This used to be a great company, but something changed.” A new CEO turned a once family-owned company into one that was becoming increasingly employee-unfriendly. “I’m working 80-hour weeks with no end in sight under really bad conditions,” lamented Joe.
Soon after we started working together, he quit his job (disclaimer: I don’t recommend quitting without something else lined up!). We hit the job search hard, and a month and a half later he had an offer that wasn’t his number one choice. The pay was a little less than what he was hoping for, and the position meant relocating to a city he and his family weren’t excited about. But we continued his job search.
Soon after he found exactly what he wanted with a multibillion-dollar multinational corporation. He received an offer that was precisely what he was hoping for. But this is not the end of the story: I recommended that we go back and negotiate. “I don’t know because this is exactly what I wanted,” said Joe.
I knew he would always take two weeks every year to visit his mother overseas, not for vacation but to take care of her. The offer he received only gave him two weeks of paid vacation a year. We put together an ask that would land him a killer offer without killing the deal. The company came back with $25k more in base pay, 4 weeks of paid vacation time, a plusher relocation package, and the best part: the company would fly him to his mother’s city, let him work out of the local plant for two weeks, and the entire thing would be a business trip!
What are some things you would ask for if you were going to negotiate your salary and benefits?