Should I negotiate for higher salary if I have no previous work experience?
4 01 Mar 2017 18:54 by u/Bolbi
Hello everyone, I am graduating in May and I have a question. Would you advise negotiating for a higher salary to a newgrad with 0 previous internships/ tech-related jobs?
Thanks
19 comments
4 u/curomo 01 Mar 2017 18:55
Check where you are relative to the market, if the offer is low, negotiate.
3 u/Bolbi [OP] 01 Mar 2017 18:57
How do you determine where you are relative to the market?
5 u/curomo 01 Mar 2017 19:10
well I don't know your gender for sure, so I'm not sure that I should say anymore... how else to us men keep our $0.23 bonus!!
But since this is voat and we have no women here: lots of sites have it.
I just checked on glass door: you can punch in the job title and market that your are in and they'll give you a reasonable estimate. Remember that salary is only one aspect of compensation. Think about vacation time, work hours, commute, and other benefits. (eg, are you willing to take $5000k/year less for a stock option worth $5000? the answer depends on your financial position and confidence in the company. hint - no matter what your confidence is, diversify when you can!!)
Welcome to the patriarchy!
4 u/1F4A9 01 Mar 2017 20:24
As someone who hired people like you: nope. Unless you have multiple offers to choose from, you have a special skill, or there has been an opening for a long time and it seems likely that there are no other suitable applicants. They are taking a risk with you because you haven't proven yourself yet as a productive employee. As yourself this: can they get someone more qualified of someone similarly qualified that doesn't ask for more?
First get the job, you can always negotiate a higher salary later. Your bargaining position will be better then.
4 u/karaz 01 Mar 2017 21:43
Short answer: No.
Long answer: You have no bargaining chips and nothing to win other than a couple of extra bucks. Don't be greedy, take the low paying job and wait a year. After that, you can reassess your situation by checking other offers and either asking for a raise or leaving the company for a more lucrative position.
Experience is what pays, you have none. Don't kneecap yourself, everyone starts with a shit salary.
3 u/obvious_throwaway1 01 Mar 2017 18:57
Regardless of experience you should always negotiate salary. I've been involved in hiring for over ten years and 100% of the time the initial offer is 80-90% of the max offer I am willing and able to spend. I don't agree with it, but it's always been the expectation - same process spanning across 4 different organizations in 4 different fields.
The offer you get will always be lower than the company is willing to pay. Failure to negotiate lets them know right out the door that you are someone they can walk all over and fosters a bad beginning relationship in my opinion.
In short, HR are assholes.
7 u/piratse 01 Mar 2017 19:47
This is not always true. I also have done years of hiring. When someone is BRAND NEW out of school, I'll happily pull the offer if they throw a big stink about salary. 1) they have no experience 2) they are unproven 3) it shows me they would be willing to jump ship at the next highest offer. 4) they are basing it off what they think they should make based on the internet. I will only negotiate with people that have leverage. And a recent graduate with no experience or other offers has shit.
3 u/obvious_throwaway1 01 Mar 2017 20:07
Perhaps I should clarify I've always worked for Fortune 100 companies, and 100% of the time a manager would not be allowed to pull an offer if someone negotiated the offer - the absolute worst that would happen is HR would reject the negotiated request and state they are firm on salary.
Pulling a job offer because of salary negations would land a FLSA lawsuit faster than you could blink for every org I've worked at.
2 u/karaz 01 Mar 2017 21:49
This makes very little sense to me. What exactly would be the grounds for the lawsuit? I don't know about other professions, i'm asking about programming jobs because i've never heard anything like this.
1 u/obvious_throwaway1 01 Mar 2017 21:52
It isn't necessarily unheard of - but you basically have to ask for ridiculous things for it to happen, it's extremely uncommon. If you're asking for 2.5-5% more salary the worst they will do is say the initial offer is final. If you ask for 25% higher salary, 100% more stock options, a company car, subsidized living, and relocation assistance - sure, anyone with a brain will tell you to go pound sand because you're not only not in the same ballpark but you're likely going to be a huge pain in the ass to employ.
I'm trying to be realistic here.
2 u/karaz 01 Mar 2017 22:02
I understand that, i am confused about the 'pulling the job offer'. You mean from the guy or off the market? Because it's pretty commonplace that if a guy for a 60-80 offer asks for 80 without having the skills to warrant it, he's not getting the job. Doesn't mean the offer gets pulled from the market though, just that the guy isn't getting it.
1 u/obvious_throwaway1 01 Mar 2017 23:25
If a guy is offered 60 and asks for 80, that's a 25% increase. Like I said before, anything over 5% without a really good reason is justified to pull an offer without a "firm". That still doesn't negate that the 5% is basically built into every offer I've ever seen, and I've hired roughly 30 people for 4 different large organizations in the past 15 years. Not a huge sample, but enough for me to know a consistent theme when I see one.
1 u/karaz 02 Mar 2017 00:00
I can see that, but the premise is that it's one guy for the offer, not 10 or 20 as it generally is. You can negotiate extra 5% if you're the only one, but if you're basically intern level like OP... you have 20 other dudes jumping at the offer. In this case... negotiating higher salary is really fucking stupid,
2 u/piratse 01 Mar 2017 19:44
Are you just going in assuming you need to ask for more? That's stupid. You need to look at work life balance, benefits, company size, advancement opportunity, and what the average for a new person in the industry is. Generally, your first job you take what you can get, you have no real value yet. Or you better have multiple offers.
2 u/Anonymous_User_69 01 Mar 2017 21:41
Negotiating is just a contest of leverage. You can't negotiate a salary higher than what you are worth, however, you can negotiate up to that point. It isn't a verbal debate where if you win you get more money.
2 u/zquad 01 Mar 2017 22:18
Many people offered valid points. Ultimately you have to have something, some talent, skill, work experience the company wants. What you can do is volunteer on open source projects that the company uses that you can use to upsell yourself. Please remember your current situation for future reference so that your future self don't find yourself attempting to bluff knowing you're not holding anything.
1 u/Bfwilley 01 Mar 2017 23:49
If you never ask, your will never hear some one say YES.
1 u/Dr_Poop 02 Mar 2017 00:02
I would try, but lightly. so you don't go way above your worth. The way I see it, if they offered you a job, they'll counter either way even if it is to say "We can only give you the same salary we offered". You have to accept the second offer though, you won't get more after that
1 u/zak_the_mac 02 Mar 2017 00:24
It's easy to get something to negotiate with: apply for a number of jobs, and compare the salaries they offer you. If the job you particularly wanted didn't match the salary offer from another company that you didn't want so much, you could ask the company you wanted to work for to match it.