Who Wants a Raise?

Why, you do, of course! The big question, naturally, is how to go about it. It seems that the tactics we employ are the ones least likely to guarantee success (Who here has “hinted” or “suggested” to your boss when it comes to salary issues? Or been upset or “hurt” when no one noticed you were raise-worthy? We thought so. You can put your hands down now.) Well, question no more. fwm Expert Contributor Laura Browne is here, with her fabulous new book, Raise Rules for Women: How To Make More Money At Work (Laura co-authored this book with Jill Ferguson). We’ll let Laura tell you a bit about herself:

I train high potential women from Fortune 1000 companies to be better managers and communicators through WOMEN Unlimited, a national company that helps businesses who are concerned about women’s leadership development. Companies such as American Express, Bank of America, Genentech, IBM, Microsoft, Sony and Williams-Sonoma send participants to attend my 6-month program. They learn how to be more confident, gain visibility in the organization, network, communicate more effectively, influence others, and take initiative. I help them to find out what they need to do to be more successful.

Raise Rules for Women offers strategies and truly useful solutions to getting the raise you deserve. We highly recommend having a look!

Reading it raised some questions for me. Chief among them: why is this book so necessary? Because whether we like to admit it or not, it is--most career women can identify with the pitfalls Laura identifies. In fact, many of us can recall specific examples in our own careers when we either did not recognize our worth, or simply failed to communicate it properly. Are we still worried about being nice, or being well-liked? Or does it go deeper than that?

Three Tips for Negotiating With Goliath

Our three Yahoo!Seeds for Success finalists continue to grow their businesses and learn from others in the business community through the mentorship provided by Carolyn and a team of mentors drawn from our fwm Expert Contributors. If you haven't been to the Seeds for Success page lately, drop by for updates on these three women entrepreneurs as they move closer to the selection of the contest winner. This week we were very pleased to welcome mentor Carol Frohlinger, Esq., co-author of Her Place at the Table: A Woman’s Guide to Negotiating Five Key Challenges to Leadership Success and co-Founder of Negotiating Women, Inc. Carol's advice resonates with any career woman who has faced a negotiation, big or small. In other words, all of us. Here is what Carol had to say about our finalists’ progress:

I recently had the pleasure to speak with each of the Seeds For Success finalists. Our topic was negotiation. Each of the entrepreneurs was very clear about the myriad of opportunities to negotiate ─ with suppliers, service providers, independent contractors and, of course, customers and prospective customers. For these three businesses as well as every other start-up I know though, when it comes to negotiation, it can seem as though it’s a clear case of David v. Goliath. So the question is:

How do you negotiate effectively when the other party has more leverage?

Planning is critical. Some important things to consider:

1. The first thing is that you need to figure out is what you need to get in order to make a “good deal”.

Examples:

When dealing with customers:

• What is the lowest price you can charge and still make a decent margin?
• How does that stack up against your competition, assuming you have competition?
• What differentiates your product if you are not the lowest cost provider?
• What value does that differentiation provide to your customers?

When dealing with service providers:

• What defines a good working relationship from your perspective?
• What kind of turn-around timeframe do you need?

What dealing with independent contractors: 

• What is fair compensation?
• What rights should you retain?

If you don’t know what you need to negotiate for, it’s impossible to be successful. The secret here is to do your homework ahead of time.

2. Consider your BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement). What will you do if you are unable to reach agreement with this particular party? What alternatives do you have? How good are your alternatives? How can you improve them?

Examples:
If this potential customer won’t pay the price you need, where else can you sell? Perhaps you’d really like to have this customer but, trust me, your business won’t shut down if you can’t agree on terms that make sense. And, if you sell your product for less than it takes to make it, you can be absolutely sure you won’t make it up on volume!

When dealing with a potential supplier:

• Can you source what you need to produce your product someplace else?
• What would be the cost difference?
• The delivery difference?

Always have at least a Plan B, you can’t walk away from a bad deal if you don’t have alternatives. And, think about a Plan C too.

3. Build your confidence but realizing you probably have more leverage than you may think.

Examples:

When dealing with customers Your product may be unique, you may have had the idea first and can bring it to market more quickly than anyone else.

When dealing with service providers:

• You may have an “in” with someone who has influence over the individual with whom you are dealing.
• You may not want to use this leverage, at least not right at the beginning but it helps to know that you have some clout too.

Fear is easy to spot and some have no qualms about exploiting yours; confidence counts!

As their businesses grow, the opportunities these women have to negotiate will also expand, for example, as they hire people, they’ll be negotiating with them too, not only about compensation but about performance standards. I’m confident that their negotiation skills will too because they’ve each made a commitment to building them.

© 2008 Negotiating Women, Inc.
www.negotiatingwomen.com