Hey, guys. Welcome to the podcast. I have a special episode today by request. I'm going to talk about how to negotiate a job offer, and I'm sincerely hoping that there's a lot of you out there that are in this position or very soon will be, and you'll find this information really useful. Welcome to MSL talk with Tom Caravella, a podcast specifically designed for MSLs and all things field medical. Hey, guys. Thanks for joining me.
I've been getting a lot of questions lately from job seekers wanting to know about, how to negotiate a job offer. So I wanted to dedicate some time and share my 6 quick rules for job offer negotiation. So before I get into that, there's a few questions that I need to ask of you guys and you need to ask yourself, I guess, when you get close to a job offer. Number 1, are you working with a head con headhunter or a recruiter?
I think that's really important because if you are, your recruiter should really help you with this. I would definitely rely on your recruiter, spend some time, you know, making sure that you can get as much detail from them and you can share as much detail so that you guys are both on the same page. So for example, some of the questions that you might wanna ask the recruiter is, you know, what is the salary range for the position? What's the bonus potential?
When they make an offer, is it going to be a best and final offer? Does that client typically negotiate at all? Just so you know how to handle it, who is the offer going to be presented by? Is it presented by the hiring manager? Is it presented by the recruiter? And then when you get the offer, how long do you have before you know, so that you can, take some time to think about it before you make a decision typically. Sometimes it's a couple of days, sometimes it could be as much as a week.
So you wanna get as much detail from them as you can. Now keep in mind that your recruiter should be asking you questions. So the questions that you should anticipate are, you know, what are your salary expectations for the role? In this day and age, there are laws that will restrict people from asking you exactly how much you make, but you should tell them what your expectations are.
They may ask you what your bonus potential is, when your bonus gets paid out, if you have any long term incentives, you know, when those long term incentives get paid out. There's a lot of questions that they're gonna need to know so that they could communicate that back to their client, and everybody is on the same page. You know, do you have any vacations coming up?
Is, you know, is there anything, you know, if you if you have to give a certain amount of notice to your employer, before you can set up a start date. Anything that you can tell them is helpful. My advice is be as transparent as possible with your recruiter. And if it's you're not working with a recruiter and there's somebody internally, like an internal HR person that you're dealing with, be honest with them as well.
I think it's really important to set the tone and be transparent because you don't wanna have a, you don't wanna have anything between you and and, and the people that you're, you know, you're finally gonna be dealing with and negotiating with. You wanna develop a level of trust. The other thing is when it comes to the opportunity and you're about to be presented with an offer, you have to ask yourself, how badly do you want the position? How badly do you wanna accept the offer?
And that's important because if you there's no reason to negotiate, then you don't have to do so just for the sake of doing so. Have an idea in your head what you think a fair package is, kind of a best case scenario, maybe worst case scenario, find something in the middle. And then as the offer comes in, if if it's if you're really pleased with it and you wanna take the job, you don't have to negotiate, just for the sake of doing so.
So that's those are a couple of things I wanted to to kinda start with before we got into the 6 quick rules for job offer negotiation. Okay. So you're a job seeker, and you've been interviewing, and you're going through the process, and you're about to get an offer. So here are my 6 quick rules for job offer negotiation. So number 1, really, really important, be gracious.
You wanna make your first reaction positive, and you wanna make sure that you're showing whoever's presenting the offer how grateful you are. Don't balk. Don't seem negative. Don't seem like you're disappointed. Even if the offer doesn't come in exactly where you kind of expect, you definitely wanna have a gracious tone, and you wanna make sure that you keep it positive. Number 2, just be tactful. And again, be tactful, but I think be tactful and be positive at the same time.
Even if you are going to ask for more money, be very careful about your words and how you choose your words. You may even wanna practice this, because I think it's really important to set the whole tone of the negotiation based upon your response, your attitude, your tone, and how you handle the, ex not accepting of the offer, but how you handle the offer presentation, at the very beginning because that's gonna set the tone for everything else.
The other thing, number 3, is you wanna be responsive. So after the offers presented and you go back and you have some time to think about it, maybe talk to your recruiter about it, don't disappear. The the like, the worst thing that you can do and what really up such, you know, hiring managers and recruiters is when they are working with someone, an offer is presented, and all of a sudden, they they stop returning phone calls. They don't get back to the person. That certainly upsets people.
So I would be very careful to even if you need more time, just be honest about it. Just say, I'm thinking it over, want us to speak to my this is my significant other. I wanna crunch the numbers a little bit. You know, can you give me another day? Can you give me 2 days? Can I take the weekend? It's okay to ask for more time. It's okay to think about it. But you wanna be responsive and you wanna be transparent, and make sure that you're being tactful. Again, be positive, be gracious.
These are all important when you're negotiating the offer. Okay. Number 4, know the market and do your homework. Let's assume for a second that you are going to be asking for more money. It's very important that you have done your research, you know the range for the position, and you have an understanding of the market. Now how do you do that? Well, again, you can go back and make sure that you rely on your recruiter to help you with that information. You could talk to some colleagues.
There's ways of doing research. Obviously, if you're if you're interviewing for a medical science liaison position, you can go to the MSL Society. It does a really good job every year with a salary survey so you could get some data that way. There's there are resources available out there, that you can go to to have an understanding of the market so that you're not making an unrealistic request. Number 5. You wanna know your why.
You wanna make sure you can express your reason for asking for more money. Is it because of your the research that you've done? Is it because of you know, some internal motivation? Is it, you know, based upon your years of experience and what you feel you deserve for the position? Or is there a competitive offer? If you're interviewing at other places, and you've gotten an understanding of the range from other opportunities, use that information.
If you have a competitive offer, you don't have to necessarily disclose that information, but you can say, well, I am interviewing in other places, and I'm I'm considering, other offers that are in this range. Again, you're being tactful. You're being positive. You're being honest. You're being transparent, but you're just stating the facts.
So this is really, really important to make sure that, you have the the research, you've done your homework, and you also know your why so that you can present that. And then lastly, number 6 is don't over negotiate. You could really get yourself into trouble and you can implode the whole negotiation process by pushing it too far. And this is a situation where sometimes people wanna negotiate for the sake of negotiating, where they don't know when to stop negotiating.
But you need to pick up cues, and utilize the emotional intelligence that you need to see when, you've gotten to that point where it's a best and final. And even ask sometimes. Ask your recruiter or ask the internal person that's presenting the offer. You know, is this a best and final? Or is there any, you know, is there any room left for whatever it might be? And so let let's put this all together for a second because we're we're talking about these 6 quick rules.
But I wanna give you an example of what it might sound like when you are going to negotiate and how you what kind of language you wanna use. So what you wanna say is something like and, again, start by being grateful for the offer. So you're gonna say, I can't thank you enough for this generous offer. I really appreciate everyone that worked on this all the time that you put into it, and I'm very excited about this opportunity.
Based upon my experience and some of the research that I've done and even some of the other, you know, interviews and opportunities that I've been considering, I really think that I I was hoping the salary would come in at x, whatever that number is. I feel like if we can get to that point, I will graciously accept and really look forward to joining your team.
So that's the type of language, that's the type of response, that's the type of tone you wanna keep, you know, when you're negotiating and you're asking for more money and, you know, you're having these these conversations, which I know can be difficult, but that's how you wanna approach it. Okay. So here are some of the most common questions that I'm asked when people are, negotiating job offers.
So one of the one of the first questions is, should I always try to negotiate and never accept the initial offer? Is is that true? I I would say yes and no. Yes. I think that it kinda doesn't hurt to ask if you're looking for more money, if you're looking for, a sign on bonus to make up for some loss, or if there's something you're trying to negotiate.
I I again, if you're tactful about it, I don't think it's terrible to ask unless the reason why I say that that's not always true is because sometimes companies will come in with a best and final offer. So whatever it is that they're coming to you with, there is no negotiation. Now how do you know that? Well, you have to ask. You have to ask your recruiter. You have to ask the people that you're dealing with.
It's okay to say, can you, you know, can we talk about how the offer is typically, presented by your organization? And and, you know, again, that's a better conversation to have with your recruiter than it is to have with somebody internally, but you do wanna find out if there is any room for negotiation. And if you absolutely have no idea and you don't feel comfortable asking, then you give it a chance.
You but you give it a chance tactfully, and you come in with a very, very delicate request for whatever it is. And again, use my 6 rules, you know, be gracious and and and be very, very positive in your tone and in your approach, because it's it's okay to ask. You just have to do it the right way. And then the the next question that I get asked a lot is, should I disclose my current compensation? Well, you know, years ago, yes.
You know, I I think that you would be asked what you're currently making, and typically people would would disclose that. In this day and age, there has been, laws passed at the state level, recent legislation that says that you cannot ask someone how much that they are making. So you might wanna do a Google search and find out if those law exist laws exist in your state. When if you're not comfortable disclosing it, then you certainly don't have to.
But just keep mind that you wanna maintain the best relationship that you can with your recruiter, with the the hiring managers and folks internally. So you want to be transparent with at least what your, your expectations might be with comp, and just be delicate about this because you don't wanna make it seem like you're avoiding something, but you also like I said, in this day and age, you don't necessarily have to disclose that.
So people always ask me the next question is, well, when do I disclose my comp and when do I not disclose my comp? And the answer is actually very simple. If you are in a situation, and you probably will know this, but if you're in a situation where you're underpaid for what you do, then you don't wanna disclose your current comp because your current comp is not going to match where you need to be.
So you want to be paid at a range that's more commensurate to your experience into where you wanna be. So you don't wanna lower the bar for yourself. Conversely, on the opposite side, if you are at a high end or the higher end of your job function, and you realize that you're very well paid, and you're maybe even above the range that you think might exist for that position, well, then you should disclose it. Because now what you're doing is you're saying, well, listen.
I'm very interested in this position. I really love to join your organization. My current comp is this. And I'm I'm looking for an increase or I'm looking for same or better. I'm looking for a comparable. These are some of the I mean, some ideas of what you might wanna say. But you definitely definitely want to be sure to use your current compensation to your advantage when you can. But you wanna also again, if you're not at the level where you wanna be, it's probably better not to disclose it.
One of the questions I'm often asked from job seekers is, how do companies put together or determine a job offer? Obviously, this is going to vary from company to company, but I think for the most part, there are 3 factors that come into play when companies are determining what a job offer is going to be for a candidate. So the first factor is internal equity. You might hear that term thrown around.
It's kind of a fancy term that indicates what the company's currently paying for their employees in that same position. So they're gonna look at, basically, a range of what they're paying, their current employees from low to high, and then that range is going to determine what the internal equity piece looks like for your position. The second thing that they're gonna look at is the job seekers information, compensation requirements, background, years of experience.
So they're going to take all of your information into consideration. You know, what are you looking for in compensation? What information do they have for you compensation wise? If you're offering or sharing with them what your current compensation is. Again, if that's something that's going to be a benefit to you, then you can mention that. You know, how many years of experience do you have? And how do you rank against their internal equity?
And, you know, what do they pay those folks internally? And then the third factor that they might look at is market data. So a lot of companies are going to look at what the industry is paying for, candidates or employees in this specific role. So if it's a medical science liaison position, I'm sure they're going to go out and do market data, look at statistics, and come up with numbers.
Sometimes there is comp corrections that will happen, but typically, a company will determine a range that they have in place. So you need to be aware that it's not just an open thing. It's not just a an open wallet, so to speak, where, if you're looking for x and they don't ever pay x, well, maybe they'll make an exception for you. That's not really always the case. Typically, there's gonna be this predetermined range or set of numbers that they're gonna be working against.
But it's important to just understand that, again, when you're negotiating a job offer, you wanna keep all of these factors in mind, understand how companies do things, so that puts you in the best position to negotiate. One of the questions I'm often asked is, how and when do companies offer sign on bonuses? And this is just to put in perspective, this is definitely done on a case per case basis.
I think it's really important to understand that not all companies offer sign on bonuses, but be aware that such a thing does exist. And typically, the reason for it and what I typically see happen is if there's a situation where a company needs to bridge a gap, where a candidate is walking away from a certain amount of money, whether it's a bonus or stock or some type of LTI, long term incentive program that there it creates a gap.
So they present an offer, and they're comparing it to what the, the candidate has on the table, and there's a gap somewhere. That's very often why a company would offer a sign on bonus. So keep in mind that if you're a job seeker and you're in that situation, you should talk to your recruiter.
You should talk to, whoever you're negotiating with internally, whether it's HR or the hiring manager, and just, you know, see if there's a way where they can make up for and bridge that gap on your behalf. But I do wanna caution you that a sign on bonus is not, a mandatory. It's not a given. It shouldn't always be expected.
But it is something that it's a tool that's used or a tactic that's used, in situations where, companies are looking to be more attractive to a candidate, to make a candidate whole, or to be competitive. So keep it in mind. Use it when you need to, but be tactful and be careful, not to expect it or ask for it if you don't have a situation where, it's warranted. To summarize, the most important thing when negotiating a job offer is really your attitude and your approach.
Again, I think it's important to be gracious, to be tactful, to be positive, to be responsive and transparent. You know, this this negotiation is the first insight that this company is going to have into how you do business. So you wanna start off with your new employer on the right foot. And I think if you follow all these steps, you're ultimately going to get what you want, hopefully. Or if not, you're gonna take a very tactful approach to find out that maybe it's not the right opportunity.
Maybe it's not meant to be. But I think you can accomplish all your goals. I think you can, put forth a really good negotiation, and I think you're gonna really take, you know, put your best foot forward, take the right approach, and ultimately get to where it is that you need to be, by following these steps. I hope it was helpful. I wish you all the best, and wanna thank you guys for joining me today.
And, you know, I hope you have a lot of these situations and a lot of job offers that you have to negotiate, and maybe you can use all this advice and all this information. And, you know, if and when you do, you know, I'd love to hear success stories. So please share them with me, and, you know, I appreciate all your support, and thanks for listening. Thank you so much for listening to the show.
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