Ask HN: How do I ask for a salary increase?

It's actually very simple. So simple, in fact, that I'm surprised when people don't realize how to do it. But I've noticed that many people with greater social awareness than me feel there should be more to the process. Apart from being polite during the conversation, there isn't.

Step 1: send out a few feelers, try to find out your market worth. Call this $X.

If $X <= $YOUR_PAY + 3% (margin of error), STOP. You are not above the median and you do not deserve a raise. (Most people think they are above average. Almost 50% of them are wrong.)

Step 2: start interviewing. Ideally get an offer above your pay (but not necessarily as large as $X).

Step 3: have a private conversation with your boss. Tell him you'd like more money, and you feel you deserve at least $X.

If he gives you the raise, declare victory and decline your external offer (unless you like it better). If he refuses or gives you a raise that is insufficient, either a) point out your external offer or b) give 2 weeks notice and accept your external offer.

As a founder, and therefore Mr Cost Control, I hope you never, ever read http://valerieaurora.org/howto_salary/. :)

Here's Val Aurora's "short version", but you should really read the whole thing;

1. Negotiate! It will almost never hurt you, and almost always help. Screw up your courage and just do it!

2. Do your research - know what you are worth. Ask for advice from knowledgeable, well-compensated people with more skill and experience than you.

3. Never ever give the first figure for salary - make the person hiring say a number first, even if they ask, repeatedly. Never ever ever! If there's a form, don't fill in the "Salary" blanks. Just don't do it.

4. Always act slightly disappointed, no matter what the job offer is. Ask for time to think about it (i.e., plan your strategy) before getting back to them.

The "new to the workforce" thing raises a flag for me. It can create a LOT of discontent to give a new guy a raise for performance reasons. At many companies, raises are due to length of tenure (sad, but true). Prepare to be told, "But you've only been here for a year. It'd be bad if we gave you a raise."

I don't think you should shop around, but you do need to understand market rate. Have a casual conversation (coffee?) with your boss (say that you'd like to talk about how your compensation will evolve as you continue to work for the company) and ask them a few questions.

1) Where does the company feel it should pay folks? Do they like to pay a little above market rate to encourage retention, at market rate to be competitive, or... (don't finish the sentence) (almost everyone will say at market rate)

2) Does performance effect that? If an employee is top notch among his peers, should that effect his pay?

3) Where would you place me among my peers and could you give me some advice about how I could excel even further?

The big Q: Given that we agree that I'm in the top n%, do you feel like my compensation is appropriate? My research has indicated that an average salary for a person of my level is X (might be worth padding a touch for anchoring purposes).

NEVER give the indication that you're shopping. There are plenty of places to research salary without doing interviews. Most managers know that once people start interviewing, there's no point in trying too hard to keep the person. Stress that you really like your job and you see a long/bright future at the company.

I asked to meet with my boss, we set up a meeting. I walked in and asked if my salary was up for negotiation. We had a short discussion where basically he wanted to know if I was unhappy or had already started looking for a job. I was quite pleased with my job and hadn't started to look (and probably wouldn't have if I didn't get myself a raise, but don't tell my old boss that). He then asked me what I think my salary should be. I told him. He said that probably wasn't going to happen (It was like an 18% raise) but he'd talk with his partners (He was the CTO/founder). A few days later they came back with like 15%. I told them I appreciate the effort but the number I gave wasn't really a starting point for negotiation and I still think I deserve what I asked for. I told him I wouldn't turn it down, but those are my feelings. A few days later the CEO met with me and basically did the same thing to make sure I wasn't unhappy about anything. He then gave me what I asked for and everything was good.

I wouldn't start sending out resumes and interviewing, seems like a lot of hassle when you haven't even talked to them yet.

Just one data point, but...

Based on experience around me (ie friends etc), the slightly depressing conclusion is that you will have more raises if you change of company on a regular basis (ie each 12 to 24 months).

I've even seen people leave their company, then one year after, being proposed a lot more money by the very same company they left one year before, while the coworkers wages had barely evolved.

The situation is different on high paying jobs (still around me), where companies apparently try to ensure people won't leave (eg: > 100k€ per year + 15 weeks of holidays per year for a european insurance job I know of).

I'll give you the manager's viewpoint. There are 2 considerations:

1) I have no motivation to increase your pay beyond you being a happy contributor. More money to a happy employee doesn't make the employee more productive or more happy. Therefore, unless you tell me that your pay is making you unhappy, I have no reason to give you a raise, no matter how well you perform

2) It's all about balance with the rest of the team. You as an individual tend to focus on your perceived worth. I don't care so much as keeping fairness among the team. I know how much I pay more senior people than you, and how much I pay more junior people. If you need a raise (as defined earlier), then I don't really mind as long as you don't mess up the equilibrium with the rest of the team.

That's it. Of course, those basic facts can lead to millions of subtle variations.

On a slight tangent, if you work at a large corp that has very organised payroll/HR procedures, such as reviewing pay only at fixed times (eg. once every 12 months, as my current employer does), how hard is it usually to argue for a payrise ahead of schedule?

If the next pay review is 6 months away, is it feasible to argue for a payrise now, or would managers have very limited power to fight against the HR process?

"I'd like a salary increase please, how do I go about ensuring I get it next pay raise period?"

If you do not ask you will never get. That is what you should be thinking all the time.

Your boss will not give you money just because you are a good guy (or girl). They will always try to maximize their fortune and not yours. Sure you will get a raise at some point to address inflation but that will come as late as possible.

What I have done in the past was a long term one and not a 30 minute conversation. I would throughout the course of the year, send emails to my boss outlining my achievements of that period. So for instance if I managed to upgrade X servers to save the company money, I would send an email at the end of the task outlining that. This would be ammunition for me later on to ensure that my request is not seen as unreasonable.

When the time comes to ask for the raise I was printing the emails and started discussing the matter with my boss. 9 out of 10 the boss would not remember half of the things that I had done throughout the year. I would let him/her tell me first what they thought regarding a raise. I would approach it as "What do you think I am worth here - what is my value to this company". To this day it has worked wonders since only once I got an offer less than what I wanted.

Finally you will need to have an accurate picture of the company's financial position before you do that. You cannot ask for a raise when the company is in trouble. If that is the case then you should be looking for another job.

A very good piece of advice is from yummyfajitas also as far as assessing your value.

Good luck!!

Best not to ask for a raise, just keep working hard and good things will probably happen. Karma and all that.

The web has thousands and thousands of posts on this subject - you can get a lot of great ideas from them. I'm not trying to be rude either by implying that you haven't search; I'm completely serious: go to Google/Bing/whatever and ask this question. There are some great posts out there.

I've done this more times than I can count. It all comes down to accurately valuing your contribution and evaluating your position in the company.

If the work is steady and you are making a solid contribution, then there is usually much to be gained by bargaining for a pay increase. If work (ie: not necessarily "profits") is slow it is harder to claim you are due a raise if the organization is not operating near capacity.

I usually try to get a feel for other salaries in the company first (note: it is helpful to make friends with the HR people, even if you don't particularly like them, they can be a useful source of info). If the company has a general principle of paying way below average salaries, it's going to be harder to negotiate. But, if other people are making decent bank, your request is likely to be evaluated in proportion to other team members, and perhaps seen as more reasonable/rational.

But what it really comes down to is scheduling some time with your manager and laying out the details. There are a million variables, but you probably want to highlight your lack of salary growth while you've been there, your increasing contributions, fair market value for your position and so on. If your boss is weak, he'll probably tell you he needs to get approval and may reference some semi far-off non specific date/event ("the next staff meeting", or "after HR is done with the new benefits policy") if he won't commit to a specific time, tell him you'll check back "next Thursday" or some specific time.

In the end, few people have ever gotten fired simply for trying to better their salary and move up the ladder. Don't be intimidated by the process or make it into anything larger than what it is: a simple conversation.

In technology, the solution is to switch companies. I did this twice and approximately doubled my take-home pay each time.

Companies are desperate for good programmers. If you have the goods (and can prove it), you should have no trouble making whatever reasonable amount of money you want. If your company doesn't care that much, you can convince them to care (hard), or go elsewhere (easy).

It's a business, and you are the product.

(Oh, and something I've noticed when reading people's resumes... it's apparently fine to go back to your original company after you've gotten a raise via some other second company. The finance industry makes incest look good.)

I entered the professional workforce a little late but had always been considered good with computers. Starting low($45k) I quickly came to conclusion that people where making way more money($85k) than me and I was just as good if not better at the task at hand than they where. With my managers support I asked my employer for parity with my co-workers. I received a good bump to start(65k) and over the course of a few years I was into a six figure salary. There was some drama that helped along the way, people quiting, epic weekends of coding, and normal BS of not working at a "google/fog creek" type of place but it worked out for me.

I did the following two times. They were the only times I tried and I was successful in both cases:

-I researched how much I should be getting and brought that data to the meeting with my boss. It's usually a little tricky because most data is one-dimensional (e.g. salary per years of experience) but it also opens up more ways to interpret it to your benefit. I insisted on comparing to the market and not to my co-workers.

-I always highlighted what the company or my boss was getting with my work. Never what I needed for myself. Also think about how much it would cost them to replace you.

-I highlighted how my work was changing and how that change should be reflected in my salary (e.g. more responsibility).

-I was open to creative solutions, such as getting half of the raise now, half of it a year later.

-I was prepared to leave if he had strictly refused without good reasons (e.g. a strict company-wide freeze on raises).

The last time I did this, the raise was 33%.

As an employer I can tell you step #1 would be to make sure you're worth it to your boss. If you don't know that your boss would be very unhappy to see you go, he probably wouldn't.

Assuming you're one of the most valuable employees, and you have a good reason (ie. your boss is paying you well under market rate for someone of your skill set) then keep in mind that your boss probably won't be upset. Nobody is happy to pay more for the same thing, but they'd be less unhappy than losing you. What an employer pays his employees is often based on what they asked for rather than what they deserved.

You just ask, but take the advice that others have posted and definitely do your due diligence on local market research before asking.

On a side note:

I've had 4 jobs in the past 3 years, and I've had significant pay increases everytime I started with a new employer (except for my current job).

Job 1 -> Job 2: +30%

Job 2 -> Job 3: +50%

Job 3 -> Job 4: -15%

I took a pay decrease for Job 4 as the job was still paying well over the median, was more interesting, and had a way better work environment.

Sometimes the best way to get a raise is to find another job.

There's a tendency here to excuse any such request with, "there's no budget", and, "these are tough times", which frustrated me when I was in the same position as you. Unfortunately, my advice isn't that good: I wrote a nice letter explaining why I deserve a raise and ended it with a threat that if I don't get it, I'm gone. Then, all of a sudden, the money was there ;)

Stop thinking that above average is good enough --- you shouldn't be happy with that. You should be thinking about top 5% (of people with your number of years experience).

Listen to the other advice here and go negotiate, but if the best point you have is I'm average and not paid average, you aren't at a strong negotiating point, yet (I know you said "above" average, but you also said that you "feel like" it's that -- meaning you accept that you might not be).

If you don't get the raise, and you feel like it's hopeless to get it. End with: What do I have to do to merit this raise in 6 months? Then go exceed it by a lot, and keep going. Future negotiations will be much easier.

Also, becoming more than marginally above average will make finding a different job much easier too.

As others have said, know you value to the company. But, there are two parts to that. First (as already stated), know what a competitive salary is for your position and experience. Second, be able to back up your request. Have documentation of goals, successes, and anything else you've done to move the company towards its goals. The latter is worth a lot more than an article or job posting telling you what you're worth (and generates a bit less animosity than waving an offer letter in their face).

I've asked for a raise and gotten it once. My other raises were all from switching jobs, although I usually left for other reasons and you generally get a step up.

When I did ask I knew the company was small and relatively informal. I said that I had done X, Y and Z that included taking more responsibility and really delivering and that I would like a raise. They asked me how much and I said $15K and they said yes. It was pretty sweet.

Not to say you don't deserve it, but I would not really consider doing "above average work" to be a good enough reason for a big raise. A small annual one, sure. I would think you'd need to be taking on additional responsibilities. Assuming you're doing that, then I think you should be able to make a compelling argument. Also, since you know that you're underpaid, you could bring that up as a point.

Whatever you do, don't make it into a threat that you will leave if you don't get the raise. If they say no, just ask what steps you can take so that you WOULD be worth $10K more money to them. If the answer is "nothing", then get the hell out. Most likely the answer will be "you would need to doing X independently" or something like that. In that case, do it, get your praise in writing from your managers/coworkers, and then ask again in 6 months.

I hate to sound all macho, but you have two options in your case:

If you're new to the workforce, and think your underpaid, get a new job, or shut up.

Out of college, I received a decent job offer and I took it. About a year later, I felt like I was doing as much as most of the senior guys (maybe a little lower in quality but higher in quantity), and felt like my salary should be closer to theirs. Their salaries were 30-50% higher. So, I went to my boss, and basically said "look, when you hired me, I was just out of college, you were taking a risk, you didn't know what I could do or not do, etc. Over the last year, I think I proved that I can do good work and lots of it, and I hope my salary can reflect that." I asked for a 12% raise, my boss said it sounded high but he would think about it. A few days later, I got what I asked for.

TL;DR: you don't have to threaten to quit, and presenting good, logical reasons for a higher salary can be pretty effective. Just figure out what those reasons are and then present them to your boss in a non-threatening manner.

Ask "the man" if he has any plans to increase your salary, or if there is a company policy that dictates that kind of thing. This way he will know that you are interested in a raise, you will know from his answers if you have any hopes of getting one, and then you can decide whether to stay there or not.

If you are not happy with your pay aren't you basically indirectly implying that you are not happy with your job?

I would say if you are not happy with your pay, find a new job or at least offers and take it from there.

You may not be unhappy at your current job (not your dream job, but not terrible either), so if you present any real offers to your current employer and they like you and see you as a valuable asset that they do not want to lose I would think they would offer you more if that's what you wanted. Then you can decide from that point if you want more pay (assuming they offer to pay more and keep you) or do you want more pay and a different job?

You should talk to your co-workers and ask them what their experience was asking for a raise. Another idea is to compare salaries and then see if maybe most workers deserve a raise too. If the management keeps denying raises, then you can collectively bargain for raises...I'm not sure how big the company is, but it's kind of a pain in the ass to sack 5+ workers at a time and re-hire especially when there are projects going on.

I had an offer in hand and asked them to match it. To do this, however, you have to be willing to accept the offer and leave.

Some time ago I've blogged about it,

"Top 10 Tips (+1) to Get a Pay Raise"

http://codemonkeyism.com/top-10-tips-1-pay-raise/

For a good book on the topic see "how to make $1000 a minute". Some of the techniques are dated, but overall the principles are solid.

The best way to get a raise is to get a new job.

two options:

1. Just ask what you need to do to get a raise. You should expect something about the economy being bad as the answer.

2. Get another offer, Tell your current employer that you are very happy with the current job but, they are not competitive in compensation, and you will be giving you two weeks notice the next Monday. The wait to see if there is a counter offer.

1) Work somewhere where they have the resources to pay you more. You ain't gettin a raise if they dont have the money.

2) Justify your raise, this will probably mean talking to the guys in accounting, make up something about helping sales but get the sales numbers and a rough estimate of profit margin. Show your boss the numbers and how you contribute to them, admittedly I got cut off from the official numbers after I almost doubled my salary doing this.

3) Send out resumes. Yes, most employers don't want to hear you're leaving because the pay is crap, others do, you want to work for the latter. If 1 and 2 don't work then usually this one will as business is a bit like dating, it's much easier to get the girl if you already have one. When you have a job and ask for money you will do so with confidence. If you are looking for money then you are looking for money. Focus on the goal you want, be willing to jump ship if the pay isn't there.

4) Be interesting, if you don't have some funny stories, make some up, you want to be affable, when you talk to whoever will give you the raise do not go in talking about your raise immediately, make some small talk about whatever THEY are interested in first. Then move to your pitch.

5) There is a lot more to a job than money, make sure you really want the cash, and not any other kind of perk.

Edit: I also wanted to say, that asking for a raise is a bit of an art, like interviewing. You want to get good at it so do it frequently. Admittedly, you can't ask for a raise every month or two, I personally never asked more than once a year. So go do lots of interviews.

I have a very humble experience in workforce myself (less than 5 years). But these are my takeaway lessons.

1. Never ask for a raise with "or else I'm leaving" threats. This is an important lesson, that some of my coworkers don't understand - so they believe that I got my raises through threats - since I am inclined to stand my ground on important issues. I have threatened to leave for various stuff - even gave my notice a couple of times. But never for trying to get a raise. I also categorically refused to accept a raise as bribe instead I demanded to sort the pressing issues out and after awhile I came to negotiate a raise.

2. Make sure you're really that good OR at least perceived as good. Run the extra mile, jump through extra hoops, endure extra hardships - don't overextend yourself just step out of median (messianic complex is bad in itself) - be a little more thorough, a little more reliable,... And your efforts shall be noticed.

3. When asking for a raise make your mind beforehand of what you're worth and stick to the plan. If they refuse of the bat - persist, don't cave in (don't be an ass - just ask what will it take to get what you want). What actually happened with one boss is that I was commended, he said that he didn't realize I was that aggressive and that this trait was exactly what he required - this was actually a big boost to my early career.

Many, many years ago in my first job developing software I made the worst possible mistake and asked for an absurdly low salary out the gate. I was happy just to be paid to code at all, and I was utterly naive about how money truly drives the entire software industry. It took a few months until I realized how badly I cheated myself so I asked the boss/owner of the company (a small non-startup, less than 10 employees) for something like a 50% raise. I knew I had to slightly highball to get the going fair market amount, since nobody in this world can just be honest about money, so I expected the boss would counter-offer with a lower rate. The boss avoided me for two weeks straight, he shut himself in his office, constantly had his phone glued to his ear, took extra days out-of-office, and completely let go of asking for progress updates for my work, all to avoid talking to me at all.

It was kind of nice actually. I made a mental note of this trick, so that the next time I want some breathing room to get the boss off my back, the easiest way is to drop a hint that I want a big raise. :)

I did eventually get the raise, and oddly for the exact amount I requested, but it was quite a painful first lesson to learn. Why will a modestly wealthy person who owns a successful company have no issue whatsoever with completely ripping of a just out of college kid who is slaving away for the owner's profit margins, and yet exhibit the most irrational behavior when it comes time to play fair and pay up? I don't know.

But it is absolutely true that in the software industry the easiest way to get a raise is to switch jobs. That's just how the game is played. Any human enterprise premised on profits is forced to be hugely wasteful, especially when you consider how much talent is thrown away to another company in order to avoid being honest about money, all so some jerk at the top can keep a larger piece of the pie for himself. This kind of direct experience is why I laughed at that stupid blog article from a few months back that said to never hire "job hoppers." IMHO job hopping developers, acting like all out software mercenaries, guns blazing on behalf of whoever is signing the checks, are automatically amongst the smartest of the pool, since they see the fundamental economic pattern underneath the entire software industry.

This silly money pattern also leads to the unusual circumstance that requires when you switch jobs, always, every time, no matter what, ask for a higher salary than what you received at your last job. Even if it's only a little bit. Never, ever move backwards, at least unless there are other external constraints preventing it. This is the only way to keep yourself from sliding down into the economic sinkhole. Sadly, it is money and not geeky ideology about OS, programming languages, etc that is the true driving force to align yourself with. Money is magnetic north in all things.(Unless you have enough Fuck-You Money, but that's a different story.)

Anyone who doesn't follow this negotiation pattern, and who isn't in some highly custom circumstances is a complete fool who probably deserves to get fleeced and left as a beggar by those shark-mouthed, pointy-haired MBAs we all love. But we can absolutely beat them at their own game. :)

Best of luck!

If you _really_ want more money the most effective method is to to "play hardball". This play can double or even triple your income from a entry point salary if you're worth it and you play it right.

The deal with hardball is that you have to leave your current company. You may not actually leave the company but you must be _prepared_ to, otherwise it wont work and you will back down too quickly.

As usual, look around the market for better pay and try to get a job interview and a position for pay that you like the sound of. Once this is done and dusted, hand in your resignation and state that the reason you are leaving the job is due to pay. State a figure that would keep you at the company but obviously keep this very private between yourself and your manager. You can be a little cheeky with this figure, depending on how much you want to remain there.

If they value your work sufficiently they will accept your figure and modify your salary to keep you there. If they don't you leave for the other job that pays better.

For best results you need to get the timing of the hardball perfect. You need your employers to either be desperate, guilty or a bit of both. Desperation is achieved by doing this at a critical moment. Say, the most senior member of staff on your project leaves, thus leaving you with the most knowledge of the system. Or in my case, regulation of the mortgage market was about 8 months away and I was the only member of staff with sufficient knowledge to implement their new system.

Guilt can be even better though depending on the type of manager you have. Essentially you want the manager to feel as though they owe you something. For example, if your pay review was supposed to happen six months after your start but it has been twelve or eighteen months then they will feel guilty about not doing it sooner. If they have cancelled a project you worked hard on or did you some other kind of disservice your guilt ratio increases and you can cash in.

I managed to push my salary from £12k to £36k in one fell swoop this way about 8 years ago. It's how I started contracting.

For context, the company had cancelled my own software development project (which despite being poor code (when i look back on it) was fit for purpose and worked). They replaced this with a system bought in (which they had to buy on a management agreement from joining a particular group) that was just a confusing mess of VBScript and SQL stored procedures. It didn't work, wasn't built for purpose (a common operation would lock up the database server for 2 minutes+) and I only _just_ managed to stitch it together in time for regulation day (actually it was a few days after, I had to manually do a lot of the quotes in the first few days of regulation.. ). And when I say stitched this process involved a bunch of programs I had also hacked together to cover the gaps.

Read "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" first...