You’re sitting in a job interview and you’ve nailed all the tricky questions about your experience, your character, and why you want the role. And then, the money question drops and you feel yourself getting nervous, uncomfortable and stuck for words (or numbers, should we say).
Believe us when we tell you it’s happened to the best of us – knowing your worth at work is very difficult. However, it is also important, especially if you’re changing jobs or looking at a promotion.
By Chloe Schneider
To help you determine what your work is worth this year, we asked Kate Southam, founding editor of CareerOne and Career Mentor, for some tips on how to work it out.
RESCU: What tools are available to people looking to start a new career and wanting to find average salary information?
Kate Southam: Let me say up front that getting accurate, up-to-the-minute information about salary can be difficult. If you ask somone doing the job, he or she might well exaggerate. Ditto, those salary guides on job sites based on what candidates have told them.
Recruitment consultants definitely have the information so cultivate your relationships if you get a job via a consultant. Recruiters also publish salary surveys based on what employers and candidates have told them. Usually these surveys take a while to compile and check so the market might have moved slightly by the time you apply the information but it is still a worthy guide.
Government and industry associations also publish salary information so it just means searching the relevant websites.
RESCU: How else can we find salary information?
Kate Southam: There are several ways to find more accurate information.
1. Talking to someone in the role
While it is not the done thing to ask someone, ‘hey, how much do you earn?’ it is fine to ask someone ‘what do you reckon the salary range is for a role like X role?’ You can then put that info into context as to whether you are targeting a big industry leading company or a small company, which might pay a bit less.
2. Salary surveys on big recruitment websites and speciality websites.
Examples could include Michael Page or Hays and then for speciality it would depend on which specialty but an example would be Greythorn for IT or the blog on Aquent for creative people.
3. Government and industry
You will find Salary info on on the government website, MyFuture but it is from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and can run behind market. The way you search is go to the home page, then The Facts > Occupation Search (within Work & Employment box) then type in your occupation for example, to see a profile about that occupation including Earnings Industry associations sometimes publish salary info to sell to employers so it could be a case of just getting the media release from the media section to at least get an idea about where salaries are going in that sector.
RESCU: How can people looking to get a pay rise in their current position use this information about the average salary for their position?
Kate Southam: It is crucial when pitching for a pay rise to try and get an idea about market rates so you can tell your boss that not only have you done x,y, z achievements but you are underpaid when compared to the market.
Recruiters are probably the most accurate way to find out and or a person working in the sector. However, know that recruiters are not a community service so you cannot just call up and ask. If you got your job via a recruiter then you could call that person to ask; you could look at job ads to see if salaries are listed or even call a recruiter to ask about the salary range for a job but the she might just ask you to just apply and then come in for a chat.The salary survey on a recruiter site is good as it is something you can quote to your boss.
Your HR department might tell you the salary “bands” for a particular role – I’ve used this – but don’t go into detail as to what you are doing. Only say you are doing some research.
If you are a member of an association or professional group then absolutely call up and ask if it has any salary info.
Keep in mind that salaries in the market usually move faster than when you stay in a job. The reasons are that employers will have to pay whatever the market rate is for a particular type of talent – let’s say a social media manager.
However, once you are in the job your salary increases are based on what the company can afford, how it has performed; how your department has performed, then you. Your manager is usually told the range to use for pay rises based on the overall budget – for example, “this year award 0 for poor performance and up to a 5% increase for great performance” but on the open market, salaries might have moved by 10%. The upshot of all that is if you have been in a job for a few years it is not unusual to find you might be below.
RESCU: You mentioned Social Media Managers. There seems to be new roles popping up every day – how can people in these roles accurately determine what they should be getting paid?
Kate Southam: These roles often pay more because there are fewer candidates for each role. However, the methods of finding out salary never change – using your network, quizzing recruiters specialising in your area, asking people in the field
RESCU: Any other advice for determining your worth at work?
Kate Southam: Know how you add value and how hard you would be to replace. You never want to threaten a manager into giving you more money – this never works. Who likes being threatened?
However, if you know that because of you three customers stayed and their accounts are worth X dollars or your new initiative resulted in a cost saving of x or new revenue of y OR that there are not a lot of candidates with your skills in the market making you hard to replace and therefore more valuable you will get a sense of how to negotiate.
Always be realistic. Your manager probably does not have the power to give you whatever you want; some companies award pay rises at a particular time of year so know what happens at your company and put your pitch together well ahead of that time; be prepared to ask – many women say nothing hoping someone will notice she is underpaid – that rarely happens.
Also, do get plugged into an industry network, make time for coffee chats with people who can help your career – long before you want anything from them – and keep an eye on salary survey info when it comes out – don’t think you will be able to find it again down the track. If you see it, store the URL to that page or print it out and put it in a file.
