Thump! – The post has arrived – you open your letter and
YES, you have been offered the job! However, it might be
that you have decided that you don’t want this job after all
and that you couldn’t stand the interviewer or the company.
If that is the case then you should let the employer know
politely and turn them down in a professional manner and as
soon as possible – after all there may be someone out there
that really does want the job. It is always prudent to
remember that you never know when or if you and your
interviewers paths might cross again and the last thing you
want is to find you’ve happily settled into your new job and
six months down the line your new manager happens to be the
interviewer who has now joined your company! A lot happens
in industry, takeovers, mergers, reverse takeovers, you name
it, and most industries are very incestuous. So it’s not a
good idea to tell them to shove their job “where the sun
don’t shine” or anything else along these lines – so if you
have changed your mind and don’t fancy the job anymore just
decline it professionally and you then don’t have to worry
about “what goes around comes around!”
Life is never simple, if it were, we would all be living in mud
huts feeding our children by living off the land and never
worrying about a thing - no complications, decisions to make or
anything else. But that isn’t the case. The problem you may have
is if you have applied for several jobs and attended several
interviews and then you get offered a job it may not be your
preferred choice. It may be that you are still waiting on an
answer, from another company (which is the job you would really
like) but have not yet had a reply from them. You don’t want to
accept the first job and then find out a couple of days later
that you’ve been offered the second one it would be a disaster.
Well there’s a couple of ways you can play this. The first thing
you need to do in this position should be to try an create
yourself some breathing space – buy a bit of time. You could
contact the employer and say to them that you’re really pleased
that they have chosen to offer you the job you’d just like a day
to make your mind up for certain or discuss it with your wife -
after all changing jobs is a big decision, one that you are not
going to make lightly. This isn’t an unreasonable request and as
long as you keep the time extension short then they wont think
anything of it. If you start asking for a week to think about it
then your potential new employer is going to start getting
suspicious and you could be risking the offer – don’t forget
they’ve been around the block a few times and know their job. No
one wants to play second best and if they think you’re looking
for a better offer with another company you could blow your
chances – once and for all!
Now you really are in the driving seat! You have a job offer on the
table for a job that you really wouldn’t mind doing at all
because you know you could do it well – you have little to lose
providing you play your cards right. So what do you do next. A
good idea would be to contact the company whose decision you are
waiting on and explain the situation. Chances are they will be
glad to hear that they are your first choice and it always looks
good if every one else wants to employ you and that you are in
demand – wow what a catch you would be! However just because you
are the next Gordon Gecco it’s fairly unlikely that they will
give you an answer there and then but it may be that they will
get back to you the following day with their decision – it
really doesn’t matter if its no because all of your doors are
open! It isn’t a good idea to play this game if you haven’t been
offered another job (although it seems tempting) because the end
result could be disastrous – you don’t want to lose the chances
of getting this job by being over zealous if time is just a
matter of course.
Negotiating Your Salary & Benefits Package:
Lets get down to business now comes the really important part!
It’s always wise to leave negotiating salary and any benefits
package until you’ve been offered the job. The reason being once
your future employer has decided that you’re the employee for
them your are in a great position to negotiate a mutually
acceptable package. Negotiating a deal is not just about money
and benefits, its about negotiating your whole contract (which
includes salary, benefits, holiday entitlement, working hours
and of course those free season tickets to your favourite
football team or use of the corporate hospitality box!!). By
negotiating your deal it will give the perception that you know
what your you are actually worth (of course this isn’t
necessarily what you are going to get) but that you are not
prepared to settle for just any old offer (without being over
the top). This might not be exactly what your employer wants, on
the basis that they will be paying you more than they really
want to, but it will show that you have good negotiating
qualities, a strong personality and good negotiation skills
(something that will have a good bearing should you be entering
a sales orientated role) which you will be able to apply to the
job once your in it – it’s a good quality to have. There’s
little point in trying to squeeze them like a lemon with
unrealistic sums, at the end of the day they can only pay you
what they can afford and you might end up losing the job at the
last minute – something you won’t want to do due to greed.
So
the big question here is how are you going to determine how much
they value you and what are they willing to pay you? Well in all
honesty it’s no good just plucking a figure out of the air. When
you applied for the position the chances are that there would
have been an indicative offer in salary whether that being an
“Salary In The Region Of X” or “Basic Salary In The Region Of X
With On Target Earnings Of X” or “Salary Between X and X Subject
To Experience”. Aim for the top end of the scale or if you are
really cheeky you could try and squeeze them for 5% – 15% more
than the quoted figure, they can only say no and the chances are
you will end up getting more than they would have offered you in
the first place! Remember that if you can prove to your future
employer that you are better than the average “Joe” you will
have a far better chance of negotiating your way to the higher
level of the salary bracket. So how do you prove this? Well your
qualifications are always a good start. If you have more
qualifications than were originally advertised for the position
then that’s a plus point. You will definitely need to prepare
some justifications for asking for the top dollar rate but you
could say something like “I’m not only ACII qualified but am
four parts FCII qualified and you were originally looking for
candidates who were working towards completing their FCII” or
“The advertisement for the job stated that the candidate must
have two years sales experience for the position whereas I have
five years including 12 months experience in pure new business
lead generation”.
At
the end of the day you have been offered the job based on your
experience along with other attributes and because you were an
overall better candidate than the other applicants so all you
really need to do is point out these qualities and use them in
your negotiation techniques.
Additional Employment Benefits:
There are other package benefits that may apply that are not
necessarily salary orientated. They are things such as holiday
entitlement, luncheon vouchers or expenses, performance related
bonuses, commission, overtime, profit sharing, private health
insurance, share options, childcare contribution, sports / gym
facilities, company car, mobile phone, rail or travel ticket and
non contributory pension. This list is not exhaustive and it
would be unrealistic to ask for all of these benefits, the best
thing to do is choose maybe two or three and see how you get on.
It may be that your employer doesn’t want to provide a company
car but he may be prepared to finance your travel to and from
work so compromise is as always the golden rule.
Hey lets face it some hard ball managers (whether they be HR
Managers or Heads of Department) are going to try and get you as
cheep as possible so there could be some dirty tactics at play
at negotiation stage. You can just bet your bottom dollar that
they will be holding a card up their sleeve to try and get you
to agree to a lesser package or make you take on more
responsibilities that the job role originally stated. Generally
speaking this is a little bit “Un British” and ruthless and the
chances are they will pull this one out of the hat just when you
have almost struck your salary deal. A good example of this is
where your employer tells you his right hand man is off sick and
is likely to be off for at least six months and would you
therefore mind taking over his work. Its not that you don’t want
to demonstrate what a hard working person you are or that you
can’t do the job but you’ve basically agreed on a salary that
was acceptable and now you’re finding out the job is twice as
involved – it’s now much harder to go back and negotiate and
your employer knows this! All is not lost however. You can
prevent this situation happening by you both laying down your
cards at the start. All you might say is “We need to talk about
my salary, benefits package and holiday entitlement. Are there
any other areas of issues concerning the job role or workload
that you feel we could do with discussing at whilst we talk
about my salary and benefits package?” You have now made it
extremely difficult for your employer not to mention the fact
that his right hand man is off sick and you will be required to
do his job as well as your own for the next six months – hence
you can use this in your salary negotiation.
Confirmation Of Your Employers Job Offer:
When you have agreed everything with your employer, salary and
benefits package, working hours, holiday entitlement etc, etc
and both you and your employer have agreed on the final points
of the deal then your employer should issue you with a letter of
confirmation of the offer, this should encompass all of the
agreed areas such as your salary and benefits package, the title
of the job being offered, working hours, the date in which your
contract will commence and any conditions that apply to the job
offer. Once you receive this confirmation and are satisfied that
everything is correct that you should formally respond to your
new employer agreeing the terms and conditions outlined in the
offer letter and off you go!
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