Salary & Promotion Negotiations: One HUGE Mistake

Negotiations with your boss for promotions and salary increases are some of the most important business conversations you’ll ever have. 

Those meetings could make a difference of hundreds of thousands of dollars over the course of your career. If that’s the case, you definitely do not want to mess things up. 

Today, I want to talk about an enormous mistake that can ruin your chances of getting that salary, raise, or promotion you want. What I’m about to explain is equally true whether your meetings are in English or Korean. 

The Big Mistake: 

Waiting until the actual year end meeting/situation to make your request. 

Your end of the year evaluation should NOT be the first time you bring up your desire to earn more/move up in the company. By this point, management has probably already finalized budgets/positions for next year and will be much less likely to accept your request.

Instead, you want to let them know far in advance what you want. However, the way you should ask this is very important. 

Don’t just say ‘I want a raise’ or ‘I want to be promoted to assistant manager’. 

Instead: 

1. Know the goals your company has for the future.
2. Align your request with those goals.
3. Ask what you need to do to earn the higher salary/promotion.  

Here’s an example:

Let’s imagine it’s June. Your company has plans to expand into Japan. You want to become a manager at one of the new Japan offices. 

Instead of just saying: ‘I want to be a manager at an office in Japan’

You could say: ‘I would love to make a bigger impact here and contribute more to our expansion in Japan. What would I need to do over the next 6 months to earn a manager role at the Osaka office?’ 

Notice here we say earn a promotion not get a promotion. Also, we’re saying we want to maximize our impact and help the company reach its goals. Finally, we’re asking far in advance and have a clear timeline set up.

What will most likely happen next is your boss gives some recommendations for what you need to do. If you follow them, you'll be MUCH more likely to get that promotion when you have your end of the year evaluation.

What's Next?

This was just a tiny part of the salary negotiation process. We go over this in much greater detail in my full coaching program. So, if you want to learn exactly what to do/say to make a great impression on your boss & get the career opportunities you really want, click the button below to book a consultation with me today.