This Woman’s Work

Know your worth. This is a strong statement that relates to many aspects of life. Your friends, your mate, and your career. In each track there are different methods and mindsets needed to show your worth. Today we are going to concentrate on the career.

So do you remember the time when you wanted to go to your manager and request a raise but you stopped because you couldn’t or didn’t think your manager would go for it? Or maybe you were afraid because you didn’t want to seem greedy. Or my favorite, I don’t want to face rejection. We all know when someone in leadership tells us no we feel inferior or that they believe we cannot handle more responsibility or don’t deserve more pay. Then you leave their office and go right to the job search websites to find another job even though you know you’re not going anywhere. Okay maybe that’s me #truestory. One more for giggles, you get rejected from leadership and you go directly to your work crew and rip that manager a new one and work on a plan to strike. Yep that escalated quickly. But we all know how that goes in cube-ville.

Time to drop some knowledge. Have you ever Googled your name? Most people have. I have and boy was I shocked. What about your position title? Try it, this is a good way to see what other organizations have going on in your industry. You may find that your title doesn’t match your job duties. A few sites can help you find out more about your position and the salary range. I would begin with Indeed.com or use some of the tools on LinkedIn. Knowing the range will give you an understanding of how you fair against the standards. If your current salary is closer to the low end of the salary range you have the data (well some of the data) needed to assist in the negotiation process for higher pay. You can also use these tools to become more aware of what employers in your industry are seeking and when you meet these needs highlight them.

Now you have the research on how much you should be making lets work on the confidence. You have to believe that you deserve a higher wage or why would anyone else. First make a list of your accomplishments and profitable skills. Interview your friends and mentors to see if you are missing anything from your list. Now that you have your list, put some meat behind it. Put your marketing hat on and begin telling your story. For example, if you have implemented a new program that brought in more revenue write out how you implemented the program, how you monitored the growth and run reports on the ROI (return on investment). Yes print this out and create some visuals. Do this for all of your accomplishments and create a book. When it is completed read it, make edits, remove any redundancies, and last but not least relish in how you are a rock star and deserving of a larger pay check. Guess what, you can also transform this information into a resume. You should always have this information stored in your mind and always ready to give your elevator pitch about yourself. An example of an elevator pitch: as the business operations director I have implemented a new sales process that has reduced the approval time for projects from 180 days down to 90 days resulting in the closing of 1,007 projects and $4M in sales. BOOM DROP THE MIC and cut the check.

Be your own advocate and ready to market your skills and experience. No one else is going to do this for you and most managers are comfortable with paying you the standard. If you want more money or more responsibilities you have to pitch yourself and get out of your comfort zone.

Hope these tips have been informative and helpful. Have a good one.