Scripts for Salary Negotiation 101: Conversation Scripts to get paid like a white man

Head over to read my other post on salary negotiation 101 in which these scripts are referenced and I explain how/when to deploy them (and how to think about salary negotiation more broadly).

Aug 07, 2023

1. Script responses to answer: “What are you currently earning?” or “What is your expected salary range?”

In some places the law says you cannot ask the question re salary anymore, but folks are still asking it, even if indirectly. So be prepared for how to have this conversation, however it comes up.

If they do ask, you don’t want to leave them hanging with an awkward silence on your end of the receiver, or come across as rude by refusing to answer. And really, you want to know what they’re willing to pay for the role, so you can make informed decisions about where to invest your time/energy interviewing with them.

For the same reason you should bring up salary in the first chat (toward the end) if the recruiter doesn’t - you can use a flavour of the below response examples to do that.

In all cases, be lighthearted but firm and clear. Under no circumstances should you be apologetic - we ain’t sorry. 💅🏽

Question: “What are you currently earning?” or “What is your salary expectation?”

Response 1 : “Thanks for bringing that up - I would actually love to know what the salary band for the role is, as I assume your benchmarking is much more up to date than mine. Could you share that with me please? I can then definitely give you an indication of whether it would work for me.” Silence. Wait for them.

Response 2: “Actually, if you don’t mind, I always prefer to base salary conversations on the value you believe I will bring to this role after interviewing me, rather than the value I bring to my current role. Could you share with me what salary or salary range I should expect an offer to be in, if we get to that point? I can then give you an indication of whether that aligns with how I see my value in this role.” Silence. Wait for them.

Response 3: “Go to hell you swine.” - OK, don’t use that one.

If you find yourself talking to a particularly persistent recruiter, and they won’t give you a figure first or let the question go, you should feel comfortable explaining more explicitly why you won’t be providing that figure.

You could say:

Follow-up: “I appreciate you need to make sure candidate expectations are aligned with what you’re offering before you can even consider progressing someone - that is important to me too. I hope you understand that a candidate providing a salary number first usually hurts our chances at the most competitive compensation offer, especially for women because we tend to undervalue our experience. I agree aligning early is important, and would love to know what you’ve benchmarked and budgeted for this role, so I can let you know if we’re in the same ballpark.” Silence. Wait for them.

If you still cannot get a clear answer, resist the urge to volunteer a figure just to move the conversation on. That’s not your job. See point 2 of this post on how you should proceed if that’s the case.

2. Script to ask if there’s flex in the budget:

This is a simple one. If you are excited about a role and the top end of the budget is just a bit below what you’d be willing to take but you are willing to proceed a bit further with them in the hope that there might be some flexibility in their salary budget for the ideal candidate you can try and feel that flex out like this:

Imagine the recruiter just told you the salary band for the role is £30,000-£50,000, but you need at least £55,000 to accept any role, because reasons.

Question you ask:

Thanks so much for sharing that with me so transparently, I really appreciate that.
I think early alignment on salary expectations is important, and I don’t want to waste yours or the team’s time if we’re not aligned.
Especially as I tend to get excited about a team and a role the more I speak to them and get to know the problem we’re working on, and don’t want to end up disappointed not to be able to make it work.
I am not sure I could make £50,000 work at this time. [Important - do not explain why. You are giving them fodder to objection handle you - resist. If asked, ‘personal commitments’ is enough of a response.]
We aren’t miles apart, but we’re not quite there. Is there any upward flexibility in the budget for the ideal candidate?

All you’re looking for here is an indication of whether their budgets are super strict or if they can flex it a bit if needs be. Startups for example are more likely to be able to flex than a government agency with strict pay bands and high bureaucracy, so set expectations accordingly.

3. Script to let your recruiters know you are in demand / there is competition

See point 4 of this post.

If you can align your various interview processes and manage them with discipline, you can generate a competitive situation at the end (or at least, reasonably imply one - which is often enough).

Communicating with your recruiter(s) that there are other processes underway without making it seem like you aren’t interested is important.

This script assumes you’ve just been asked by a recruiter whether you are in any other processes (which means they are mentally planning next steps), or they’re trying to arrange the next step of a process with you.

Script if you’re in work right now:

I am currently speaking to a few other companies about roles that sound interesting, but am really excited about this role in particular.
I do have a few personal and work commitments coming up in the next few weeks, and although I am of course open to new opportunities and thinking actively about what I might like to do next and excited to be having these conversations, I am still very much committed to doing the best I can in my current role and that takes priority during the working day, so will need a little bit of patience and help from you trying to juggle those commitments with the time investment I’ll be making to organise chats with your team as part of your process.
I hope that’s workable? [Silence. wait for them.]

Script if you’re not in work right now:

I am currently speaking to a few other companies about roles that sound interesting, but am really excited about this role in particular.
I have a few personal commitments coming up in the next few weeks, and although I am of course open to new opportunities and thinking actively about what I might like to do next and excited to be having these conversations, I am also trying to make the most of this period of rest and recharging ahead of jumping head first back into something new with full energy so not stacking interviews on top of interviews is something I am proactively trying to manage.
I’ll of course try and make myself as available as I can for chats with the team, but may need a bit of help from you to ensure we space out the conversations with your team as part of your process in a way that works for everyone.
I hope that’s workable? [Silence. wait for them.]

Then when the time comes that you need to slow something down you can say:

I’d love to schedule a chat with [whoever] - I do have a very heavy week ahead, so although I can make time if absolutely urgent to squeeze this conversation in sooner, it would be ideal for me if we could arrange something for [DATE] onward? [Then provide 3-4 time slots and dates you can make presumtively].

If the time comes to speed them up and get some urgency moving, say:

I am in the final stages of conversations with a couple of companies. The next conversations I am having are on [Date] and [Date].
I appreciate you probably have a few candidates you’re speaking to alongside me, but wanted to be upfront that I am most excited about this role and this team, so would really love to squeeze in any further conversations with the team ahead of those other chats so we can figure out if it’s a good match before I reach offer stage with the other roles and feel obliged to make a decision without having reached an outcome on this process.
Is that possible to organise? I can make myself available [provide 3-4 time slots that precede or are around the other Dates you gave] and be flexible if nothing in there works for you and the team.

4. Script if you receive an offer, and you want to negotiate it.

Recommend always having this conversation on the phone/verbally, not by email or text. People tend to be far more open.

Congrats, you have an offer on the table (verbal or written, doesn’t matter). Here are some scripts to help you conduct the salary negotiation, and some push back responses you can draw on if you are being offered less than the top end of the band.

Remember point 5 of this post: even if it sounds like a great salary and you’re elated - always negotiate. If you’re offered top of the band available, you can still ask for more (although proceed with caution and be soft in your ask if you aren’t hugely experienced - they’re still assessing you).

For these scripts, I assume you’ve at minimum covered the foundations at the start of the process, and secured clear salary bands from the recruiter (see point 1). I also assume the offer is below the top level.

Recruiter/Offer Letter: The offer we’d like to make is £40,000 per year. That is standard for this role.

Your response:

Thank you so much, I’m really excited about this role and working with the team. In our first conversation you mentioned that the salary band for this role is £30,000-£50,000.
Could you help me understand how determined the salary level to offer to me, and what would have justified an offer at the top of the band?

Although framed as open curiosity on your part rather than a challenge to the offer, what we’re really looking for is more data from them.1 Their response should tell you where you lost -£10,000 in their minds, and tell you how and where to push for more. This is where we use the witness’ testimony against them ;)

If they can’t explain their decision-making logic and where you are ‘lacking’, or their explanation is vague, push back:
Push back response:
- Thank you for explaining. I have to admit I haven’t fully understood how the pay level of my offer was decided based on that additional info.
- I think I am hearing that you are excited about me and that you believe I could do the role well, but that for your ideal candidate you had in mind someone who maybe brings one or two extra things to the table in terms of outputs and hitting the ground running.
- If that’s right, I’d love to know what that ‘extra’ is - could you maybe help me understand the specific, measurable criteria or behaviours you are looking for in this role that you aren’t confident I will bring to the table right away but that your ideal candidate would and that justifies the top end salary?
- This will at worst help me know what my development areas are as soon as I land, and at best help me clarify for you whether I can bring those attributes and behaviours to the table from the start so we can have a proper conversation about the salary offer.

If the recruiter cannot then give you at least 1-2 concrete answers, you may need to decide to either negotiate blind based only on figures (yikes) or see a 🚩 and decide what you want to do from there. What you can’t do is keep pushing when there’s no movement. If they do give reasons you can work with, skip to the response scripts below.

If they can explain the specific, measurable and achievable criteria that they would’ve liked to see in their ideal candidate and that led to you not being at the top of that band (ie where they anticipate you will perform less strongly at the start), be honest with yourself:

If you feel they’ve misjudged your experience and aptitude or you can justify that uplift some other way based on your strengths, push back:
Push back response:
- Thank you, That’s incredibly helpful and it is really reassuring for me that you are so rigorous with how you assess and think about hiring - it gives me a lot of confidence about the calibre of the team I’ll be working with.
- You mentioned [lacking criteria 1] - I understand anyone taking this role will be expected to do [XYZ].
- I have experience that allows me to do that with confidence, for example [give examples / evidence of situations here].
- *[Repeat this ^ with as many criteria as you can but max 3-4]*.
- Where expectations of performance for anyone in this role are presumably the same, I’d like to discuss being paid at the same level for those outputs even if my experience might be different to someone else’s, given expectations level out on arrival.
- I think what we’re not disagreeing on is that my aptitude for the role is the highest of the candidates you’re speaking with - which, I hope, is why we’re having this conversation.. :)
- With that in mind, could we talk about increasing the offer to the top of the band? [Silence now, wait for them to respond].
If you agree with their assessment of your areas of development and it seems fair, perhaps choose to ask for an increase (always ask…!) but don’t push as hard as in the former situation.
Soft push back:
- Thank you for taking time to explain that in such helpful detail. It gives me an immediate set of things to work on when I land, which is awesome.
- When speaking to [your future manager’s name], they mentioned that [XYZ thing - something you are strong at and was not mentioned as a weakness just now] is really critical in this role.
- That’s something I bring in droves. For example [give 1-2 examples of something you are particularly strong at, and that isn’t in dispute - i.e. no something that is in the ‘lacking’ criteria you just went through. Steer fully clear of objection handling those now and just focus on the things you already agree you are very strong on and the value that will bring to the team].
- I have noted the areas for development that I will want to address as soon as possible, but am I right in understanding that the value of the specific skills and experience I will bring to the role immediately are more important right now?
[They sort of have to say some flavour of yes to this, because otherwise why have they made an offer to you? Let’s assume they do say yes or something that confirms]:
- That’s great to hear - I think I could do a lot of great things right away in this role and am super excited about it.
- We aren’t miles apart on the offer. Yet I do feel I bring a lot of value to the table already and would love that to be recognised. Would you be open to reviewing the offer to recognise that value?

Best case, they increase the offer.

Worst case, you asked and didn’t leave money on the table. Happy days.

Remember, if they counter by asking you what you’d take - don’t answer. See point 1 - just let them know you’d love to hear from them what they’re able to do, rather than setting a specific expectation.

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Just the right amount, actually

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