You’re asking yourself “when should I ask for a pay increase?”
You don’t want to do it at the wrong time. When is too soon so you don’t look bad? Will it make you look bad if you ask?
Did you receive a pay increase a year ago? Maybe you receive a bump in pay every March for “cost of living” so you don’t normally ask because you know that’s when a pay increase is given.
Perhaps you’re the highest paid person in your current position and there are nine other women/men paid less than you are.
Or are you the least paid in a group of ten?
Whatever the case, please allow me to help guide you to when you should ask for a pay increase.
The Reason You Work
Let’s start by saying you work for a reason.
Most likely, that reason is for money. If it’s not for money, you’re reading the wrong article.
I’m going to assume that every single reader wants to earn more money.
Believe me, the company you work for wants to earn more. Do you think they want to make larger profits just so they can pay you more? In a perfect world, yes. However, the world isn’t perfect.
Let’s say you have someone cutting your grass every other week. They charge you $120 each time. You receive a $5,000 a year increase. Do you decide to give some of that money to your grass cutting company? Nah. You don’t.
They are providing a service and that’s their fee. If they want to go up on the fee, they can and they’ll let you know.
This scenario is a little different, but the point is that companies are always trying to make more.
Why should you not feel the same about earning more for yourself? You have to ask for it, because most likely it won’t be freely given.
Get Organized Before You Ask For A Pay Increase
If you’re new to this website, you don’t know that I am a huge fan of to-do lists. Being organized is at least 50% of the reason why I have received pay increases in the past.
That being said, I do believe you need a few things in order to be successful when you ask for a pay increase.
Do you need these things completed before you walk into your boss’s office? Not necessarily. I can’t count the number of people who have asked me for a pay increase without bringing anything else to the table.
However, if you’re organized and present a strong case for your pay increase, you could be able to sway someone who may have been on the fence. It could also help bump the amount of increase you’re given.
There are five things that I’m going to ask that you start keeping:
- An on-going list of dates and values of every increase in your pay that you have received.
- An on-going list of any bonus dates and values that you have received.
- The dates of any promotions that you’ve accepted.
- A list of everything you do that is “above and beyond” your day-to-day tasks.
- Any dollars that you have saved the company.
The first three are pretty easy. We want to start keeping track of your past increases so you can confidently say it’s been “one year and seven days since my last increase”. Your employer may mention bonus amounts, so know those ahead of time as well.
You also want to know the dates of any promotions so if you did get a large bump in pay, you can recognize that the bump was due to increased responsibilities.
Now for the remaining two items, please allow me to go into a bit more detail…
Reasons Why You Are Great
What do you do that is “above and beyond” the call of duty?
Do you get out of your chair when you aren’t busy and ask everyone if there’s anything you can help with?
Are you willing to take on tasks that aren’t in your daily workload?
Instead of hiring an outside company to complete something, do you research and learn how to do it on your own?
Create a list of all these tasks that are “above and beyond”.
What do you do that saves the company money?
Perhaps you fill in for an hourly employee that needs to leave at 3:00 every day. You do your work plus you complete the work of someone else for two hours. Say that person makes $20 an hour. $20 x 2 hours a day = $40 a day you are saving the company. $40 a day x 5 days a week = $200 a week. $200 a week x 52 weeks a year = $10,400 the company is saving by you willing to put in a little extra work.
Think out of the box when you answer this question. There are certainly obvious answers.
Like, maybe you buy the computers for your company. You found somewhere that sells the same computer for $200 cheaper and you started buying those. $200 isn’t much but multiply that by 10 computers a year. We’re now talking thousands.
Anything that is more than $1,000, write it down.
Keep an on-going list of all the dollars you have saved the company. It’s much easier to get a $5,000 a year increase when you saved the company $50,000 in the last year. Take the time write down every single time you’ve saved them money.
When Is Too Soon To Ask For A Pay Increase?
Never.
Eh. Maybe not never. Maybe one day after you get a pay increase is too soon to ask.
But what if you didn’t get the pay increase you were expecting? Perhaps you should thank your boss for the pay increase, and then let them know that you would like to approach them again in a month to present additional data in hopes to bump that increase up a bit.
See what they say.
Have you ever heard of anyone getting fired for asking for a pay increase? I haven’t.
So When Should I Ask For A Pay Increase?
Any day. Not every day, but any day works.
More often than not, people don’t ask for pay increases outside of their normal annual pay increases. Most of the employees that I’ve spoken to feel that the annual increase is their pay increase and they should wait for that.
I say they are wrong. I say that the annual increase (or cost of living increase) is just to try to keep up with inflation.
An article from Paychex.com says it very well: “COLAs are increases in compensation intended to help employees maintain the value of their compensation against inflation. These increases are not viewed as merit increases resulting from good job performance but should be considered a way to help employees maintain their earning power.”
Every company is different and it is possible that your annual increase is different as well.
Should you approach your boss for a pay increase before or after your annual increase? I say – Do both. Approach them before the annual increase and present the list we spoke earlier about. Show how disappointing your past increases have been (if they have been). Show how much money you have saved the company.
And then after the increase, let them know that you’d like to speak in a month about things you can do to bump the number up.
Is your cost of living increase six months away? Ask for a pay increase based upon the lists you have written. Ask for this any time of the year on any day. A pay increase for performance is not the cost of living increase. You can have both.
What If My Boss Says No?
Perhaps timing was off and the company isn’t doing well financially. Ask if you can approach them again in a couple of months to follow up on the increase instead of accepting the “no”.
What your employer says means a lot. Most likely, they want to keep you because hiring new people and training them is hard. If they say you can approach them again in a couple of months…great!
If they say no, that’s irritating. I want to be able to negotiate. It feels a lot better knowing that the door is still open for later.
I’m here to make money. I work so I can be promoted and receive bonuses and increases and work on funding my retirement.
I want to surround myself with people that want to see me promoted. My boss should want me to be able to talk to them about increasing my pay because they want to keep me happy.
If they say “no, you cannot ask again in the future”, set up a meeting to discuss the reasons behind that answer. If it’s your job performance, you need to be aware.
One last tactic would be showing comparable salary ranges for like positions at other companies. This may open your employer’s eyes if the “no” you received was not performance driven.
A Quick Do’s And Don’ts When Asking For A Pay Increase
- DO These Things
- Be confident.
- Have a list of what you’ve done great for the company.
- Know when your last increase was.
- Have a list of all of the money you’ve saved the company.
- Have a plan if they say no or they are not sure.
- Know when you’re going to ask to meet again beforehand.
- Make sure to ask what you could do to secure a higher pay rate. What else could you take on?
- DO NOT Do These Things
- Be scared.
- Walk into the room without knowing your facts.
- Weaken under pressure. Be confident in knowing how great you are!
- Think that it’s not ok to ask for a pay increase. It absolutely is ok.
- Never ask for a pay increase because you are afraid of being rejected.
Final Thoughts On When To Ask For A Pay Increase
Like I said early on, companies are in the business to make money. You should be as well.
I wish I could tell you that you should ask for a pay increase tomorrow at 12:05pm. However, there’s not a magical time to ask. The worst thing you could do is not ask at all.
The more time you spend debating on when/if you should ask, the more time that passes. The more time that passes equals more of your dollars that you’re losing.
Don’t be hesitant to ask for an increase. If you’re given a “maybe” or even a “no”, ask if you can revisit with them in two to three months. During that visit, present additional data, like comparative salaries at other companies or how many more dollars you have saved the company since your last talk.
Know that there’s really no wrong time to ask for a pay increase. (Except for obvious days like maybe your boss’s birthday…Bonus day…Stock Market crash day…)
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