What You Need to Know About Business

Asking Questions -- An Essential and Overlooked Step

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Putting a Spin on Work Experience

[Chapter 16: continued from here] ...But someone's got to be the first to state a figure-or at least a range-and while you'd prefer that it be the employer, it will often have to be you. You can try reversing the question by asking "What do you have budgeted for this position?," but if the interviewer is persistent, your further attempts to dodge the question will only agitate them and hurt your chances of being offered the position.

If you have to give a figure first, you'll want to give a range. The less you've heard about the position, the employer's expectations, and the responsibilities you would be given, the wider the range you'll want to provide.

A range communicates that you're willing to be flexible, and increases your chances that the amount you quote will be close to the figure that the employer has in mind. Specific negotiations will come later. For now they just want to know if they're wasting their time.

Don't lowball yourself! If you have to give an expected salary range, you should make sure that the range you quote truly is acceptable to you. The employer won't select you anyway unless they think you offer something of value and are more capable of helping them solve their problems than the others they could have offered the position to. If they offer you the position, they already think you're valuable. They won't think less of you for expecting a little more than they were hoping to pay. If you quote a low amount, the employer may wonder if they've overrated your value.

You should also give some idea of the factors that would determine where in the range you would expect the offer to fall. These may include the responsibilities you'd have or the expectations the employer would have of you, for example.