Difficulty: Medium to Hard
How-To:
Pay Equity - You can determine if you are being compensated comparably with your peers by accessing salary calculators for your industry. For Architects, AIA National has a salary calculator tool that you can review provide information about years of experience, role, and geographic location, and it will provide comparable salaries. Visit http://info.aia.org/salary/ or the Archinect Salary Poll results here: http://salaries.archinect.com/. Other resources include websites like Glassdoor and FairyGodBoss are also very useful.
If you are getting paid an appropriate salary for your level of experience and project responsibilities, and firm size, and geographic location, then congratulations! If not, you should evaluate your career path, professional development goals, and the firm’s alignment with your values and career goals before you consider asking for a raise.
Ask if your firm performs annual pay audits to track if equitable pay practices are being administered.
If you determine that you will ask for a raise, you should self-assess your ability and comfort level with negotiation. If you are not comfortable with negotiation, that is a good place to start - get out of your comfort zone and tackle your weaknesses.
Anthony Gold - Our guest juror and venture capitalist of #EQxDHack16 has these tips. http://www.anthonysdesk.com/top-10-salary-negotiation-tips/
Why it is important:
It’s not just about negotiating an individual’s salary, but also about building a skill set that is invaluable to any architecture firm. If you are not building your negotiation skills, you are leaving money on the table for client fee proposals and additional services. You also won’t be advocating for your clients with contractor’s change orders.
Further Reading:
Knowing Our Worth - Design Intelligence
Negotiation is your Power Tool by Rosa Sheng
Must Read - Books on Negotiation
Design Intelligence Compensation and Bonus Report 2016
Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In - Roger Fisher
Difficult Conversations - How to discuss what matters most
Hardball for Women - Pat Heim
What works for Women at Work - Joan Williams
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Description of Difficulty Levels:
Very Easy - Takes no more than a couple of minutes, requires almost no effort
Easy - Takes no more than fifteen to thirty minutes, requires little effort
Medium - Takes no more than an hour, moderate effort required, might have to put yourself out there a bit
Hard - Takes a couple of hours, effort required, will have to put yourself out there.
- Very Hard - Takes more than a couple of hours, may be a recurring commitment. Requires a solid amount of effort. Challenge yourself!