April J, will you please give advice on negotiating benefits other than
salary is it proper to talk about vacation lead time off prior to being hired
or does it send the wrong signals okay there's a couple questions in here these are pretty good
all right april j about negotiating anything uh literally and i'm not being funny here everything
is negotiable everything even when they tell you it isn't okay so now they may not give in to you
or they may say we're drawing the line there i just coached a woman week before last living
in florida going to a design agency they said two weeks vacation non-negotiable she got three
right two extra weeks five total right off right we don't give no more no more no more extra week
right somebody else they wanted him to move in two months both of these are boot campers
wanted him to move in two months he got two years right so so so everything is negotiable
now i have talked about this before in a number of videos and i would definitely check out my
salary negotiation playlist but april for you the one important thing that you want to do
is the tactic you need is when you say is it proper to talk about vacation lead time off
prior to being hired and any of that stuff so let's go backwards because it really kind of
fits in what i want to share you should if it's major and soon discuss that you are going to be
gone on a vacation it is not something for you to sweat employers totally understand that your life
was scheduled right you're changing jobs you may have a vacation planned with your family
you may have mom coming in from europe they whatever it is okay maybe you're going to hawaii
i don't know which is whatever it is you need to i would let them know in 99 percent of the cases
it will not be an issue okay now there are some organizations that it might be a little
uncomfortable they may say well you know you're only going to be able to have three weeks vacation
in the first year and you already have a month planned in august to go to your whatever it is
you're gonna have to take unpaid leave for a week okay well that's entirely up to them and you can
figure that out but to address your first question never never negotiate anything and i mean never
and anything until you get down to the end okay so tactically when you say negotiating benefits
i don't care if you're negotiating vacation i don't care if you're negotiating profit sharing
percentages 401k matches personal time working from home anything any of you can think of
none of it should be negotiated until the very end and why is that such a big deal
well number one and i've said this until i was blue in the face is you want to do it when your
stock is highest so you are increasing the likelihood that you will get what you want
however secondarily and just as importantly is you want to show up to the negotiating table
not having taken a thing along the way because what does that do so let me give you an example
and i've talked about this one a few times but whether it's benefits whether it's vacation time
whether it's work from home whether it's the relocation time the relocation expenses the
relocation payback period anything you restricted stock units incentive cycle you name it all
if any of that is discussed and granted to you before you get to the negotiating table
you are already in debt okay what do i mean well annie you know uh we really only have a
two week vacation policy oh you know i'm coming from this company and i got four you know i
know four might be a stretch but three seems more appropriate you know what andy no problem for you
we're going to make an exception three weeks all right now i owe them one back all right because
they gave me something i took it all right you know i don't really want to come into the office
five days a week can we make it three well we really want everybody in the office but for you
okay now this doesn't happen all at once a lot of times this is sprinkled in along the way so
what are you doing you're taking taking taking so you're putting yourself in a hole and you don't
even know it now you get to the end but april april you you didn't want a hundred thousand
you wanted 110. you didn't want a ten thousand dollar bonus you wanted a 20. right you didn't
want two weeks vacation you wanted four you didn't want one percent property match you wanted to
you needed additional benefits for whatever you needed vacation leave early now imagine you're
going to go through all this you have a greater likelihood when that is a consolidated package
and i'm not going to go into all the what to say and the scenarios
but trust me when i tell you you need to keep pushing things off until the end if
they say april you know uh we can we can visit your vacation days you know what i'm thinking
it's we can give you three weeks you know what we don't need to discuss that i'm sure we can discuss
that at the end push it push it push it okay just keep pushing everything and then when you come
to the end you've increa now you're even steven you're starting you're starting on an even playing
field you haven't taken anything your stock is the highest you haven't asked for anything and
you haven't taken anything okay this goes for all you people that ask me every single day hey annie
i see this job but i don't want to move but they tell me it needs to be in the office no interview
go get locked in get them to love you negotiate at the end okay you you cannot imagine what goes
through an employer's mind when they spend three weeks or three months trying to recruit you to get
you down to the end only to find out that there's this silly thing about you not wanting to relocate
when you could very well do this job from home they don't want to spend another three months
looking for you right so they break they find the time they find the money they find the ability to
do it all right so you but you're you're trying to negotiate when you're weak so april it doesn't
matter what you're asking for you go in with the whole the whole kitten kit and caboodle
so i looked at all this based on the value i'm going to add based on what i'm going to do based
on the experience i'm bringing all that stuff i told you i'm coming with this and that my network
and so on and so forth and my bright bubbly face and all the stuff this is this is it 120 20 4
weeks vacation and you ask for all of it and then they say well hang on we can't change that that's
a you know corporate wide thing and we can't muck with the 401k plan all right i'll bend on that
right you bent on something they couldn't change but it looks like a bend psychologically to them
so then they're looking for the levers where they can play well so now if you're negotiating with
me i'm doing stuff like this to you what's more important the salary or the time off
now which now i'm making you trade with yourself okay that kind of stuff and it appears like it's a
choice because it is a choice except except i was locked in on something and now what you're doing
is you're having to choose within the constraints i'm providing but you don't know that so so you
got to think about all this but you you you make your ask at the end and it doesn't matter what
you're asking for i really want to work here but i i if i i can't i can't move my my my mom's sick uh
i can't move my kids in school oh you want me to move i'm willing to move you don't want to pay the
full freight for me to move it's going to cost me 18 grand can you pay me that somewhere right like
all this stuff can be discussed do not think one size fits all i had a guy on my youtube channel
yesterday you think i don't read these things i wake up in the morning i go through a routine i
go to my youtube channel the comments on my blog and then the comments in the milo academy and i
answer all the milwaukee stuff and i read through all the youtube stuff and he said on one of my
salary videos he said you know folks you need to listen to this because i've interviewed you know
i've worked at colgate and palm island this and that you know all these brand chip companies he
puts on there he's like it's always negotiable even when they tell you it's not it it always is
and you should listen to what andy's saying i mean it's it's true even though you think it's not
because you're taking their word for it and they actually are telling you what they truly believe
even though when it gets down to the end they will they will they will make accommodations they do
they do all right april hope that helps i know salary negotiation is a big one for
everybody stand your ground and don't don't take anything until until you get down to the end big
mistake