Why Good Girls Don't Get Ahead_. But Gutsy Girls Do - Kate White [72]
There's asking for what you want, and then there's asking for money To a good girl, the first seems tough but the second is positively excruciating. As a good girl, what you may do to avoid having to talk raw numbers is to convince yourself that good bosses pay you what you deserve. Wrong. They pay you what they can get away with. As a friend of mine in human resources says, “When we get someone cheap, we think how lucky we are.”
A gutsy girl knows that the only way to guarantee that she'll earn the money she wants and deserves is to go after it aggressively. When she starts a new job or gets a promotion, she negotiates for as much as she possibly can. But that's not all. She also realizes that getting the money she wants isn't a once-a-year experience at salary review time. A gusty girl thinks of her salary as a living, breathing thing that she must constantly manage—almost as if it were a stock portfolio. She must, for instance, keep her eye on the market (if she's been at a company for a while, she may not be keeping pace with the industry—even though she's getting decent raises). And she must find innovative ways to grow it (by asking for bonuses, perks, etc.).
Any discomfort we experience when it comes to asking for money may reflect messages we got from our parents. A 1993 study of 600 college students by Jerome Rabow and Michael Newcomb of the sociology department of the University of California, Los Angeles, found that parents’ expectations for their male and female children about money differ dramatically. Sons, more than daughters, perceive and evaluate their parents as expecting them to know how to work and to save. Males are introduced to discussions of family finances at an earlier age than females, are more likely than women to work in college, and receive less financial support from their families than females do. Such differences, in expectations and behavior, help establish what the researchers call different money “tracks” for males and females.
As a long-term result, say the researchers, men and women have sharply different evaluations of money in relation to themselves and others. Men, more than women, feel positive about money and others who make money Men feel that those who earn money are rational, responsible, and attractive. Money makes men feel lovable, happy, in control. Women, on the other hand, are repelled and intimidated by money and consider those who earn good incomes immoral.
Repelled and intimidated are pretty strong words. They make it sound as if our attitude toward money is pretty ingrained. Now, I hate to quibble with the people from UCLA, but I have my own theory on this subject I think that, yes, some women are uncomfortable about money matters, and maybe they even start out thinking money isn't so nice But I also believe that the first time you can afford to buy a pair of Calvin Klein gabardine trousers with your income and compare the beautiful, silky feel of them against your thighs to that of the partially polyester ones you purchased from T.J. Maxx, you cease being repelled by the concept of money. In fact, you find it quite a lovely thing. From there, all it takes is a little behavioral modification to learn how to ask for more of it.
First, Determine What You're Worth
One of the mistakes good girls make when they discuss salary with a boss or potential boss is not having any sense of their actual value in dollars. Therefore, they end up accepting a salary or raise based not on their worth but on guidelines from Human Resources or on somebody's budget or simply on what they were making (“I'm making X now so I should ask for Y.”) If you follow any of these approaches, you are likely to end up with far less than you deserve and even far less than what they might be willing to give.
To determine your worth, you must consider both the market rate for your position in the industry and your performance in your current job.
For market value, you have to keep your ear close to the ground and listen for tidbits about what people in your