I have good news and bad news. First, the bad. Recent college grads who are women are far less likely to negotiate on salary than their male counterparts. Here’s the graphic:
The graphic is taken from this article. It depicts the “percentage of graduating professional students who attempted to negotiate their pay.” In 2017.
We all know about wage inequality. Women are typically paid less than men. This is not fake news; it’s a fact. Younger women start out being paid approximately equal to men (which is why younger people think there’s no pay gap), and then as they get older the gap widens. This failure to negotiate–on the salary they earn, the purchases they make, or the services they sell if they own a business–compounds throughout their lives until they end up poor compared to older men.
And this happens even to the smartest women.
In her book, Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg says that when Mark Zuckerberg hired her to be his second-in-command at Facebook, she was prepared to accept the salary he offered. She went home and told her husband about it. Their exchange went kind of like this:
David: You can’t just accept his first offer.
Sheryl: But it’s a lot of money! And the money isn’t everything—it’s the chance of a lifetime!
David: Because if you do, he’ll / they’ll never respect you, and from then on, you’ll always get less. That’s how men work. It’s not personal. It’s just real life.
So Sheryl went back and asked Zucks for more money, and she got it. Good for her. Good for her sweet husband, may he rest in peace. But if this can happen to a woman with the brains and education of a Sheryl Sandberg, what hope is there for us?
Here’s the good news. There’s a simple fix. We just need to start doing one little thing:
Women are not taught, or not in the habit of, or not comfortable with negotiation. For one thing, we hate the word, since it conjures adversarial arm-twisting and all that conflict-based nastiness, so let’s rename it.
Let’s not call it negotiating. Let’s just call it “asking.”
Still, we don’t ask. Why is that?
Because, according to the book, we have this little voice inside of us, clucking and frowning. But we need to ignore that voice because it’s not even OURS!
The little voice inside telling you not to do it (don’t rock the boat, don’t get pushy, why can’t you be happy with what you have?) isn’t your voice. It’s the voice of a society that’s still trying to tell women how to behave. It’s a voice whose message is conveyed, often unwittingly, by our parents, teachers, colleagues, and friends – and then repeated and amplified by the media and popular culture. – Babcock and Laschever
Doesn’t that resonate?
And if we don’t ask, the damage is greater than just wages (“just”?! Like that’s not the whole basis for our lives.) We get cheated when we buy things, when we pay for services, when we sell things–it never ends.
But it could. If only we ask.
I once saved myself fifty bucks by deploying seven words. In SEVEN words, I “earned” fifty dollars. Here are the words:
“Do you have any flexibility on that?”
Okay, so it’s not that much money, but I felt like I’d found a fifty on the sidewalk. And I walked out of the store energized and pissed off. Because I should have been doing this all my life, but this happened when I was sixty. AND the only reason I even thought to try was because I had read the above book.
So, obviously, I never taught my kid to negotiate, either.
Which is why this story delighted me:
Last week my son went to buy furniture. He asked that question because he’s a guy. The sales person said no, looked around, and in a quiet voice told son and DIL which furniture store they could visit to buy exactly the same product, where they DID have flexibility. So son and DIL did. And they saved 25% of the cost, which was thousands.
When he told me the story, I asked him, what made you think to ask the first salesperson for a price break? He just shrugged, as if I had asked why he thought to breathe.
I have no idea how he learned this. I can only assume it’s from Growing Up Male.
Ladies, wake up!!! You are paying too much and selling too cheaply. This is not a measure of your virtue. It’s a measure of foolishness. Sacrifice where it matters; not here.
For more on this topic, you can see these three posts, which, sadly, date back to 2012, but since we’re still not asking, are still incredibly helpful (if I do say so myself). And please report back and tell me you followed through and saved yourself some cash! Happy Asking!
Improve Your Life with One Simple Tactic
Boomer Broad Scores, and You Can, Too!
One last thought: I’d like to ask that you check out my two novels and one collection of short stories about midlife and beyond. If you’ve already read them, I hope you loved the experience. Would you mind writing a review? Here’s the link: http://www.Amazon.com/author/lynnespreen
Great advice. I’m going to share this with my D-I-L and granddaughter.
Please do! The more girls hear about this, the less they’ll be shortchanged. Tell them to share it with their friends too.
If you don’t ask, the result will always be “no”. It is normal for me to negotiate, which has not always been received well, especially when buying a car ;))
Lynne, I am not sure if it is just my browser, but the image of the book and the balance of your post keeps changing image size, which is very distracting and off-putting.
Ginger, I’m sorry about the graphics.
Is anyone else having that problem? Please let me know.
Such a simple tactic–and one that too many of us have been reluctant to do. Thanks for this, Lynne. I’m going to ask that question at the next opportunity to present itself (not sure what that’ll be!); I’ll let you know what happens. And Kathy G–you’re a great role model!
She is, isn’t she?
Yes, those seven words are pretty simple. They don’t take a ton of guts to say, and after getting used to saying them, maybe stronger ones will be easier!
Hi Lynne! I completely agree that MOST women find negotiating difficult and off-putting. But for some reason that isn’t one of my liabilities. Maybe because my grandfather was a horse trader or who knows why, but I am a far better negotiator than my husband. I will just about always ask for discounts and I’m pretty sure he is embarrassed by it sometimes. BUT, just like you say it can be a learned behavior, through the years he has grown more and more comfortable with doing it. I also think it has to do with the culture you are raised in. When we travel I actually enjoy the negotiating with vendors and see it as part of the experience. Not so here in the U.S. As you say, we have been conditioned to think a price is a price–to our detriment. Of course, I’m not always as bold and outspoken as I would sometimes like, so I’ll bet the book you recommend would have some tips in there for me too. Thanks for bringing up this issue for us all. ~Kathy
Kathy, you’re so right that having a person in the family who you can look at as a model can really help you have great skills! My husband is a former car dealer. We met when I was forty, and celebrated our 20th anniversary this year. I have learned so much from him!!! I like to say that after being a doormat all my life, and after 2 non-working husbands, when I turned forty God threw up Her hands and sent me a car salesman.
Hi Lynne! Haha…God does have a good sense of humor, doesn’t she? 😉 Congratulations on your 20th. And I’ll bet he has taught you a few things about negotiation too…of course if he is really good at it, it is probably tempting to let him take the lead. Sometimes we have to step out and be the lead huh? Just so we learn, right? ~Kathy
FYI…I received your email announcement for this post today and it looked GREAT! Looks like you’ve got that figured out.
Oh thank you so much Kathy! I have been working hard to tinker with it, and every time I send it out, I hold my breath! I did figure out how to attach it to the RSS function, now if only I could get it to not duplicate mailings to people who signed up on the WordPress blog itself, which I have since disabled.
Diane, if everybody could just remember to say, “Do you have any flexibility on that?”, it would be a big improvement and not THAT scary!
This situation (see above comment) is remarkable given that women are the major decision-makers when it comes to household spending. The inequality of women over the long term in the paid and unpaid work force has a huge impact on their well-being that is not recognized or acknowledged in our society.
This situation is remarkable given that women make the majority of decisions (80 per cent) about how/where household money is spent. Women pay a big price in the paid and unpaid workforce over the long term, one that is still not acknowledged or recognized.
Wow, Lynne, just got a degree in negotiating! All this is true, and I’ve known about it for years, but confess that I still don’t ask for costs to be reduced! If I’m not happy about a price, I tend to walk out the door and find a better deal, which is fine, except that I waste a great deal of time. So it would be better to ask for it in the first place! I constantly marvel how our current situations, as women, are rooted in what society expects of us!