In tight economic times
improved pay and conditions are
still possible if employees think
outside the square, a United States
job coach and author says.
"Lean and mean ... tight budget
You hear those phrases a lot nowadays,
and they discourage people
from thinking there's any way to
increase their income at work. It
seems the best people can hope for is
a cost-of-living adjustment" Jack
Chapman says.
But there are many ways to be
recognised that don't cost employers
money out of their pockets, he says.
The biggest one is time. If a cash pay
rise is out of the question, why not
ask for more leave? One week more of
leave can mean a 2 per cent salary
jump, Mr Chapman says.
He gives as an example of "time
negotiation" a librarian who had a
target salary of $40,000 but was
offered a position of $20,000.
"Instead of turning down the interview,
she spent time finding out the
specialty library's needs and found a
way to be paid the full $20,000 but
work only 20 hours a week."
The woman discovered the employer
was planning a reorganisation of
a computer system, its security, and
moving to more than 40-hour/week
coverage.
She proposed she take on the project
and work only 20 hours a week on
the higher-skilled tasks, while training
two clerks to do higher-level
library work besides clerical tasks, he
says.
Once these clerks were trained, the
library would have 100 person-hours
of skilled coverage instead of the 40
hours skilled, plus 80 hours clerical
that it had been using originally.
"The net result [was] she got paid
the equivalent of $40,000 - working
for $20,000, but only half-time."
There are several other ways to
negotiate time - flexi-time, personal
days and extra days for time spent at
conventions, trade shows and working
late with customers, he says.
Mr Chapman says another clever
way is to set targets with your boss,
such as construction deadlines, production
deadlines, sales quotas, customer
satisfaction survey results,
employee productivity measures, and
accident-free days.
"Bosses like to reward excellence.
Your job is to tie the excellence in to a
measurable quantity and link some
dollar [or time] compensation to it."