Become an informed negotiator with these money talking tips from Stripe’s Strategy & Operations Lead, Anneke Jong (She/Her)

Let’s talk money, honey!

Negotiating an offer isn’t as scary as it sounds. Anneke Jong (She/Her), a Strategy & Operations Lead at Stripe, has some great tips on how to get to the offer of your dreams.

First off, know that every role has a strictly budgeted range that is already set by the company. Your goal is to get an offer in the top part of the range that they already have set. This is the framing for your negotiations.

So how do you figure out the range?

Anneke says to first use sites like Glassdoor or Payscale, among others to triangulate a range for the specific position at the company you are applying for. Make sure to bring that data in with you to your conversations with the company, but know that the number you have is not the actual range, it’s merely a jumping off point. Instead share that you have seen that particular range and that is what you believe your market value. Always tie this back to the value that you will bring to the company. Once you have made this case, ask the recruiter if this is in alignment the salary range that they have for the position.

When to Bring Up the Numbers

Anneke’s advice is to throw out the old wisdom of beating around the bush about $$. It might be awkward at first, but all parties are better off to know if your range and their range are in alignment. This way no one’s time is wasted if you are unwilling to accept a cash salary offer lower than $70k, while the cap of their range is at $58k. If you’re worried about this mismatch, but are still interested in the job, you can always throw a number out with the acknowledgement that a compensation package consists of more components than just cash salary, like more vacation time or flexible work arrangements.

Got an offer? Here’s how to negotiate:

Congrats! If you have an offer, they want you to work there. Anneke’s recommendation is to never just accept that offer as is. There is already an expectation that you will come back to negotiate. You might be afraid that if you negotiate, the company will rescind their offer. This won’t happen (and if it does, you probably don’t want to work there). So fear not, there is only upside for you in this situation.

The company’s fear in this situation is that you are going to use their offer as a bargaining chip with someone else. So, it’s really important to assuage that fear and tell them that you are excited for the position during the negotiation. Reinforce that this is a two way thing, and let them know what your priorities are by grounding your negotiations in the phrase “at this stage of my career…”. Don’t forget about compensation outside of cash salary and equity like flexible work arrangements, bonuses tied to goals, PTO, stipends, a specific title, etc. These are all great things that can often be arranged outside of salary budget caps.

Now go get that money! 💰

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Anneke Jong (she/her) is an NYC tech leader with over 15 years of experience in technology and high-growth companies. She currently leads Strategy & Operations for a new product area at Stripe. Before Stripe, she served as COO at ecommerce startup Rockets of Awesome and restaurant tech app Reserve, where she scaled and managed diverse teams of engineers, designers, operators, marketers, data scientists, and creatives. Previously, she led teams building the future of tech in the Google Creative Lab and ran the business side of Bread, an adtech startup acquired by Yahoo. She has an MBA from Stanford and is a passionate writer, speaker, and advocate for diversity in tech.

Stripe is a technology company that builds economic infrastructure for the internet. Businesses of every size-from new startups to public companies like Salesforce and Facebook-use the company’s software to accept online payments and run technically sophisticated financial operations in more than 100 countries. Stripe helps new companies get started and grow their revenues, and established businesses accelerate into new markets and launch new business models. Over the long term, Stripe aims to increase the GDP of the internet.