2 Ways to Be the Best Negotiator in the Room

1) Less Talk is More

When asked what salary you want, be direct and candid with the individual. The most successful hires I've had internally at my firm, as well as the best placements we've made for 3rd party companies, have a very quick negotiation process that ends up ideal for both parties because expectations are set prior to the person interviewing even once with the firm.

Q: What If You Don't Have a Recruiter to Negotiate for You?

A: Playing cat and mouse over $5,000 shows that you have a lack of understanding of what your time is worth. Make sure the interviewing company is told in a very polite, non aggressive manner (think: you don't want to waste their time) that you are seeking X dollars if you get the job.

Regardless of whether you're working with a staffing agency, most of the time, I would recommend not having a recruiter negotiate for you because a lot of them have incentive to inflate your salary needs to a point where you don't get the offer at all.

Moreover, the best piece of advice I've ever received from anybody was from my father. It was, "Stop talking and just do it." If you're going to be successful at a company and you know you can make yourself indispensable to an employer, then your salary, in conjunction with quickly raising, becomes part equity in that company.

2) How to Leverage an Offer From a Competing Firm

Always base the number regarding what you should ask for your next salary based on what the market (in this case, defined as direct competing companies) is offering, but don't tell them that is where you got the number.

The best companies hate their competitors and sometimes will even take back an offer if they think you are flirting with the enemy.

There are exceptions to this, which I will discuss some other time, but don't bet that you are one; they are exceptions, not rules, for a reason.

Q: What to Do If The Hiring Person Asks Where You Got That Number From?

A: It's what you been offered for jobs that you've turned down over the past few months and it's what you need to keep the lifestyle that you want intact so you don't have to come for a raise every six months.

Try to stay away from pointing fingers at former employers.

Ken Sundheim runs KAS Placement, an executive staffing firm that Ken started in 2005.

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Ken's articles have appeared in, among many others Forbes, NYTimes, USA Today and more.

KAS Placement is an executive recruitment agency.