How to ask for a pay rise?

We all want to be better paid for our work and feel valued for our time. However, talking about salary or asking for a pay rise can sometimes feel awkward and like a taboo subject. 

If you find asking your line manager for more money intimidating, you are not alone. In a salary survey conducted by Totaljobs, 67% of respondents said they don’t feel comfortable requesting a salary increase, with 31% admitting they lack the confidence to raise the subject of a pay increase. 

It doesn’t need to be that way. In today’s hiring landscape, candidates are well and truly in the driver’s seat, so now is the time to negotiate a more competitive salary packages from your current employer. This article will guide you through how to know your own worth and when to approach the conversation of a pay rise, as well as what to avoid and how to demonstrate your value to your boss. 

Step 1: Know your worth 

Firstly, find out how your current salary lines up with the industry standard and your own salary expectations. This will help you work out what you should be aiming for. One way to do this is to check the Page Personnel Salary Comparison Tool. Our state-of-the-art tool calculates the average salary of job titles from Michael Page placements and advertised roles in the last 12 months to give you the information you need to go into a salary negotiation confidently. 

Now you know what you are asking for, it’s time to know when. Timing can be crucial to acquiring the desired outcome when asking for a pay rise so knowing when the optimum moment is can make a real difference. 

Step 2: Knowing when to ask 

When it comes to asking for a pay rise, timing really is everything. Even if you have a fantastic relationship with your manager, it’s important to know when to ask for more money and also when not to. Here’s some of our advice: 

Best times to ask for a pay rise:

• After the successful completion of a project or campaign you were heavily involved in. If you’re working on a big project, it’s worth making a note of all the successes and contributions you made to help you build your business case. 
• When your line manager announces positive financial results, this is a good sign that there maybe extra budget that could then be used to inflate employee salaries.
• If you’re coming to the end of a contract and the company wants to renew it, this might be a good time to re-evaluate your role, and how that might change when the contract is extended.
• Has your manager asked you to take on more responsibility beyond your usual job description? If so, then that might be a good time to ask for additional compensation in light of the new responsibilities.
• After a positive annual performance review, you will be in one of the best positions to ask for a pay rise. If your manager has already outlined how well you’re doing in role and how great of an asset you are to the team, this will allow you to more naturally segway into asking for more money.

💡TOP TIP: If you want to set up a meeting to discuss a pay rise, make sure you choose a comparatively quiet time in your line manager's schedule. If it looks like they have a lot of other priorities that day, you might want to change the timings to a morning or afternoon where they don’t have many other meetings. This way you’ll be able to have their full attention and know they won’t be distracted with other things. 

Worst times to ask for a pay rise:

• If your company has recently announced poor financial results, or the loss of a major contract, it might be worth letting the dust settle before asking for a pay rise.
• Similarly, if your company has announced a pay or recruitment freeze, you’ll likely not be granted a pay rise until these restrictions are lifted.
• It’s also not a great idea to plan a meeting on either a Monday morning or a particularly busy time in the quarter. Similarly, Friday afternoons, when your boss is thinking about the weekend, will also not be a great time.

Step 3: Preparing for a pay rise discussion

Now you have a specific moment in mind to make your case, it is vital that you prepare fully for the conversation with your boss. The more prepared you are, the more professional you will come across and the more valuable to your company you will appear. A great place to start is by rereading your performance reviews so you have concrete examples of where and why you add value to the business and why this is deserving of a raise. Don’t be afraid to blow your own trumpet. This is the time to do so!

During a pay review, your manager is going to assess the value you bring to the organisation. They will consider what you have contributed over the past 12 months, what would happen if you left the organisation, and how easy it would be to replace you. Ultimately you will have to make a business case for why you deserve a higher salary. 

The next step is to practice what you are going to say when you make your pay rise request. The more you know about what you are going to say, the more confident and assertive it will seem.

Think about what questions your boss might ask you and prepare and practice your responses. As the old adage goes: “fail to prepare, prepare to fail”. Remember to remain professional - the more calm and collected you are, the more confident in your abilities and valuable you will seem. 

Step 4: Justifying your desired salary 

Whilst you prepare yourself for the big meeting, it’s important to make notes on why you think you deserve your desired salary. 

• Use specific, recent accomplishments and the value you’ve brought to the company as reasons for why you deserve the salary increase you’re proposing.
• Think of specific moment you demonstrated your technical skills in the last financial year.
• Quantify your value with data and awards/accolades so you can demonstrate more tangibly how you’ve contributed to your company’s bottom line.
• Present your justification for the pay rise request, and answer questions from your manager, in a logical, compelling way.

Now you have a good idea of what you are asking for and how you are going to ask for it, it is time to request an in-person meeting with your boss. It is important that you treat this conversation with the level of seriousness it warrants. That means a one-to-one in-person meeting is nearly always the preferred option.  

The intimacy of a one-to-one in-person meeting is a much better vehicle for staking your claim to a pay rise than a mere email, as it will allow you to further respond to your boss’s reactions in real time. 

Although an in-person meeting can seem a bit more daunting, an email will make your request for a salary increase seem less serious and be easier to brush aside. However, do not forget to inform your boss ahead of time why you are requesting a meeting so they can mentally prepare (you do not want to appear to be blindsiding them). 

What’s next? 

These steps are should provide a good guide to getting a pay rise. But if you still feel you are being undervalued, why not make a career move? Top employers are looking for talented professionals to join their business, which puts you in a great position to command higher salary packages from top companies across the UK. 

We currently have over 10,000 job roles across our UK sites, so start your job search today. Our job boards are waiting for you. Alternatively, submit your CV and one of our dedicated recruitment consultants will be in touch to help you with your job search.