A Different Kind Of In- Store
Monday, Jun 18, 2007   6PM @ INKWOOD BOOKS (216 S. Armenia)

Penelope Trunk is a career columnist at the Boston Globe and Yahoo Finance. Her syndicated column, "THE BRAZEN CAREERIST", has run in more than 200 publications. Our friends at Inkwood Books will be hosting a signing of her new book.

Trunk started writing business advice when Fortune magazine published an open call for a woman to write about her own life as an executive. She auditioned with a piece about her brother's stupid Internet ideas, and a piece about her boss's sex appeal, and she won the job.

She is dedicated to helping people find success at the intersection of work and life, because that's what she wants for herself. To better understand the nature of her offbeat, creative and effective advice, read her blog, where she posts daily tips for making work life and personal life one happy, synchronized adventure. Below is an example-

April 5, 2007

Yahoo column: Five steps for getting a raise

Here are numbers one and five on the list. You can read the rest at Yahoo Finance (http://finance.yahoo.com/expert/article/careerist/28422).

1. Understand your boss’s perspective.
This is not a moment of truth, it’s a moment of negotiation. You convince your boss you’re worth more and your boss convinces you he or she is fair, and you reach some sort of compromise that makes everyone happy.

So be reasonable in your approach. You don’t deserve a raise just because you’ve been doing your job well for x number of months. It’s your job to do your job well — that’s why you were hired. You need to show that you’re doing more than you were hired to do, or that you’re doing different work that’s typically paid at a higher rate.

Gather as much information about your boss’s perspective as possible in order to form your strongest negotiating position. Consider this list of 10 things bosses hate most about employees (http://money.guardian.co.uk/work/story/0,,2048182,00.html).

5. Think in non-financial terms.
If more money isn’t happening for you, try asking for something else. Telecommuting, a job for your spouse, extra vacation time, training, even relocation to a company branch in a city with a lower cost of living — these are all things that are worth a lot of money to you, but look a lot less expensive than a salary increase in a company’s budget. So non-financial rewards are a good place to compromise in salary negotiations.

Also, you can turn these benefits to cash next time you change jobs. When you negotiate salary at your next company and they ask you how much you made in your last job, add up all the benefits and include them in the number you give. Some people’s benefits total up to 30 percent of their salary.

If the shy ones among you are thinking this isn’t a fair negotiating tactic, get that thought out of your head. Even CareerHub, a group blog of career coaches, recommends that you include benefits in the total calculation of your salary next time you negotiate.