Formally asking for a pay raise

[TremoloGreen]

I have an appointment with the MD of my company this week to discuss a review of my salary. Background is that when I joined the company, I was new to senior management, my previous role had been junior/middle management and I think I allowed myself to be somewhat lowballed on salary due to this and also because my current company was offering the best flexible working deal I could find. I know in theory that this shouldn't have a bearing on salary and the salary should just be pro rata'd but I think in practice it does affect my value to the company. Later this year, I'm planning to go back to FT and do more core hours, plus I'm more available for travel from now. I also can argue that my job role has expanded and I have driven growth/efficiencies within the company.

I know the process they will ask me to follow is to submit a letter outlining the reasons for my request so I've drafted one. The thing is that I've had some contradictory advice about what the include/leave out and would be grateful for any input. This is the jist of it (details obscured for privacy):

Dear [MD],

Thank you for giving me the opportunity for a salary review in the current cycle.

When I joined [Company] in 2016, I negotiated my salary on the basis that I was a new appointment to [job title] level. My current salary is £60,000 per annum (pro rata). I have outlined below some of the ways that my skills and responsibilities have expanded to meet the needs of the business since I first started at [company].

(I have heavily summarised here, it's much better written than this)

Grown key account from £0.9m revenue in 2017 to £1.3m (projected) in 2018. Comment about challenges faced here. Info on how this account is top priority for key client and involves interface with key influencers in industry.

Team I manage has grown from 3 to 8 people. I directly line manage an extra 3 people. Feedback that i have supportive and motivational management style. Contribute to company's aim to increase staff satisfaction and retention.

Added value to client relationships through creative/strategic insights - included three quotes from clients where they asked specifically for me to work on something for them or said I did a great job

Driven efficiencies, volunteered to lead task forces on internal processes, streamlining non-chargeable time

Finally, I enjoy working at [company]and remain committed to further developing my skills and progressing my career within the company, as well as contributing to the continued success of [company] and the [named key] account. To this end, I would like to increase my working hours from 4 to 5 days per week later in the year and plan to keep actively auditing and building on my existing skills. I also hope to take advantage of increased availability to travel this year.

I have conducted a salary benchmarking review, based on recruiter salary surveys (please see attached), as well as speaking to recruiters and contacts at other agencies (names of agencies, one is a direct competitor) about salaries and benefits available to someone with my skills and experience. Estimates ranged from £70,000 to £80,000 per annum plus other benefits such as pension contributions, childcare vouchers, health insurance and annual bonus schemes.

Taking into account the above and also the total benefits package available at [company], I would like to request an increase in salary to £60,000 (pro rata until I begin working full time later this year).

Thank you very much for taking time to consider my request.
Yours Sincerely, etc
Trem

sorry, obviously that last figure should say £70k... key detail wrong!

Only scan-read your OP and letter.

Grown key account from £0.9m revenue in 2017 to £1.3m (projected) in 2018

Can you find a different metric to show what you have already delivered in terms of revenue? Or have you got the years wrong?

Your statement above isn't a tangible benefit as we are only 1 week into 2018, so I'm not sure how what you've written will entice them into paying you more, projections are not achieved targets, actuals are.

How long have you been there?

I know 2016 but how many months?

17 months

Thanks daisy - I can check the figure for 2016 - probably around 0.6m

Personally, if I had only been there 17 months I would not ask for a pay rise at all.

I'd move this bit to above the numbers - remind them early on you want to stay and progress:

Finally, I enjoy working at [company]and remain committed to further developing my skills and progressing my career within the company, as well as contributing to the continued success of [company] and the [named key] account. To this end, I would like to increase my working hours from 4 to 5 days per week later in the year and plan to keep actively auditing and building on my existing skills. I also hope to take advantage of increased availability to travel this year.

Industries are all different in terms of typical length of service/ job market demand. To give you an idea, 3 years is considered a long time to stay with one company in my line of work.

Thank you very much for taking time to consider my request

This sounds a little bit timid for such a big proposal

"Look forward to discussing your input to this proposal" sounds more managerial, it will give them the underlying sense you mean business, and you are interested in what they have to say. And that you will give them good value for their investment

Hmmm if three years is a long time for someone to stay, why should they give you a pay increase.... just a thought.

(Not an HR prof, just someone who manages in my own discipline).

i applaud you for doing this.

in my first people management role, i was astounded at how little the female members of staff valued themselves at hiring. and of course, didn't negotiate or even attempt to raise salary discussions. huge discrepancies were allowed to develop (think £30k plus for the same mid-level roles). i don't have anything else to add because you've already included the things i was going to suggest.

however, the only point i'd make is to go high in the banding, as you should expect some pushback/negotiation.

e.g. if you're on 60k, and market rate data suggests your role is 70-80. go 80.

the only other thing is that your request is a bit waffly ("I would like to request that") - i know there's a fine line between politeness and showing you're not meekly asking,but i really think it needs to be stronger/bolder in tone. that's based on similar requests that i've had from male members of staff (some of which stray into arrogance territory, but it showed they were serious...).

Thank you very much for taking time to consider my request

Urgh I'd missed that bit!
You need to take that out.

I wouldn't expect to see that in any comms from a Senior Manager, male or female!

Go in higher... your benchmarking puts the rates from 70 to 80K, put your proposal in the middle of these two at 75K. Annual bonus schemes can be anywhere from a few hundred to 25% of salary.... this could be significant.. any way of getting some info on this?

Did you negotiate your salary when you started or was that the salary you were offered?

How about;
When I joined X in 2016, I was offered a salary of 60K based on my experience at the time. I was delighted to accept the opportunity to work for X despite the fact that this salary was below the benchmark for jobs in this position in the market at the time.

Since my appointment, I have proven my commitment to drive client satisfaction (see attached recommendations and client requests), taken on more responsibilities including management of 3 additional staff and my commitment to addressing inefficiencies in internal processes and non chargeable time.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my time here thus far and am fully committed to my long term future with the company. The demands on my time outside of work have reduced and as a result I plan to increase my hours from May 2018 and will no longer be restricted in the amount of work related travel I can do. I intend to leverage this flexibility to deliver on my objectives for 2018.

I have carried out some benchmarking of my role (see attached) and propose that my salary should be in the region of 75-80k.

i look forward to our discussion.

I would send the letter before the meeting.. but obviously, you know best how the MD is likely to react to that.. whether it would be better to have the convincing discussion face to face and the letter to back it up afterwards or if he is armed with the facts before the meeting it is more likely to be approved quickly...

Because every company is desperate to retain staff (recruitment and training/onboarding costs a flipping fortune), they just mostly don't manage it. My company like many others is in a period of huge growth at the moment. Demand for niche skills is so high that you can always get a considerably better deal by going elsewhere. The thing is that I actually really like my current job and want to stay, however, I do need to maximise my earnings this year... so I will be off if I don't get the pay rise!

I wasn't sure if I should include the bit about competitor salaries or tone it down a bit... obviously it's key to my decision but don't want to come across that I'm holding them to ransom.

market data is the key thing my dept will pay attention to. as long as the evidence pack is timely (within six months ish), relevant (in terms of responsibilities, not just job title) and objective (from a reputable recruiter/organisation/published market insight/etc).

thanks so much for all the input so far!

yes, i negotiated the salary when I started, from £54 to £58k - I figured they expected some pushback on the first salary they offered.

so the reason i put my estimate at the bottom of the 70-80k range was 1. my company offers a 10% pension contribution and a 10% bonus, other companies tend to offer 5% pension and 5-10% bonus. 2. (but maybe I shouldn't think this way) it's a big increase at 15% anyway, to give you some idea the average yearly increase for a top contributor is 2.5% (I got this last year).

I would still use the words I accepted the offer of 58K.

Leave out the pension and bonus discussion in that case and focus on the salary.

Do you have any other numbers to back up the work you have taken on.. I presume there is more too it than that one account which has a predicted growth of 400K. If your staff has grown from 3 to 8, presumably the revenue your team is bringing in has grown .. (caveat... I can only make wild and hugely inaccurate assumptions on how the business is structured)

Yeah there is more to it than that. I can dig out further numbers later, I was just doing a quick draft based on the key ones i know off the top of my head.

Team has grown from 3 to 8 mostly because we were pathetically under-resourced before. I was regularly working til midnight to pick up the slack or was relying on freelancers.

Any update OP?

Hi - thanks for asking. I submitted the request based on all the advice I got here. ForgivenessIsDivine's model letter was really helpful so thanks!

I asked for 75k (I'll probably accept anything upwards of £70 but may try and negociate some other non-monetary benefits)

MD had a discussion with HR and finance the same day and followed up to say that they highly value my work, appreciate my concerns regarding the benchmarking etc. He said that all salary changes are not his final decision, but he makes proposals that get signed off up the chain (we are one company in a big network, so it is the network CEOs and Financial COntrollers who have the final say on these things). He said he is working with FInance and HR to work out how to get the best outcome for me and will put together a proposal on that basis.

I think I'm most likely to hear for certain at the end of February with any raise backdated to first January which is the 'winter pay cycle' for the whole network (I'm normally in the Summer one). Worst case scenario is they will offer something but push it back to Summer, in which case i guess I will push to get an amount agreed ahead of then.

TremoloGreen that's excellent!

However, ensure you get any promises in writing.

Saying this because i've once worked at a large (household name) org which had a habit of promising stuff informally then not delivering. not to me personally, but i did see a woman i worked very very closely with get "promoted" (with a ton of extra seniority) but it never resulted in an HR title change, nor a salary increase... lo and behold, a couple of months later her director was fired and she was left in the lurch, having taken on loads of extra work. There were email discussions with her director but nothing agreed and final in writing.

(i only found out about this years ago when i met her again and became friends! was very jealous of her being recognised at the time!)