Learning to Negotiate for Your Career - For Training and Development Professionals

Learning to Negotiate for Your Career

For Training and Development Professionals

Introduction

•         Look at the image above. What do you see? I see a metaphor for many professionals as to how they approach negotiating. Statistics show how much difference exists between men and women in terms of how they negotiate ( for raises, promotions, new opportunities, clarification of job roles) regarding their careers. While I always like to point out that such studies present "averages" and don't hold much water for individuals in their own careers, the point remains valid. Likewise, studies show how folks from different socio-economic backgrounds, even different styles of parental upbringing approach their careers. Personally, I would pay to see someone do an extensive and well documented study of how training professionals - especially those with a highly technical background, approach such a topic. Many studies and article you can access free of charge point to how individuals with lots of technical expertise fair poorly, compared to others, when it comes to how they approach the issue of negotiation regarding their career. Why? Perhaps because many technical people build that proficiency with tools, processes, etc at the expense of human relationships. Perhaps it's partly the fault of the system - both work & educational - were success is defined in opposite terms and where personalities that do well tend to also differ from one area to the other. Many career coaches and other human resource professionals would do quite well if they could create a training program for folks with technical minds, introverted individuals, etc. that approached the issue in a technical sort of way.
•         When I mentioned the analogy about career negotiation with the image above, I see what many technically minded and highly educated people see - if I want a raise, a promotion, if I want to advance my career - where's the button. Where's the class, degree, project I can complete that brings these things to me. It may sound silly, but that's how many technical minds work. It's not necessarily a bad thing - but on issues like career advice, many training and development professionals, as well as IT folks, scientists, etc., need to learn to use the other part of their brains that learns negotiation is a process and a conversation - built upon relationships and expectations, not just a moment. Many successful and educated professionals with great competencies don't engage in the activities or see the opportunities that could help grow their career. Yes, the old jack of all trades mentality may get folks promoted in certain fields or in certain industries - sales, certain parts of HR, marketing, but in highly technical areas the people you want running the show need as much depth as breadth. The issue for many training professionals, many of whom fall into this category of technically minded folks, tend to not know how approach the subject and if coupled with an introverted tendency, can lead them to getting stuck and/or feeling burnt out in their jobs.

Cause

•         I cannot relate any hard data regarding how training and development professionals, especially technically minded (and the triple whammy - introverted) ones fair in their career development. Again, I'd love to see it. But, I can share my own experience and observations on the subject. Those of us with technical minds and/or introverted personalities - and I've run across many of them in the training world - especially on the ID, Graphics, and LMS/tech side, see things in black and white or learn what we know because we focus, we enjoy learning, and we expect the world to work the way we see in movies or as taught in the books we devoured as part of our degree programs, or the in our favorite business books or professional development magazines. Because we often see our work as either "working" or "not working" and because our culture promotes and is dominated by people spouting opinions, observations, and critiques, many of us find it hard to evaluate ourselves, our work, our capability in an honest manner. In the training world today demands are high - programs must be developed in shorter and shorter timelines, technical components must work without proper time for testing and troubleshooting, many training folks who don't start out on the "business" side, although I've met a few who did, tend to be much more analytical, reserved, technical, etc. So, we learn the skills we need to gain entrance into the training world, but not the skills we need to succeed in it. Let's face it to - if you look at the number of roles people need to play today in a training department - most accountants or financial folks would push back noting how unrealistic the demands were. 
•         The point here is not to dwell on the causes per se - it's to help you the reader figure out exactly where you fall in the spectrum. I just recently realized how the negotiation and career development process starts the first moment you walk in the door to a company for an interview. You must develop your ability to accurately gauge a company, to accurately gauge management, to accurately gauge the organization's commitment to and understanding of training. If you are smart enough to teach others, if you've completed a professional degree and have a few years of work experience under your belt, you can learn a particular process, a new industry, etc. Proper negotiating begins by accurately knowing what you are worth and what the company is like before beginning employment. So, if you want to improve your chances of negotiating with success read further

How-To

•         Do your homework
• If you graduated from college, earned a professional degree, possess practical experience in a business setting of any sort where you were tasked with leading and/or training others, you can spend a little bit of time doing your homework. Come on, you used to do it diligently every night when you were in school. Yes, many of us grew up believing in the story that if you did well enough in school, behaved, and earned your degree (degrees now) you will succeed. As Malcolm Gladwell talks about - those kinds of metrics predict "entrance" capability  not "excellence" capability. In other words, if you are 6'7 you are tall enough to playbasketball. If you are 6'7 and athletic you probably could play on your h.s. team. If you were 6'7, athletic, and played in h.s. you could probably play in college. If you played in college and high school, were 6'7 and athletic and went to a decent college program you might get to the NBA. But you wouldn't necessarily succeed. You may gain "entrance" but entering something and excelling at it requires a lot more.
• As part of doing your homework, you need to gather facts. That means before you start a job - learn about the company, the industry, know what other people make for the position at the company or others like it - region, size of company, industry, etc. If you are already in a position, do the same sort of stuff but gather even more information, if you can, on the company's success, financial health, etc.
• Assess yourself honestly. That's the biggest thing many training professionals, again especially those with technical minds and/or introverted personalities, lack - we're not good at judging ourselves and we usually succeeded in the past because we did what we were told and focused on developing certain competencies. This also helps overall in your career progression. Don't just apply for a degree program. Putting off a year, or two, or three, doesn't mean the end of the world. You will serve yourself better and increase the likelihood of success if you know exactly the skills, experience, and exposure you need.
• Assess the business honestly. Whether applying for a position or already in one, knowing what the company can offer, knowing when they're low-balling, knowing when they can't find someone with the right skills a/o personality for a job, knowing their performance and the outlook for their business/industry - all of that can pay dividends in your negotiations. I had a strain of thought one day that I would love to follow or find research on - how do people in specific fields do when they work for a company that isn't in that field compared to those who do? In other words, how do IT folks fair in their careers if they work for a retail, real estate, or financial company as opposed to working for a IT company? I think that because a lot of career advancement comes with opportunity, timing, and a little bit of honest chance. Being prepared and doing your homework on a company can help increase the likelihood you'll find the better opportunity that's open when you want/need it.
• Tools. If you are a training and development professional - especially in today's job/career market, tools represent the life-blood of your work. E-Learning development software, screen capture tools, learning management systems, employee performance metrics, all of that constitutes your daily world. When engaging in your own career development remember there are lots of free or low-cost tools and resources available to help. Sites like Salary.com TheLadders, Scout, and even a professional organization, like the ASTD, can provide you with tools or statistics that can better prepare you for your career discussions.
• Know your worth
• This is not just the same thing as "assessing" yourself as mentioned a few paragraphs ago. Knowing your worth is the next level. It's not just doing research once in preparation for a round of job interviews or for the annual employee revue. It's a process that continues over time. It's what you do every day, week, month, year, to learn something new, to take on a new responsibility, to sit and journal, meditate, reflect on how you are, what you want, and what you need to do in order to achieve those goals. It's moving from beyond training to education. It's not just learning how to fish - it's exploring all the aspect so that you can fish successfully in any location, with any sort of bait, for any type of fish, in any season. 
• If you meet highly successful people - people in senior executive roles, individuals who run their own companies, or stand prominently at the top of a field, if they got their from their own work and perhaps with a little luck, they'll tell they learn as much as they can, they find and pay people well, they're passionate about things, and they self-reflect. Now of course, you'll meet people who got there through paternalism, through really, really good timing, through the luck of the system, through back-stabbing, they don't pay people well, they agree to things that they can't deliver on, etc. But, the majority of people who a normal person would define as successful would all fit a certain mold. The biggest thing - especially for those of us with technical minds or introverted personalities, is the ability to honestly self-reflect and to evaluate your experience, your goal(s), your current/perspective company, your skills, your desires, your personal history in a totally honest and unjudgmental way. Many of us probably grew up in an environment were success was relatively easy and were expectations and rules were clear. For technical folks, for training individuals who constantly assess others, a full self-assessment needs to be done slowly, and in consultation with lots of folks - friends & loved ones, professional career folks, colleagues past and present, bosses, employees, etc. It's a process, not a one time event. The more you work at it, the more it will pay off in the long run.
• Leave emotions at the door
• Doing a "job" well usually entails dedication, a certain modicum of intelligence, and a few other typical traits that most people possess. Doing a "career" right - that's a whole other complex beast that needs taming. Yes - taming. Everyone makes career mistakes. You pick the wrong major, you jump at the first job offer, you decline the wrong one, you leave a company because of unexpressed fears/emotions instead of talking about them, you constantly worry or anxiety drives the way you operate. You miss the forest for the trees or vice-versa. You grew up without parents/family who valued you, directed you, saw the real person inside of you. Negotiating as part of a career - that's a texas two-step combined with a waltz, fox-trot, lambada, and tango. So, what to do? One of the most important things to do is to leave emotions out of it. If you can feel the emotion rising in you - it's not a good time to negotiate. Nothing is set in stone - reschedule the meeting, talk to your boss tomorrow, hold off on the salary discussion till later in the interview. Remember, managers "manage" and companies only exist when people come together and work together. Don't think of this as a single, one time event. It's an ongoing discussion. Managers, executives, they all hold a stake in the fortune of the company - which means they need dedicated and educated professionals like you. Don't let emotions get in the way. But, remember that emotions need to get discussed, feeling aired - even if you're afraid of making a fool of yourself. 
• Fake it till....
• "Act as if ye have faith and faith shall be given to you". Even when you feel lost, when you get desperate - when you find yourself at a time in your life when you feel depressed and shamed about the course of your life, your career, you still need to negotiate. Practice makes perfect - so practice selling yourself, pay the extra money for a professional coach, take interviews for job you don't feel qualified for - fake it till you make it.