Negotiating Your Worth in a Male Dominated Field

By Olivia Bartholomew

The session titled “Negotiating Your Worth in a Male Dominated Field” presented by Rana Karimi was very eye opening and inspiring to me. She began the presentation with facts and figures on gender and racial wage gaps, which varied much more than I would have thought. The figures she showed made it obvious that overall women all around were paid less than men. She also discussed how education and lifestyle choices impact that number as well as, according to her presentation, women are less likely to complete professional degrees than men and are more likely to delay or exit a career to raise their families. Although these reasons make a lot of sense, I had never thought of how directly postponing/exiting education or careers could impact the gap so significantly. She also mentioned an anecdote from her own life where she was offered the same position a male colleague of hers was, but he negotiated with the company and ended up getting higher compensation, whereas she simply accepted the position thinking she should be grateful for being offered one in the first place. From this anecdote, she continued her presentation with a 5 step guide she developed on how she from then on negotiated her worth and how we can and should negotiate our worth as well. The first step was to research the company, job position, industry, and to be able to leverage the competitive landscape. The second step was to define value, such as your value, the company’s value, knowing your nonnegotiables and evaluation criteria for choosing a position. The third step was (if offered a position or proceeding in interviews) to evaluate your salary baseline for your previous/current position, market average reports, and a holistic approach to reviewing offers based on your evaluation criteria. The fourth step was to leverage your worth with other offers, skills, experience, and your value. The fifth step was to engage with the other party, deliver feedback, to know your worth, and be confident in yourself. She concluded her presentation with a brief discussion on internal negotiations and some advice for audience members in specific situations, such as an negotiating compensation in an intern position right out of college.