By now, you probably know that it’s a bad idea to share your salary history with a prospective employer. If you were lowballed by your last hiring manager, it could come back to bite you with a lower offer this time. Even if your current pay is perfectly in line with the market, you don’t know this employer’s compensation philosophy — you could be cheating yourself out of a big pay bump.
But knowing that you shouldn’t share isn’t the same as feeling comfortable keeping quiet. In this week’s roundup, we look at tips for dodging the salary history question, plus advice on developing mental toughness and finding your flow.
Alison Green at Ask a Manager: How to Avoid Sharing Your Salary History
A reader writes in to ask:
I wondered if readers could share stories about successfully refusing to share their salary history. It’s advice I hear all the time, and that makes sense, but having just been hired by a sizable corporation, it’s hard for me to imagine getting companies to go against their own policies. Aside from simply not providing it with the initial application, what about when you’re asked directly, or given a form? I had to give salary history about three different ways for my new job–I tried to demur but there was really no way around it.
Green offers her own advice — and opens the floor to her readers, who share some useful tips of their own.
LaRae Quy at her blog: 4 Things Successful Women Need To Know About Mental Toughness
“As a new FBI agent, I thought learning how to shoot a gun and arrest terrorists would make me successful,” Quy writes. “I did not expect to learn that my biggest, and perhaps most important skill set, would be to develop the mental toughness needed to prevail in my circumstances.”
In fact, she says, many people misunderstand what toughness is. She defines it as the ability to manage your “emotions, thoughts, and behavior” in a way that sets you up for success. Learn how to do it, in this post.
Christine Carter at Medium: 3 Tricks to Find Your Flow
“When was the last time you were so focused that time stood still?” Carter asks. “Athletes call this mental state being in ‘The Zone’; psychologists call it ‘flow’ or peak experience, and they have linked it to leading a life of happiness and purpose. Lao Tzu, the ancient Chinese philosopher who authored the Tao Te Ching, called it ‘doing without doing’ or ‘trying without trying.’”
Of course, if you’re not used to trying without trying, it might take some doing to get there. These tips can help. (h/t: Jessica Stillman at Inc.)
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