11:42 AM CST on Sunday, November 27, 2005

Joyce Lain Kennedy

After recently changing jobs, I now realize I was low-balled on the salary offer by nearly 20 percent. Yes, I know, I should have checked the market before accepting the job. But the recruiter was a spellbinder who kept emphasizing this is a growth opportunity with lots of training, and I believed him. Behind the curtain, that promise, as well as the job description, turned out to be hype and hooey. Advice for next time?

B.C.

But if the recruiter is paid a fee based on your first-year earnings, doesn't the recruiter lose money in a downpay offer? From the recruiter's viewpoint, most of a loaf is better than none.

And the recruiter hopes for future assignments from the employer, which can compensate for losing a few bucks on a single transaction.

An oversimplified example: Say the recruiter is to be paid 25 percent of the job's first-year salary. Assume the job's market rate is $100,000; that's a $25,000 fee for the recruiter. But if the job's budget figure is only $90,000, the recruiter takes a hit of $2,500, compared with your loss of $10,000.

To avoid getting snookered the next time out, do these three things:

1. Research market rate. Check salary .com for a quick measure.

2. Develop broad negotiation skills so that you can recognize typical recruiting pitches. Two new general negotiation books: Negotiate to Win: The 21 Rules for Successful Negotiating by Jim Thomas (Collins/HarperCollins, $22.95) and How to Negotiate Like a Child: Unleash the Little Monster Within to Get Everything You Want by Bill Adler Jr. (Amacom, $17.95).

3. Trust but verify. Perform your own due diligence with a homegrown background check of former and current employees through networking, financial investigation, and company reputation and prospects.

When a position's pay is under market, alert recruiters reframe the discussion by speaking not only of cash compensation and benefits, but also of "job stretch" and "growth opportunity."

Job stretch is a term describing an environment in which you show what you can do on a larger stage – heftier operating budget, bigger challenges and supervision of more employees. In baseball, the move is from the minors to the majors.

Growth opportunity is the lure of future raises, promotions and company growth.

If you refuse to budge from your "show me the money" stance, practiced recruiters may respond with such rebuttals as:

•Don't make the mistake of overvaluing compensation and undervaluing opportunity.

•Prove your ability. Do a great job and you could get a sizable raise next year.

•If I can get the cash increased, will you sign an iron-clad guarantee you'll take the position with no further haggling?

Recruiters may be right in urging opportunity over immediate money and benefits – a long-held tenet of smart career development. But perhaps the time has come for a rethinking of this doctrine.

The 21st-century rate of company mergers, downsizings and other job-busters may mean that even if you take a downpay job, you won't be around long enough to fully benefit from opportunity.

Submit questions to Joyce Lain Kennedy by e-mail using "Reader Question" for the subject line or by writing to Careers, Joyce Lain Kennedy, Box 368, Cardiff, Calif. 92007.

E-mail jlk@sunfeatures.com