Hi Reader,
This week on the Gentle Power Podcast (gentlepowerpodcast.com), we sat down with Mia Smithson, a renowned tech industry recruiter who has interviewed more than 5,000 people and hired more than 400. Amongst many achievements throughout her career, Mia joined a startup as its founding recruiter when it was around 50 people and helped grow it to a workforce of 700 across seven countries. Today, she is recruiting at a frontier AI company that hires 30 to 50 people every month.
In this episode Mia walks us through the behind the scenes on the company’s side of offer negotiations.
Anytime we have someone from recruiting or people ops on the show, it turns into one of our most listened-to episodes. Who doesn’t want to hear directly from the person who is in the room when the team decides on extending an offer and increasing the package?
Below are our takeaways, plus links to the full episode: YouTube | Spotify | Apple
1. Salary market data loses to compensation philosophy
When setting the compensation range for a particular role, Mia's teams pull ranges from tools like Pave and Carta. Gerta spent 3 years at Salary.com advising companies on how to pay their employees, so this part wasn't surprising: the number a company lands on originates from a specific dataset that employers usually have access to and job seekers do not. That's why as a job seeker, your data that you found on Blind, Levels, LinkedIn, Glassdoor, or Reddit will never go toe-to-toe with the company's data, and is why we advise against using data as the foundation to ask for more. In fact, doing this can backfire (we wrote this past case study of someone who overly relied on market salary data and he ended up losing the offer!).
But that’s not the full story. Then, every company layers its own compensation philosophy on top, informed by internal variables like budgets and urgency. At the end of the day, a company will almost always fall back on their own comp philosophy instead of industry benchmarks. As Mia said, "the compensation philosophy of the company that you're interviewing with is so crucial."
So you can walk in with excellent research and still be talking past them.
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2. The recruiter has more pull than you think
A head of department says they need to hire someone, and they think the role is an L4. That leader usually has a rough idea of comp, though it isn't their area of expertise.
The recruiter on the other hand goes into the comp data, works out the real numbers, talks to current employees in similar roles to better understand the role's responsibilities and expectations, calibrates the job posting according to their findings, and handles every conversation with every candidate for that job.
"I do think it's a recruiter's job to know the market," Mia said. Whereas a hiring manager is busy doing their own job. "They don't really know the market, and they don't really understand what people are getting paid."
Approval to extend an offer usually runs through a candidate debrief doc, with the head of the department and the lead recruiter signing off at the end.
Mia said the recruiter can influence a lot more than people realize, so give them material. When Mia goes to bat for someone, "I need to have a convincing pitch and a convincing story."
Sometimes that recruiter already has approval to go higher before the call even starts. If you push back, they may tell you they need to check with management, then go for a walk for an hour and come back with the good news that they can go higher. "They're [sometimes] fake checking," Mia admits.
3. Upleveling is the hardest ask on the list
Getting bumped a level opens a different band entirely, and Mia was blunt that it's also the toughest thing to get. "I think it's a lot easier to get, let's say, a signing bonus," she said, "because that's not going to change the level at all."
A level change needs budget, business need, and skill set all lining up, plus sign-off from the head of the department and the head of recruiting.
Recruiters can push for uplevels too. Mia has often gone back to hiring managers and said "every candidate who could actually do this job is a level above where we posted it, so can we talk about bumping it up."
And if you've genuinely got a promotion coming at your current company, tell the recruiter. She will take it to the hiring manager and ask what an upleveled version of the role would look like.
4. Whoever says the number first loses
We felt so validated when we heard Mia, a career recruiter, say this exact thing we've been hammering on for years:
"I do believe that whoever says the number first loses."
On that first call with the recruiter, they’ll typically ask: what salary range are you targeting? Junior candidates answer with a number, and it tends to be the low end. If they're feeling bold, they might say a number closer to the top of the posted range. Mia has even seen candidates name a figure below the posted range entirely, which is baffling but understandable if the candidate feels that the role is a stretch for them.
The answers Mia wishes more candidates say instead: "I'm targeting the higher end of the range." Or "Let's discuss that as the conversation continues."
One thing we'd add, the top of the posted range isn't automatically your ceiling. We've had clients land well above what was published, so we'd rather you keep that number open than anchor yourself to the top of the range.
5. Then stop talking
Once you've said where you're aiming, say nothing else. When you say, "I'm targeting the top of the range", pause. And wait. Say nothing else.
Most people will go on and on, throw in caveats, and end up trailing off.
"I'm targeting the top of the range because I have 10 years of experience, I've led three teams, and I delivered X, Y, and Z."
Compare that to: "I'm targeting the top of the range."
Remember that less is more. The first example above reads as nerves. As Mia put it, "when you try to justify too hard, I immediately know that you're nervous, and you don't think that your skills merit whatever it is that you're asking for."
She sees this most often from people who recently hit a higher level in their current job and are trying to punch above their weight. Maybe they are capable of executing at that higher level. But if they don't believe it themselves, the recruiter won't believe it either.
6. Across 5,000 interviews, only 1 rescinded offer
Almost every client we talk to is afraid of the same thing: that they could lose the offer if they negotiate. So we asked Mia how often she has actually seen it happen.
Across Mia's entire career, she has "seen only one offer get rescinded during a negotiation."
Once, across 5,000 interviews and more than 400 hires.
The story is unusual too. The candidate was coming in as an IC (Individual Contributor) and had never met their future manager, because that manager hadn't been hired yet. The written offer was sent out and unsigned while the two sides went back and forth. During that stretch the company hired the manager, added one final interview with her, and the manager said it wasn't the right fit.
Mia thinks the delay was part of it. "Speed and urgency is also super key," she said, and "making sure that you're negotiating in a way that you can still move things along and start quickly is essential."
Her reasoning: "There are so many variables that you are not aware of." A company can lose a major client mid-negotiation and decide the role can wait.
The lesson here is that negotiating won't get your offer pulled. We'll add though that negotiating poorly can, so make sure you're going in with a plan and not negotiating on the fly. (If you're job searching, book a free call with us to discuss how to negotiate without risking the offer.)
7. Mindset and vocal inflection
Mia puts mindset, visualization, and manifestation on the same tier as knowing the fundamentals. "It doesn't matter if you have the perfect script... If your mindset isn't at a place that will win you the job, then it's kind of all for naught."
Mia can pick out the difference. When someone believes they're worth what they're asking for, they use "a downward vocal inflection."
"200K? ↗️" is the version where the pitch rises at the end and the recruiter hears a question. It signals to the recruiter that even you are unsure that you deserve it.
"200K. ↘️" is the version where it the job candidates believes what they're saying.
Before big conversations, Mia recommends that people practice saying their asks out loud.
Closing
Mia covered far more than fit here, including what to say when a recruiter asks about your other offers, the pre-read doc she recommends sending before an offer call, how staffing and in-house recruiters get paid differently which affects your negotiations, and her rules for using AI in a job search. We'll cover these in the next few issues.
If you don't want to wait, listen to the full episode with Mia here: YouTube | Spotify | Apple
Connect with Mia:
Warmly,
Gerta & Alex
Founders, YourNegotiations.com
P.S. Are you job searching or have upcoming negotiations?
If you have an offer coming or are mid-process, we’re always happy to help you think through how to approach it. Book a free call here: https://calendly.com/alexhapki/call
P.P.S. Know someone interested in negotiations?
Send them our way and we’ll thank you with $250 for each person who becomes a client. No cap.
A quick intro or an email to alex@yournegotiations.com works.