STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

iconic · BCBG

salary negotiations... law firm in DC

lsubatgirl · Gucci

Hmm not sure about salary negotiations. I've never been in the position to negotiate. Are there any rules about everyone at a certain position makes a certain amount there? I know with the job I was offered that is the rule: we all make the same coming in. That said you might not get to negotiate.

Is the amount you get paid by the temp agency the same as what they will be paying you? I wouldn't accept if they would be paying you less or the same.

Not sure about the lsat part. I would try to stick it out though because the experience is priceless and you will need it on your resume. I'm sure esquiress is better with this area than I so hopefully she'll see this soon.

Good luck.

honey · Gucci

i was trying to put myself into salary.com but it took to much time. ime, the wages from places like salary.com tend to be a tad inflated so i would proceed with caution. is your current salary higher than what the permanent employees are making?

eta: a couple more things, are you sure that you're salary is going to be negotiated? i'm just wondering if it might not be a situation where they say this is what we're going to offer you. either way, quote them something higher than you want to make and then work down from there.

-- Edited by honey at 15:38, 2005-03-23

Tara · Dooney & Bourke

IMO you should not use other ppl's salary when negotiating yours. Salary is private, and shouldn't be shared with your coworkers. However, you should be VERY prepared to negotiate. Go to salary.com and find a comparable position, check out monster listings, etc. Go into the negotiations with a bar graph of all the salary data that you have collected. Ask for a salary that is within this range.

If they ask you what salary you are looking for, you can take out your research! Also, someone (a very successful friend actually) once told me that a great answer to the dreaded salary questions is "I plan on being the best <insert position here> that you have. What do you pay your best <insert position here>?" Though, I have never had the actual balls to try that - but she swears that it works everytime!

honey · Gucci

sorry to be so spastic in my response. so i decided to not be lazy and look up the info. on salary.com. honestly, if you are going to negotiate you shouldn't use it as your foundation, mainly b/c it is inflated. according to their info. the median entry level salary for a paralegal is $46K. while this is not unheard of, i would not say it's the norm (at least not for a base salary) and am inclined to think the information for DC might be similarly skewed. while i don't know your specific qualifications, i think a more normal salary would be b/t $30-$35K for an entry level person with no experience.

esquiress · Marc Jacobs

you know who'd know about this kinda stuff? dcshopper--i think she worked in a law office in dc before going back to school, so hopefully she'll see this soon. from what i've heard, 30k for entry level seems to be the norm here in cali. oh and about the lsat's--good luck, good luck, good luck!! study hard and let me know if i can help in any way :)

Andrea Julia · Coach

quote:
Originally posted by: honey
"sorry to be so spastic in my response. so i decided to not be lazy and look up the info. on salary.com. honestly, if you are going to negotiate you shouldn't use it as your foundation, mainly b/c it is inflated. according to their info. the median entry level salary for a paralegal is $46K. while this is not unheard of, i would not say it's the norm (at least not for a base salary) and am inclined to think the information for DC might be similarly skewed. while i don't know your specific qualifications, i think a more normal salary would be b/t $30-$35K for an entry level person with no experience. "

I've always felt it was inflated, too, although I've never been able to find an exact match for my job titles. Their list of publishing job titles is kind of lame. However, for the hell of it, I have tried to put in job titles that I knew what the average salary for was and it seemed high.

A couple months ago, I was thinking of switching industries and was offered a legal secretary position with a huge law firm for $38,000 with no legal experience. I think you should be able to swing that amount or more since you do have experience. Just explain to them why you would be the best and never take the first offer without trying to negotiate(even if it's good). Of course, if you try to negotiate and they are like, "well, that is all we really have to work with" and the salary is good, THEN take what they are offering.