Your Career

What to do, and not do, in this sensitive but essential stage of the hiring process

After an arduous job hunt, it’s both a validation and a relief to hear, “We want you to come and work with us.” But don’t be in a hurry to say yes. Unless you’ve been told that the offer is “firm” and “the best we can do,” your next step is to negotiate. Some common principles of negotiating hold true whether the job is in academe or in industry, and whether this is your first or fourth job. What does vary is what you can ask for. Here are some of the things you can haggle over:

• For an academic offer: The obvious terms to negotiate include salary, start date, research/travel funds, relocation assistance, service load, and release time from teaching or a sabbatical. To do your work, you can negotiate equipment purchases and office or lab space. You may also be able to negotiate things that affect your personal life, such as housing assistance, child-care subsidies, or job aid for your partner.
• For an industry offer: Here, too, the obvious issues to negotiate include salary, start date, relocation assistance, and remote-work options. But you can also try negotiating your job title, stock options, bonuses, benefits (including paid time off), office space, equipment purchases, and training funds.

Continue reading: “Dos and Don’ts of Negotiating,” by Jennifer S. Furlong and Stacy M. Hartman

Share your suggestions for the newsletter with Denise Magner, an editor at The Chronicle, at denise.magner@chronicle.com.

What we’re reading

Here’s more on career issues and trends from around the web. See something we should include? Let me know.

• On LinkedIn, a site “once known for wonky posts and career congratulations,” some people are finding fame and money by mixing the personal and the professional, according to The Wall Street Journal.
• A report in The New York Times on how Trump’s research cuts are prompting European universities to “put out the welcome mat” for U.S. scientists.
• Advice in the Harvard Business Review on seven questions to help you “decode your manager’s priorities.”