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What type of salary information should I have ready before an interview?

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Karen Chopra
Licensed Professional Counselor
www.ChopraCareers.com  
 

Karen James Chopra, LPC, MCC, NCC, has been counseling career clients since 1999 and has helped hundreds of clients change careers, find new jobs and deal more effectively with workplace challenges.

In addition to her private practice, she has worked for two national corporate outplacement firms: Lee Hecht Harrison and Resource Careers. These are the organizations that help people who have experienced a layoff or downsizing to find new jobs, and their programs are usually considered the gold-standard of job search technique.

Ms Chopra is a regular presenter on career issues, having taught career theory at the graduate level, designed and delivered numerous workshops, and served as a regular guest commentator on WMAL’s career radio show “Your Career Life.”

She is a career-changer herself. Before entering the counseling field, she worked for nearly a decade as a trade negotiator for the United States Government, first at the Department of Commerce and then at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

Ms. Chopra holds a number of relevant licenses and certifications: licensed professional counselor (LPC) in the District of Columbia; Master Career Counselor (MCC), a designation of the National Career Development Association (NCDA); and National Certified Counselor (NCC), a designation of the National Board of Certified Counselors (NBCC).  She belongs to all of the relevant national and local associations involved in career counseling, including the American Counseling Association (ACA),  the National Employment Counselors Association (NECA), the National Career Development Association (NCDA) and the Washington Metropolitan Area Career-Life Planning Network (MAC-LPN).

Her B.A. is from the University of Virginia, and she received a masters of science in foreign service from Georgetown University, and a masters in community counseling from George Washington University.

What type of salary information should I have ready before an interview?

 

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Host: What type of salary information should I have ready before an interview?

Karen James Chopra: You should have your salary history available to you at least for the last 5-6 years so you should know what you made 5-6 years ago. You should know what your current income is and believe it or not, most of us can actually say to the dollar exactly what we make. So go back and check and make sure that you know exactly what you make. It may actually be more than you think it is. Sometimes, raises and cost of living increases in bump to salary and people aren't fully aware of exactly what it totals up to right now. So have all of that information calculated out. You are also looking for the calculation of the range of what you used to make four or five years ago and what you make currently. These, you want to be ready for any questions on salary history and if you can't dodge them, you want to be able to provide a nice, big range. We are talking a range of $25,000 sometimes, $50,000 or more between what you made five or six years ago and what you make now. That allows you to answer in numbers, a question about your salary without disclosing exactly what you are making now. Now all of that needs to be done ahead of time along with the calculation of how much you really need to live on, especially if you are looking at a job that's going to be paying less than you are making now, you need to do a calculation of you can really live on salary that is being offered and all that needs to be done ahead of time.

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