301: Seven Magic Words That Will Transform Your Next Salary Negotiation with Kate Dixon

One of the best ways to reclaim your confidence in this job market is by learning how to effectively negotiate your next job offer. 

In this episode, salary negotiation expert and compensation consultant Kate Dixon shares powerful, real-world strategies to help you advocate for your worth without sounding pushy or confrontational.

Kate is the author of Pay Up: Unlocking Insider Secrets of Salary Negotiation and founder of Dixon Consulting, bringing over 30 years of compensation experience to this insightful and practical conversation. 

You’ll learn why 80% of professionals who negotiate receive something in return and how you can be one of them.

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

• Why salary negotiations are not about being aggressive, but about solving a business problem collaboratively
• The seven magic words to use in any negotiation: “What kind of flexibility do you have?”
• What’s usually on the table (think base salary, sign-on bonuses, start dates) versus what’s not (benefits like retirement plans)
• How one client saved $30,000 by analyzing a relocation package and how you can find hidden financial value too
• Why compensation reflects the value of the role, not your personal worth, so you can keep your emotions in check
• How your negotiation style can shape your professional reputation before you even start the job

Kate also breaks down the importance of silence after asking for flexibility, why it's your most powerful negotiation tool, and how it positions you as confident, thoughtful, and strategic.

Visit johnneral.com/resources to download "10 Must-Listen Episodes to Help You Navigate What’s Next" and get your invitation to a free live Zoom event on June 25th at 7:00 PM ET—created just for mid-career professionals like you.

Connect with Kate Dixon

Website | LinkedIn | Book

Keywords: salary negotiation tips, mid-career job offers, Kate Dixon interview, how to negotiate a job offer, career nego

Chapters

• 0:00 Negotiating Your Next Job Offer
• 8:47 Kate Dixon's Mid-Career Journey
• 16:28 Negotiation Mistakes to Avoid
• 22:16 Building Confidence in Asking for Your Worth
• 29:45 Seven Magic Words of Salary Negotiation
• 33:06 Final Advice and Key Takeaways

Transcript

John Neral: 0:00

Picture it You've got the job offer and now you're looking at the compensation package. Your brain is filled with so many thoughts about whether or not it's a good offer or what could make it a great offer. What do you ask for? Where can you negotiate what's fair and reasonable versus asking for everything you want? What's a mid-career professional like you to do? This week's guest is here to help you negotiate the job offer and examine it from both sides of the table. In a moment, you will meet Kate Dixon, salary negotiator and services pricing coach, who's here to talk to you about negotiating your next job offer and how you can show up and they can show up and they can pay up. Let's get started.

John Neral: 0:57

Hello, my friends, this is the Mid-Career GPS Podcast and I'm your host, John Neral. I help mid-career professionals like you find a career they love, or love the career they have, using my proven four-step formula. Before we get to today's episode, I've got a quick announcement. Last week, we celebrated the 300th episode of the Mid-Career GPS podcast and I want to thank you. Thank you for your emails, your text, your comments and your posts helping me promote this milestone achievement and, in case you missed it, it's part of that celebration. I've got a free guide and a special Zoom event for you. You can visit johnneral. com/resources or check the show notes to download your free guide 10 must listen episodes to help you navigate what's next. Celebrating 300 episodes of clarity, confidence and career direction. When you download the guide, you'll receive an invite to a special live Zoom event I'm hosting on Wednesday, june 25th at 7 pm Eastern event I'm hosting on Wednesday, June 25th at 7 pm Eastern. Come join us to celebrate the podcast and I'll be there to answer your career questions. Again, visit johnneral. com/resources to download the guide and learn more.

John Neral: 2:18

Whether you're exploring new opportunities, entertaining a job offer or trying to advocate for yourself in your current role, you will want to pay close attention to what my guest has to say. This week, I am joined by Kate Dixon, a true expert in compensation strategy and the author of the award-winning book Pay Up Unlocking Insider Secrets of Salary Negotiation. Kate is the principal and founder of Dixon Consulting, a B Corp certified leadership development and total rewards consultancy. With over 30 years of experience as a certified compensation professional and a certified coach, kate brings a wealth of practical advice and real-world wisdom to the conversation. Wealth of practical advice and real-world wisdom to the conversation.

John Neral: 3:08

In our interview, kate shares her own powerful mid-career story, including what it felt like to be early retired and how that moment sparked a new and fulfilling chapter in her career. She also opens up about the fears many job seekers face when it comes to negotiating offers and reveals what most people miss when it comes to asking for what they're worth. If you've ever wondered how to make sure you're not leaving money or value on the table, my friends, this episode is for you. So grab a notebook or listening closely. You're about to get a masterclass in negotiating your worth. It is my pleasure to introduce you to Kate Dixon. Hi, kate, welcome to the podcast. It's great to have you here today.

John Neral: 3:55

So good to be here today specifically around how mid-career professionals are looking at their compensation and where they can be negotiating perhaps a little bit differently or more strategically. But before we get into all of that, would you please share with us what was your mid-career moment?

Kate Dixon: 4:18

I think my mid-career moment was when I was invited to retire early from a brand that I had worked with for 12 years. I loved, loved, do love the company and I had been working like a trillion hours toward some strategic priorities. And then got this invitation, along with many, many of my friends, and I saw that as a sign that I needed to restart my consulting practice. I had a consulting practice when my kids were young and then went back into corporate America and then got early retired, and that as a sign to go back and do my own thing again and an invitation for that.

John Neral: 5:18

Were you surprised when you were quote unquote early retired?

Kate Dixon: 5:23

I was because our, our department, had been traditionally underfunded and understaffed according to all benchmarks, and, and so it was, and, and you know compensation is not something that you know just grows on trees. So, in terms of you know people who do this work, so I was a lot more surprised than maybe I should have been.

John Neral: 5:51

I really appreciate you sharing that, because we know so far as we're almost halfway through 2025. And it kind of jolts me to say that a little bit, because there are times when I feel like this year is going very slowly and other times when I feel like it's going rather quickly but what we're seeing in the job market both from those people who are civil servants and federal and government employees, as well as to those who are corporate employees and nonprofit employees that this conversation around taking early retirement or be it being laid off or rift, is something which we have seen is happening to a lot more people than what perhaps many thought at the beginning of the year.

Kate Dixon: 6:33

Mm-hmm.

John Neral: 6:34

Yeah, and so when you sit there and you look at how your work life as well as your personal life, kind of dramatically changes, in that you no longer have a job, walk us through a little bit about why it was so important for you to go back to your consulting role and your own private practice, to go and relaunch that again, maybe in a different way.

Kate Dixon: 7:03

You know, I think for me it's a different choice than a lot of the folks who got laid off at the same time that I did. I mean, several of us went on to start businesses and several of us went to other corporate careers or nonprofit careers and I think it really depends on what it is that drives you. I love being an entrepreneur, that's something that you know. I started four different successful businesses over the course of my my life and have really enjoyed that.

Kate Dixon: 7:39

Not everybody does, because it you have to have kind of a weird combination of um, you know, especially if you're a consultant, you're selling yourself and so you have to have, you know, this confidence to sell yourself as a product, as well as the paranoia to keep your um pipeline, um full of work. So it's kind of a unique situation. I I love it and I love the creativity that it provides. I love being able to choose my own clients, which is fantastic. But you know again, it's not something that's for everyone. But you know, being in that kind of moment, that inflection point is, it's so important to know kinds of the kinds of things that really you care about, the things that you want, and some folks love that risk taking and some folks don't, and both choices are great choices.

John Neral: 8:38

Absolutely and when we've talked before today's interview. But in learning more about you and getting to know you, I think the one thing we can a primary driver for someone listening today or not we have to acknowledge that how we are paid for our services and how we are compensated is important. As a compensation consultant, tell people what exactly you do.

Kate Dixon: 9:16

Well, primarily so. I have a portfolio of different things that I do in my work, but with compensation consulting, we're essentially helping organizations figure out how to pay people, so sometimes that's in the form of executive compensation, sometimes that is in the form of creating job architectures and salary structures, sometimes it's about incentive programs, sometimes it's about consulting with boards. We do all kinds of different things and that's what makes it more fun for me. The other portfolio of things that I do. I do coaching, because I'm a certified coach, so I do salary negotiation coaching, services, pricing coaching for people like me who are consultants or freelancers, and that kind of stuff. And I also do executive coaching, which is kind of the traditional coaching that a lot of people think about.

John Neral: 10:14

So when we think about that mid-career professional who is entertaining a job offer, they find our conversation. They're thinking about negotiating that job offer. I want to take us through two different examples of a mid-career professional who is finalizing their job offer, their compensation package and everything. So we'll take person one. Okay, they are hesitant, fearful or trepidatious about asking for something additional in their salary negotiation, for whatever reason it may be, because they've been out of work for a while, they really like the job, they don't want to push the boundaries. And so for that person in particular that is looking at the job offer and thinking they should just go ahead and accept it and I know this is a rather broad example. But for those people who are thinking I'm just going to go ahead and accept it, what are some of the things you could highlight that they might potentially be missing when it comes to their salary negotiation?

Kate Dixon: 11:27

Well, research shows that people who do salary negotiation, about 80% of them wind up getting something, and it may not be in base pay, it may be some other kinds of thing that they get. Maybe they get a little bit higher bonus or a sign on bonus or something like that. But you know, those odds are pretty good. And my biggest number one tip is don't be a jerk and the kind of opposite of that, because people, you know, I think people see this stuff on on TV and they're like, you know, I just have to be a hard hitter. They need to see that I can, you know, really go in there and stake my claim.

Kate Dixon: 12:23

This equation right. In reality, it really needs to be a collaborative problem solving. This is a business problem, right? The business problem is they want to hire you and you want to hire salary or you know better benefits or something right. So that's a business problem. And if you can treat it less emotionally and more like solving a business problem and being collaborative and seeking solutions and making sure that there are, you know, multiple ways for you to get what you need, then you know again, a lot of the things that we really fear about like kind of go away.

John Neral: 13:01

So, staying with that same scenario and I loved how you phrased about not being a jerk, because it's so true, right, I can appreciate that as well, in my experiences too. What would you say are some of the things that job seekers who are negotiating their offer should really shy away from? For example, people want a different benefits package. They want more vacation time than what they are told they are going to get, based on everybody in the company. Is there anything like that that you would say is kind of a waste of their time to negotiate around, or is anything fair game?

Kate Dixon: 13:46

Well, you know I don't want to say never do any, you know any particular thing but in general, if you're with an established company or going to an established company, things like the benefits package is not going to be negotiable. That things like the benefits package is not going to be negotiable, you know. Again, you should know as much as you can about it. But things like retirement contributions not negotiable, things like benefit premiums not negotiable, and so you may as well not spend effort there. What typically people do get some movement on are things like base pay, sign-on bonuses, and we can talk a little bit about what kinds of things you should be thinking about with sign-on bonuses. But sign-on bonuses, start date, negotiating your start date Sometimes, if you're not able to make the kind of progress that you want to on your cash compensation, you might be able to negotiate some money toward development, things like that. Those tend to be things that you can and probably should try to negotiate Because, again, the odds of you getting something are reasonably good.

Kate Dixon: 15:05

And I do think that it's a good thing for both the potential employee and the potential employer when the candidate does negotiate, because, again, you know you as the candidate are really, you know, acting in the power that you have and you do have power because they wouldn't have offered you the job if they didn't want you and so you're acting in your power but you're also showing them who you are as a leader and as an employee, and that is solid gold.

Kate Dixon: 15:45

So you know, again, if you're approaching this like a collaborative problem that you're solving and you're working with HR, you know, even if you don't get anything, you still have created a little bit of a relationship with somebody who might be an ally later on. When you come to the company and when you treat your recruiter or your HR rep well, that I can promise you is going to have knock on consequences that are really good for you when you get to the organization Because, again, you know, these folks are going to be talking to the hiring manager and go oh wow, john, I'm telling you he's such a great hire, we're so lucky to get him. That can help you way more than even getting, you know, a $10,000 increase in your base pay.

John Neral: 16:36

That's such a great point. Great point and I think oftentimes people may forget that it is that relationship building across the entire hiring process that can really help or hinder, not only whether you get the job offer or not, but what happens when it comes to negotiating. So I really appreciate you calling that out? Yeah, so, kate, let's take a look at the second type of person. Okay, so they've got this job offer and, for context, let's say that they've accepted a job offer with a rather large company, we'll say Fortune 250, fortune 100.

Kate Dixon: 17:15

Okay, Somewhere in there, okay.

John Neral: 17:17

And they're mid-level, senior-level type position and they're looking at their compensation package and they're saying it is going to be nothing for them to throw me an extra $40,000 or $50,000 into this compensation package. I'm worth it, I deserve it, I'm going to ask for it and I am not going to back down. Thinking about that type of scenario, what could you tell us might potentially be helpful or hurtful for them, with that mindset going into their negotiation? Yeah.

Kate Dixon: 17:58

Um, first of all, I would say this is not the Hunger Games, so let's not treat it like it is. It's like it's not Highlander. There can only be one right. And this is a conversation that I often have with my clients who are in sales and stuff. Because, you know, they feel like, wow, you know, this is what, this is the work that I'm going to be doing for the company. They feel like, wow, you know, this is what. This is the work that I'm going to be doing for the company.

Kate Dixon: 18:24

And you know what does it say about me as a potential employee if I can't do a good job of negotiating again, you know, the key to unlock all of this stuff is it's a. It's not personal, because it's not. How much a company is willing to pay you is really a reflection of how they value that role, not how valuable you are as a person. So, kind of, get that out of your head. It's not personal.

Kate Dixon: 18:53

And you've got to be collaborative Because chances are very, very good, very, very high, especially with a larger company that the person that you're doing the negotiating with does not have the power to give you what you are asking for. So you basically have to create the kind of relationship that makes them want to advocate on your behalf. And so, you know, having this entitlement mentality or having the mentality of you know, oh no, they're going to think I'm a bad person if I negotiate Both of those things don't really help you, because when we think about a collaboration, we're thinking about people who you know likely have a similar power dynamic, and whether you think, oh, the company is so important they will never negotiate with little old me to the company is very lucky to even have me talk to them Both of those things are not the ideal situation in true collaboration.

John Neral: 19:59

Yeah, and I really appreciate, kate, how you keep bringing this conversation back to how the candidate is collaborating on this offer. Right, it is that partnership in terms of how they get to know you and, in the same breath, you get to know them as well right, but it is that kind of collaboration that makes this actually work so much better. In that regard, and to your point earlier, a really good negotiation. You're going to get some things, you're not going to get some other things. Both people end up essentially being happy in that regard.

Kate Dixon: 20:37

Yeah, yeah, well, and you know again. You know having the employee, potential employee coming in and you know, one of the big things that I tell people with salary negotiation is you have to read every single thing that you get from the employer, right, and that includes the big boring benefits booklet that you get, because they're going to be things in there that they're going to tell you about stuff, right, and so you want to know, you really want to understand that, so you can value everything appropriately, because there could be things that you know the new employer does that your old employer didn't both good and bad, and both of those data points are going to help you know how to negotiate, or know what to ask for.

John Neral: 21:27

So when you're working with someone and you're helping them negotiate their salary, their compensation package, and you have learned from them that they're a little hesitant about being confident in terms of what they're going to ask for, how do you help someone build confidence around asking for what they want and leaning into believing what they're worth?

Kate Dixon: 21:52

Yeah, well, there are a couple of different things. So one is understanding what the market is for the kind of work that they're doing, right, so you know. Only the company is going to know what, how much they're going to be willing to pay or how much they're going to be willing to increase their offer. You can't know that. But you can know kind of the ecosystem of what's going on in the marketplace and so you know some of that's going to be looking online. Salarycom is awesome, some of that's going to be looking online. Sellercom is awesome. You know they're just all kinds of glass door has stuff and just go out and look at that. And you can also talk to people who are in the kinds of roles that you want to go into and instead of saying, hey, how much do you make John, you might say, hey, my research is showing that jobs like this are paid between X and Y in the marketplace. How does that land with you? And then you're taking the pressure off them to. You know they don't need to necessarily share, although people are getting more comfortable sharing their own salaries than they are when I was coming up. So, um, so if they do share, then that's great, but if they don't, you can still get an assessment of what's going on in the marketplace by asking that kind of question. So that's part of it. Um, another thing that we do is we have script, we, we? We have a script for how the conversation should go.

Kate Dixon: 23:21

I have a four-part conversation recipe about you know what you do at each stage and you know those kinds of things can really help and you practice. One of the things that people think they don't need to do is practice these conversations, and it's fundamentally different when you're practicing inside your head and when you're speaking the words, because I don't know about you, but I am like super smooth when I'm doing it in my head, but you know when words are actually coming out of my mouth maybe not quite as good, and so, practicing you know, if you've got somebody at home that you can practice with and they can do a role play with you, that's great. But you know, talk to your dog. My dog is great. He'll listen to me all day long, even if I repeat the same conversation over multiple times. But you know you can do it and record yourself on your phone and you know, play it back and listen to yourself, but sometimes that can make you feel a little bit weird, but just do practice right.

Kate Dixon: 24:26

And, and you know, if you can't do anything else, if you don't want to like, oh God, a four part recipe, that sounds a lot. I have seven magic words for you, seven magic words of salary negotiation. And they are what kind of flexibility do you have, right? What kind of flexibility do you have? So, if you, you know, you can say, oh, you know, thanks for the offer. I see that it's, you know, 100,000. I was really looking for something in the 120s range. What kind of flexibility do you have?

Kate Dixon: 25:04

And then, the most important part of that conversation is the silence that happens after You're going to. Oh, my God, I'm so nervous. I want to say something. Give them a second. You're asking a question that's not a yes or no question, which is important because you want their brain to slow down enough so that they can actually process it right. So you have to let them process it, and it's going to feel like forever, but it's not. It's probably going to be, you know, 20 or 30 seconds. Just be quiet, let them answer and then see what happens.

John Neral: 25:40

You and I are on the same page. With that, I do the same thing with my clients in terms of rehearsing with them, about asking the question and not saying anything after. Hold that space, let them breathe, let them react, let them respond. You just got to be prepared to listen. That's all you need to do at that point. That's such. The seven words are fantastic. I thank you for sharing them with us. I can only imagine you've got so many wonderful stories from the people whom you've helped over the years. Would you share with us one particular success story that just tells us a little bit more about who you are and how you help people.

Kate Dixon: 26:21

Sure, um, that just tells us a little bit more about who you are and how you help people. Um, sure, so there, there's one that sticks out to me. Um, there was a woman that I, uh, that I helped, who was going to, um, her dream company um, a fortune, let's say 10. So we don't like tell you who it is right off the top, but really, really great company. It was a nice big increase to her responsibilities. It was going to require her to move across the country, and so she was really focused on negotiating her base pay, her sign-on bonus and her equity, because she was getting stock options. And so I'd asked her about the relocation package and she's like oh well, they have two options. You can either just take a cash bonus and then do it yourself, or you can have the company. Do you know the relocation services and stuff like that? And she's like you know, I feel really uncomfortable having people know all about what I want to do, so I'm just going to take the cash.

Kate Dixon: 27:52

So I read all of you know the relocation policy and you know a number of different things, and said to her well, here's what happens if you do use the relocation services versus if you don't.

Kate Dixon: 27:58

And we kind of enumerated the costs of moving if she didn't take the reloc policy and it was going to save her I think it was over $30,000 to use their relocation services rather than to just take a bonus and pay the cost out of that bonus. So I was delighted to be able to do that. And then we also were able to get her some more on the cash and equity side, which, seeing what their stock price did in the, you know, three years after we did that negotiation, was a really great move for her. So I think that was kind of nice because it was kind of all encompassing. But you know, we've had so many great success stories with with my clients. I just I'm so proud of them because you know I can, I can coach them and tell them what to do and stuff. But bottom line, they're the ones in these conversations and so I love it when, when they they, you know, do what they are coached to do and they get the kind of results that they were dreaming of.

John Neral: 29:02

So that's the power of coaching you know, like you said, and to, to really get them to to stand in their own, their own power, their own confidence and everything, to go ahead and do that. That's, that's phenomenal, so that's the best thing.

Kate Dixon: 29:17

That's why we love coaching.

John Neral: 29:18

So yeah, absolutely so. Kate, we're going to start wrapping up here. You've shared so many wonderful things with us today and I really appreciate it, but as we start wrapping up, what advice would you give someone listening today to help them build their mid-career GPS to whatever's next for them in their careers?

Kate Dixon: 29:43

for them in their careers. I think the big thing is to really know yourself, know the kinds of things that you value, know the kinds of things that light you up, and because when you know yourself, you're going to know whether a new company is going to meet those needs that you have of your. You know, have that value alignment. You're going to know if going out on your own is going to be aligned with who you really are and you know when, when you do start your company, you'll know whether your clients are in alignment, and that's really important as well. So that self-knowledge, any time that you can spend really understanding yourself better, is time well spent.

John Neral: 30:28

Thank you for that. So, kate, if anyone wants to reach out, connect with you, find you, learn more about you and what you do, I'm going to turn the mic over to you. Please share with us all the great places where people can find and connect with you.

Kate Dixon: 30:40

Okay, so my website is katedixonorg, so katedixonorg, I've got lots of blog posts that have really specific information about salary negotiation. You can get to that for free. I have a book and you can see it like right over my head called Pay Up, and you can buy that anywhere. Books are sold and I'm on LinkedIn at Kate Dixon Coach and I'd love to connect with your listeners.

John Neral: 31:18

I will make sure all of that is in the show notes. But, kate Dixon, thank you so much for adding to this conversation here today. It was really great having you on the show. Thanks for being a great guest on the Mid-Career GPS podcast.

Kate Dixon: 31:30

My pleasure, thank you.

John Neral: 31:32

All right, my friends. So Kate and I set an intention today for our conversation, which was she wanted to leave you with some immediate tips that you could take action with. There are three things I want to call out in summation. So the first one is that in your negotiation, this is an opportunity to show them who you are. Don't be a jerk, right? How you show up in this conversation is so important because, to Kate's point, you are collaborating and solving a business problem, right? The second thing is this isn't personal. This is about where they see the value in the role, not in the value in you per se. So when you think about negotiating your salary, go back to what Kate said about using websites like salarycom and Glassdoor and leveraging your network, about getting as much salary information as you can to help you best prepare for that conversation. And the third thing was her seven magic words what kind of flexibility do you have? Can you imagine asking that question during a salary negotiation? What kind of flexibility do you have? Can you imagine asking that question during a salary negotiation? What kind of flexibility do you have and then waiting to hear their response? What would that feel like for you to show up and ask that question in any interview or after you've gotten the job offer.

John Neral: 32:56

So until next time, my friends, remember this you will build your mid-career GPS one mile or one step at a time, and how you show up matters. Make it a great rest of your day. Thank you for listening to the Mid-Career GPS Podcast. Make sure to follow on your favorite listening platform and, if you have a moment, I'd love to hear your comments on Apple Podcasts. Visit johnnerrellcom for more information about how I can help you build your mid-career GPS or how I can help you and your organization with your next workshop or public speaking event. Don't forget to connect with me on LinkedIn and follow me on social at John Nerrell Coaching. I look forward to being back with you next week. Until then, take care and remember how we show up matters. Thank, you.