"Ask the Expert" is your chance to get advice and unique insight on questions you have about searching for a job, interviewing, navigating workplace issues and advancing your career. Featured experts range from HR professionals who specialize in conflict management to job search experts who share advice on how to secure interviews and impress search committees. Experts also include former campus administrators, academic leadership consultants, and career development professionals working in higher education and within industry.

For a recent HigherEdJobs podcast episode, HR experts Kathleen Hermacinski and Matt Trainum joined co-hosts Kelly Cherwin and Andy Hibel to discuss listener questions about salary negotiations as part of the Ask the Expert series. The questions they explore include how to calculate your worth and when to bring up salary during the interview process.

A summary of the conversation is below. We hope you'll find it helpful in your current or future job search.

Kelly Cherwin: Our listener's question is "How does a job seeker calculate their worth, considering experience, education, and specialized skills, so they're paid an equitable amount in a new role?"

Kathleen Hermacinski: One of the biggest things I took away from when I was in college was the bls.gov site. If you don't know what that is, it's the Bureau of Labor Statistics. They have a subsection for specific labor salaries for higher education based on faculty members for art versus business, science, human resource professionals in higher education, and every other position. They give you the bell curve, the bottom 10%, the top 10%, and everything in between. I highly encourage all listeners to go to bls.gov to see the salary ranges for that position specific to higher education.

We all know higher education salaries are just a little bit lower compared to the private world, so you want to make sure you set those expectations. In addition, you need to calculate worth geographically, so your worth in Central Illinois will not be the same monetary value in California or Oregon versus New York. So, if you look at the different costs of living, that's also going to help you with the salary range that you're going to be financially comfortable with. In addition, factor in different certifications, especially if you have a Ph.D., versus somebody who doesn't have that terminal degree.

Go to bls.gov and look at the median salary range. Compare it to the geographic areas you're considering and then compare it to your degree and skill set. You can find a range that will help you feel financially comfortable with your next position. Matt, what do you think?

Matt Trainum: We are in agreement. When I hear a question about how job seekers calculate their worth, I immediately think they don't; the market does. You identify what the market is saying about the value of that work.

You've identified a fantastic resource. CUPA-HR is a fantastic resource as well. Some of these resources require different subscription levels to get to the specific information you might want, but having all that data is good.

You talked about location and similar roles at similar schools. All of that comes into play. You can't just generically say a history professor gets paid this much because it's a history professor at what school and in what state, at what size institution with what endowment. All those factors come into play. Generally, salaries are set in stone. The range might vary by a 15% range. That means salary negotiations can be narrow. You need to know that.

Kathleen, one of the things I most appreciated about what you shared was identifying that the sector has lower salaries than other sectors. That's important for people to know coming into higher ed from outside of higher ed. What you're getting in exchange for that smaller salary is supposed to be a job that has a different kind of reward built into it.

Hermacinski: That's a good point, Matt. To follow up on that, in my last role at Eureka College, full-time, exempt staff employees received 52 total days off per year. That's a combination of when the campus is closed, vacation time, reduced summer hours, and everything in between. That's a non-monetary benefit that is super generous compared to other institutions that I've been around.

Some colleges will put several hundred dollars into an HSA (health savings account) plan for medical insurance and there are tuition waivers through the Council of Independent Colleges or the Tuition Exchange. So, how do you value your worth? It's not just in salary; it's also in all those fringe and non-fringe benefits as well.

Trainum: If your spouse or your family members want to continue into higher education at some point, most institutions have a tuition exchange. This type of exchange by itself is, in some ways, a $40,000 benefit that suddenly is active for you.

Hibel: The other part I'd add is the value of associations like the Council of Independent Colleges and what folks like Matt do, which is to bring professionals together. You have a network of people. If you're asking about your worth as you go into a job search, you're already behind the curve. What you should be doing is using the professional associations that you work with and your network.

When you see job postings from places where you know someone, call those folks, and ask them about it. Say, 'Hey, listen, this position was posted. Are you able to confidentially share with me the salary?'

Hermacinski: And Andy, just a follow-up. It's not what you know; it's who you know. If you can get in the door with the recruiter -- because you ask somebody in your network -- that's going to give you a slight advantage.

Cherwin: Kathleen, we might have touched on this when we talked last time about early career job seekers and the question about evaluating your worth. I'll poke fun at my teenagers; my 15-year-old thinks that she should get $40 an hour to babysit. Well, that's not what the market is saying. Parents are not going to pay her that rate. And if a new college graduate heard about a starting salary for a position of $100,000 three years ago, that may have changed.

You have to make sure that you are asking the right questions and doing your research. Reach out to your networks, go to the bls.gov site, and look at salary.com. You'll know what the reasonable amount is going in when you're getting ready to negotiate. If my daughter's asking for $40 an hour, they're going to laugh at her. We're trying to give advice not to be laughed at.

Hibel: Matt, this is for the candidate side. At what point should a candidate bring up salary expectations?

Trainum: I am a staunch believer that salary, from an employer standpoint, should be listed right away in a fair range, not some $50,000 range.

From an employee standpoint, you have a right to know the range before the first interview, certainly before the second interview. If a salary isn't posted, email is a perfectly valid way to discuss that.

I would encourage using email because you don't want to spend your precious six minutes in an interview asking the recruiter to remind you or clarify what the salary is. What we've talked about before, your job when you're in an interview, is to get them to want to hire you. Asking about salary doesn't get them to want to hire you. But if you're asking about salary over an email, it's perfectly appropriate.

Hermacinski: There are states like Illinois and other states including New York, California, Oregon, and Pennsylvania, starting January 1, 2025, where all businesses within a certain threshold are required to post the pay and all applicable benefits when they post the position.

We call and screen our candidates. So, we'll create our top three, and our second three and our next three and have these tiers we'll go through for those top three candidates. I'll call them to find out if they're still interested in the position, and I'll see if I can answer any questions. I share the salary range and when we're planning to do interviews. It's a very organic, flowing conversation that we have with our candidates because, as Matt mentioned, as an institution, we're doing our job to fill a role. But for the individual, this is a life-changing decision, and we don't want to waste our time or the candidate's time if our salary ranges are not even remotely in the same ballpark.

Hibel: I love the idea of having this conversation by email. It's awkward to discuss salary in person. The conversation can linger on. As Matt said, it could take all six of those minutes that you have to talk about your candidacy. And you can control the conversation, and it's done and over with.

If an employer does not respond to that email and is not being transparent, as much as you may love the job, that is a big obstacle to overcome. If they're not willing to tell you that at the appropriate time, I have a pretty good feeling you're not going to be pleased with what happens in the end.

Hermacinski: That part of the recruitment process does give you insight into what that institution's going to be like if you were to work there. So, as Andy mentioned, if they're not being transparent with the salary, is that secretive within the institution? And is that something that there's less communication about because of the secrecy?

On the flip side, they're very transparent and you're having a great conversation. They reply to that email -- I do like that idea, too. When you get the call, it's your first impression of the institution, whether it's good or bad, and the institution needs to be thinking about that. But just know, as you're going through that process, make sure you're starting to evaluate the institution from the moment you apply through the applicant tracking system.

Cherwin: I love your advice about being honest, as the recruiter, and just being honest with yourself as a candidate. You don't want to accept a position that down the road you're feeling resentful because you should have gotten more or you took the role and you realize, I really did need $10,000 more to survive a year.' Building relationships and being honest is great. Thank you both for that wonderful conversation.

Do you have a job search question for us? Submit your question to one of our higher ed experts.

Listen to the entire episode for more from Kathleen, Matt, and our hosts, Andy Hibel and Kelly Cherwin.