Asking your boss for a salary increase may be nerve-wracking but this may be your year to finally go for it. Researchers advise that if you want to speak up for what you want and be able to get it, the best technique is to start with an absurd amount so that you can get closer to your desired salary as it will greatly influence how much you will be offered.
This approach is called "anchoring". According to a report by New York Magazine, it is a term in psychology that describes the tendency to rely on the first piece of information given when making decisions, and in this case the first number suggested. Now if you are asking for a raise, if you give your employer a relatively low rate or number, they are more likely really going to offer you a lower increase.
"Because what happens to people over time is if in that first negotiation or those first few jobs out of high school or college you are underpaid, then you really get a snowball effect where if each subsequent salary is really benchmarked to that, then what can happen is that type of usually implicit and occasionally explicit discrimination really then follows that person throughout their career," explained Victoria Budson, the director of the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.
According to a study from the University of Idaho, the idea of "anchoring" still applies even if the amount brought to the table sounds nearly impossible like millions of dollars.
"Incorporating a joking comment about implausible salary expectations may be a relatively easy way for job candidates to establish a high anchor and minimize negative reactions from employers," Todd J. Thorsteinson, the author of the study, wrote in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology.
