Can vets negotiate salary?

Yes! Everything can be negotiated and every vet and RVN should be negotiating their salary every time they get a new job, they move up a role within a company or at their yearly salary review.

To give you the confidence to negotiate salary (and this is also what I tell myself!), I’ll remind you that employers and recruiters expect you to negotiate, especially at the time of a new job offer. Negotiating salary isn’t rude or greedy, it’s just business!

Why should you negotiate your salary?

From an employee’s perspective, negotiating salary can make a huge difference to salary trajectory for the rest of your life. Imagine 2 new grads applying for a job that’s being advertised at £30k. Vet 1 accepts the job and takes the £30k offered. Vet 2 accepts the job but negotiates their salary up to £33k. Imagine they then get a 6% increase on their salary every year for the rest of their career (I know, slightly unrealistic – but work with me).

You get a compound effect and after just 15 years, Vet 2 earns nearly £90,000, whereas Vet 1 is still on £73,600.

Imagine if they job hop and are able to bump up their salary considerably doing so. Vet 2 is able to negotiate their next salary from a much higher launchpad.

Although oversimplified, it illustrates the point. Salary negotiation at any stage, is worthwhile. And don’t let being a new grad dissuade you from negotiating. This leads me onto my next point.

From an employer’s perspective, if they’re hiring a candidate who’s comfortable openly discussing money (remember, we talk about costs to our clients all day, every day), and the candidate also values their own skills highly – they’re going to look like a great hiring prospect!

Steps for a killer negotiation

There are 3 steps for your salary negotiation once you’ve organised a pay review meeting with your manager or before you go into a new job application.  

• Research, research, research!

Nothing is going to give you more confidence going into that negotiation meeting than knowing you have everything backed up with current facts and figures. Talk to recruiters to see what sort of salaries they’re seeing for your level of experience, species, extra qualifications etc.

Talking to colleagues might feel tricky but it’s almost always easier than you might think. I’ve always found people are more than happy to tell you their salary, especially if they think it’s going to help you get a better one! Furthermore, it is illegal to prevent colleagues from discussing salaries so you’re completely ok to do this!

Reach out to peers from your year in vet school to ask what they’re currently on and check out job ads to get an idea of advertised salary ranges (if they advertise them – a bugbear of mine when they don’t).

Finally, you can get in touch with me on my Instagram page @thisvetcan_blog and we do frequent salary share sessions! Followers will request a salary share for a specific job type e.g., equine vet, and any community members who have the same job role will post their current salary. I share them all anonymously so that everyone can see them and gauge the current landscape.

With this knowledge, many ThisVetCan community members have gone on to negotiate themselves great salaries that they wouldn’t have had the confidence to ask for before.

• Prep

Before the meeting/phone call/email. Have in mind a goal figure and a non-negotiable figure you won’t go below. Write them down if you want, but make sure you have a fixed number before negotiating.

Next, consider additional areas you could negotiate. For vet jobs specifically, there is a lot of scope to budge on CPD allowance, on-call rota, 4-day week, and even holiday days. If the employer won’t budge on salary, would movement in any of these other categories suffice?

Finally, if you’re negotiating a pay rise at a current job, find out your annual turnover for the practice and pull together a list of additional duties, responsibilities, and qualifications you have. Examples of these could be:

• You’ve taken on a mentor role for one of the new grads,
• You’re a certificate holder,
• You completed that BOAS course and are now performing BOAS surgeries that the clinic couldn’t do before,
• You’re the organiser of in-house training and clinical club sessions.

Anything and everything you do, write it down. And your clinical director should be able to give you your turnover figures, just ask them. 

• The meeting

So, you have your number in mind. Be polite but to the point in these meetings. If you’re negotiating a pay rise, ask your line manager in advance for a meeting for a pay review. There’s no point in springing it on them unexpectedly in a routine catch-up meeting. They will need to prepare too!

From my experience, brief is best – it’s very easy to talk your way back out of the salary you want! Start the meeting by saying that you want to discuss salary, next make a point of mentioning the extra responsibilities and duties that you’ve taken on and how much you’re turning over for the practice.

Finally, it’s a case of asking for the salary you want. Try not to give a range, as this always gives your employer the option of going with the lower end of the range. You can say that you’ve based the figure on discussions with peers, colleagues, and recruiters so it’s very representative of the current going rate for the job you’re in.

After that, stop talking! Your employer might ask you some questions, come to a decision immediately, give you another offer, or ask to go away and think about it. Remember to have in mind your non-negotiable figure if they do come back with a figure below what you asked for.

Finally, it’s ok to not come to an agreement during the meeting. You’re more than welcome to ask to go away and think about it. Just give your manager a time frame for when you’ll get back to them by.

How to negotiate a new job salary via email?

Use all the same principles as above – research and prep is everything. A job offer will often be sent to people via email so how do you negotiate when you’re not face-to-face with someone?

Good news – I’ve got my tried and tested email script that you can use as a template:

“Thank you for your email and offering me this position! I’m so excited to join the team at ….. and this role sounds perfect for me!

In terms of total compensation, I was also looking for something closer to £….., is this a figure you could accommodate? (You can add in CPD allowance etc. here).”

The Bottom Line

Everyone finds salary negotiation nerve-wracking – you’re not the only one! And it can be hard to advocate for yourself but also hugely empowering when you pull it off! So, my advice is to talk to people and gather as much information as you can. Confidence is key! And don’t hesitate to join us in the salary transparency haven of ThisVetCan Instagram page.