The gender-wage gap is no secret to anyone. Researchers cite several different antecedents that explain why the wage gap persists. From the discrepancies in the frequency at which women apply for jobs that they feel qualified for compared to men, to lower salary that women tend to ask for—there are several reasons why the pay gap continues. Desiree Booker is a career coach who empowers diverse talent for success. She helps her clients understand their worth and effectively secure the pay they deserve. Desiree sat down with Forbes to discuss how women can demystify discussions around pay and salary and how women can shift their mindset and limiting beliefs about money.
Janice Gassam: Could you share a little bit about your background for those who are not familiar with you? Who is Desiree?
Desiree Booker: My name is Desiree Booker and I am the founder and CEO of an organization called the ColorVizion Lab and what we do is focus very heavily on empowering people of color to be successful in the workplace through career coaching. We also work with companies to help them develop strategies to attract and retain diverse talent. If you follow me online, my entire brand is about empowering people of color to be successful at work, so I do a lot of free webinars, give away a lot of free content, information…I really just want to see people of color advance in the workplace. My background is in diversity recruiting, I’ve worked as a recruiter at Turner Broadcasting, Gartner…I’ve held a number of communications roles at NBCUniversal, MSNBC and other media brands. And…recently transitioned into running my business full-time September of 2019…that’s kind of me in a nutshell.
Gassam: I know that one of the things you specialize in is helping your clients negotiate their salary. Why do you think there is so much secrecy around salary—especially for women?
Booker: I think that one, we have to look at the culture that companies are creating within their organizations. Are companies creating a culture…where you can be transparent about certain things or is the culture just kind of…kept under wraps? I think that’s kind of like the first piece of it but with women, in particular, I think that we are always concerned about our perception in the workplace. We really want to…be liked and I think that when we have these conversations, specifically about money, where sometimes you need to be a little more assertive and you need to…be able to position yourself as someone who knows what they’re worth, sometimes we think that that could be misconstrued as being aggressive or greedy, not humble…we’re just kind of told that we need to accept whatever is handed to us, so I think the perception is a huge piece and I think that naturally women, we tend to underestimate our own value and that’s a big piece of it as well. I think that, just kind of talking about how much you earn, your salary is kind of a taboo topic in general…in order to get more comfortable with that, you need to first start by being comfortable with having those conversations outside of the workplace.
Gassam: What suggestions would you have…to introduce the conversation about salary? Especially with your group of friends or maybe with coworkers who are in your similar industry?
Booker: I think that it first starts with building rapport. Understanding the role that different individuals play in our own tribe. Within our circle. You have people who are in your circle, who exist to be a mentor, a sponsor, a teacher, a confidant…you know we all have these different…role models…supporters in our lives. Everybody is not going to be that person that you can have these super transparent and…sensitive conversations with. So, I think developing a rapport, [is] first…feeling like you have that level of comfortability in saying ‘hey, I need to pick up the phone and give you a call and just talk about this offer I’m evaluating. I feel like I could use a little bit of support to make sure I’m not low-balling myself.’ I think it’s also important to know that the number of people that you have that conversation with, it shouldn’t be large. That’s not something that you need to talk about in an open forum. I think having a couple of mentors who have demonstrated, and kind of even agree [that] this is a role that I’m going to play in your career, in your advancement, these are the things that you can reach out to me for. When you kind of have that understanding as to what the relationship looks like, there’s really no hesitation when you need to pick up the phone and ask those kinds of questions…developing the rapport over time will de-stigmatize it in a way and make you more comfortable with talking about it.
Gassam: What are some tips you can offer female job seekers when it comes to negotiating their salary? A large part of it may be mindset…sometimes we don’t believe that we are worth a certain amount…how do you suggest that women prepare themselves either when they are on the job hunt or when they are up for a promotion?
Booker: Let’s start by talking about if you’re currently in a role already and you’re wanting to negotiate a raise. It’s very important to document your accomplishments in a role. It’s something that you should be doing from day one. When you come into a job, keep a short list of the types of projects you’ve worked on, the areas in which you really moved the needle, any areas where you can add monetization…really show how you created impact in the role and keep track of that over time. Essentially what you’ll need to do is build a strong case as to why you’re asking for the amount you’re asking for in terms of a raise or what the justification is in terms of your promotion request. Really building that case over time is how you get the attention of employers and essentially that hiring manager is going to make the case to their higher-ups and human resources partners to say, ‘look, this is what the market looks like, this is what the person has been doing in the role, and they’ve been outperforming and going above and beyond.’ They need to be able to make that case. Make it easier for your manager to be an advocate for you.
Another thing that I would say is positive self-talk and positive thinking. You have to be very active about managing your day-to-day thoughts…there’s a podcast that I listen to regularly by Rob Dial called the Mindset Mentor. It’s all about working on your confidence, really making your mind kind of bulletproof and understanding that…how you perceive yourself is going to come across in every conversation that you have with another person, so if deep down you don’t really believe that you’re worth, that’s going to kind of hurt your argument and negotiating for the pay you deserve so start by convincing yourself, so that you can then go out and convince other people.
When it’s preparation, research is going to be key. You can gather research from a number of different sources…we already mentioned having those conversations with mentors…you get a lot of relevant data by having conversations in terms of interviews with other companies…there’s no need to broadcast to your current employer that you’re actively interviewing but that’s actually how I negotiated my own raise…by having about five or six conversations for the same role that I was in and then I realized ‘wow! I make $12,000 less than what these other employers are saying they would offer me.’ And that is what triggered me to even ask in the first place…if you want to do research online, you can leverage websites like payscale.com and also salary.com to get an understanding of the…salary range for a role. If all else fails, you really have to be prepared to walk away…so understanding when there’s a lowball offer on the table…you got to be willing to say ‘look this is just not meant for me…I’ll hold out for the next opportunity.’
Gassam: So, I understand that you’re an entrepreneur who also does a lot of speaking. How do you negotiate your rates when you are a speaker—for women especially…they pay women less, they don’t see women as experts as much as men…what suggestions would you have for the female consultant or speaker who’s had trouble negotiating her rate with companies?
Booker: First…what I start by doing is evaluating the full package, the full opportunity. There are so many different variables that come into play when it comes to whether I’ll accept a speaking engagement, whether I want to pitch myself for one. I’m looking at…what’s the brand? Is this a really big-name conference? Who’s going to be attending? Is there some wiggle room with the pay? Am I willing to do it for free for the exposure? Then I look at, in the long term, am I going to walk away with a few contacts? Am I going to walk away with more speaking engagements? When you speak, you should always walk away with some type of follow-up opportunities. I look at those things. I also look at…am I going to have to pay someone to take pictures or videos? Do you have those resources readily available? Depending on how much they’re coming to the table with, I’m usually pretty lenient when it comes to negotiating on certain things. There is a difference between, someone trying to get over on you and…someone who is like, you know, ‘we really want you to come do this, this is what we have, here is how we can make the deal a little sweeter for you’…it comes down to that relationship and that rapport that you build.
To learn more about Desiree, click here.
This interview has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.