Career Negotiations Podcast

Google Salary Negotiation - How to Navigate a Google Offer Negotiation

• Brandon Bramley

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Are you about to negotiate a Google job offer? In this episode, I break down compensation at Google, then walk you through my proven step-by-step Google salary negotiation strategies, and highlight some common mistakes to avoid during a Google offer negotiation.

That way you have salary negotiation tips that are based on hundreds of salary negotiations and actually work.

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WHO AM I

I'm Brandon, the Founder and Lead Negotiator at TheSalaryNegotiator.com. As a former corporate negotiator, I now help employees increase their compensation. Through hundreds of salary negotiations, I've helped career professionals secure over $175 million in additional compensation. My expertise is backed by more than 150 five-star reviews from career professionals on Google and Trustpilot.

Brandon Bramley:

Google provides competitive compensation and perks to their employees, but how do you know if you're getting a competitive job offer before accepting? In this episode, my goal is to cover everything you need to confidently navigate a Google salary negotiation. I'm first going to cover their compensation structure at Google so you know more about the Google-based salary, their bonus, their equity package and sign-on bonuses in their job offers. That way, you know exactly what to expect when you get an offer. Then I'm going to walk you through my five recommended steps for negotiating a Google job offer that are proven through real Google salary negotiations that I've actually led myself for my clients. That way, you're going to be able to filter out some of the bad advice out there and use salary negotiation strategies that are actually going to work with Google. At the end, I'm going to close out the episode by highlighting my three common mistakes that you should avoid in a Google salary negotiation. That way, you don't risk the opportunity and you actually secure competitive compensation. So let's get into it. Hey, everyone, welcome back to the channel If you're new here. My name is Brandon Bramley and I'm the founder and lead negotiator at https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/. I provide professional job offer negotiation services (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/services), salary negotiation courses (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/courses) and tools (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/salary-negotiation-templates) to help professionals like you navigate the negotiation process and secure competitive compensation. I'm not just a career coach or recruiter giving out generic salary negotiation advice. There's already a lot of bad advice floating around online. Instead, I've actually led hundreds of salary negotiations across various roles and companies, helping my clients secure hundreds of millions more in compensation overall. My background is actually in strategic negotiations and my goal is to debunk that bad advice out there and give you proven negotiation strategies that are actually going to help you earn more. So if you're a career professional looking to earn competitive pay, subscribe here to get actual tips and, when you're ready to take your negotiations to the next level, visit thesalarynegotiator. com for my coaching, courses and tools that are designed to help you negotiate the best possible offer before you accept.

Brandon Bramley:

Now, before we dive into how to negotiate a Google job offer, let's talk about the compensation components in your job offer. It's really important to understand the difference between your base salary and your total compensation when it comes to Google. Too many people are going to focus on the base salary for a role, but that's really just one piece of the puzzle when it comes to pay at Google. When you're considering a move to Google. You need to make sure you're looking at the whole picture, which is your total monetary take-home pay, also known as total compensation. This includes your base salary, your annual bonus, the value of your vested equity each year and any signup bonuses.

Brandon Bramley:

Now you're going to go ahead and find four core compensation components in a Google job offer. First, there's going to be your Google base salary right? Everyone knows what this is. This is consistent. It's your guarantee that you'll see in every paycheck. It's really only going to change with promotions or merit increases, since it's a set rate.

Brandon Bramley:

Second, you'll have an annual performance bonus at google, which is a percentage of the google base salary. This is typically going to range from 10 to 30, depending on your specific google role and level. It's going to be based on your personal performance each year and it's going to be paid out annually, so it can fluctuate, while the google bonus is tied to your base salary. It's generally not negotiable, but what I want you to think about is, if you do negotiate a higher base salary, that means your google bonus is going to your base salary. It's generally not negotiable, but what I want you to think about is, if you do negotiate a higher base salary. That means your Google bonus is going to increase with it, so keep that in mind.

Brandon Bramley:

Third, you'll receive an equity grant at Google. Your initial Google equity package comes in the form of RSUs, which are restricted stock units. These represent actual ownership of Google. These RSUs are subject to a staggered Google vesting schedule, which is four years. That means that the Google equity will invest over a four year period in different annual increments, meaning you'll receive 38% of your RSUs in year one, 32% in year two, 20% in year three and the final 10% in your final year. You don't get the full value of your Google equity up front, but you do get the share in the value of these fluctuations over that period. If the Google stock price goes up, so does the value of these fluctuations over that period. If the google stock price goes up, so does the value of your equity. The flip side is, though, that if the google stock price drops, your equity value decreases as well, so there are risks with equity. It's also important to note that if you leave google before they vest, then you're going to forfeit that unvested portion when you change jobs, so keep that in mind.

Brandon Bramley:

Finally, there's the google sign-on bonus. This is a one-time cash payment that's typically paid out 30 days after you start. It's often designed to offset lost incentives or your equity from previous companies, but even just as an incentive to join the team. Google sign-on bonuses aren't always included in the initial google offer, so they do often require negotiation. Luckily, I found that we have had great success in securing them for our clients, so they are available if you know what you're doing. Google also offers annual equity refreshers, which are additional RSU equity grants each year. However, these Google stock refreshers aren't always guaranteed and they vary significantly, so we don't include them in our total compensation calculations. I will say that it's worth asking the Google recruiter about these Google stock refreshes, but we found that they usually withhold specific details, so keep that in mind.

Brandon Bramley:

Now, these four main Google salary components your base salary, your bonus, your equity and your signup bonus are going to make up your total compensation at Google. To help visualize this, we have a total compensation calculator on our site. It lets you put in the base salary, the bonus percentage, your equity grant and your sign-on bonus. Then it's going to show your estimated compensation over those four years, both in total and on an annual basis. You can find that free compensation calculator at https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/total-compensation-calculator, but I'll go ahead and link to it as well in the episode notes. That way, you can use our free tool all right.

Brandon Bramley:

Now that we've covered how google's compensation structure works, let's discuss google salary negotiation steps. These are strategies that I've successfully used to negotiate many google job offers and I'm going to recommend that you follow to navigate the google salary negotiation once you actually have an offer in hand. Note that google typically is going to provide their offers verbally initially and they're only going to give you an offer in hand. Note that Google typically is going to provide their offers verbally initially and they're only going to give you an offer after you verbally accept. So make sure you write down the offer details when they share it verbally and ask them to send over the benefits package for your review. Now, once you have a Google job offer, the first step to negotiating it is to make sure you fully understand the compensation components and benefits in the Google offer package. The biggest takeaway from this is that understanding the Google total compensation before negotiating is very important. I can't stress that enough. That way, you know exactly how to value the Google offer and what to negotiate, including the base salary, annual bonus, equity and the sign-on bonus.

Brandon Bramley:

The second step is what I call doing your due diligence and asking strategic questions. This is where you're actually going to review the Google offer and come back with a list of questions for the recruiter. This not only helps you clarify any questions you might have about the offer, but it actually allows you to ask strategic questions that are going to build negotiation leverage. Before you send a counter, you can call out things that might not be as competitive as your current company or what Google's competitors offer. If you are going to need some ideas, we actually have a list of strategic questions that you can go ahead and pull and grab at our templates page (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/store/questions-to-ask-during-job-offer-negotiations), or they're also included in our salary negotiation course (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/courses), so make sure you get those. But I do want to highlight don't skip this step, even if you think you understand the offer and you just want to counter right away. It's very important for building negotiation leverage and showing that you're doing it also lets you secure any freebies or items that they might use as tradeoffs later off in the negotiation, so make sure you do this.

Brandon Bramley:

The third step is to do your compensation research on the Google offer, and you're going to want to find the base salary and the total compensation ranges for your specific role, location and level at Google. You can use various online resources to find this data, but make sure you use multiple sources and average the results. To find this data but make sure you use multiple sources and average the results. We're really trying to identify the compensation ranges so that we can see where your initial offer sits and how much room there is for improvement. Google tries to hire employees at the lower to mid end of those pay bands, but I'm always going to suggest that you push towards the top end of the Google pay range for your role. Just remember this is publicly reported data, so it might not always be accurate. People report higher equity than a new hire would get due to stock appreciation which Google has had, or they might have not uploaded the compensation correctly because they don't understand the compensation components. If you want help with this, you can use our compensation research comparison tool on my template page ) or you can walk through the course (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/courses) which is going to show you exactly how to do the compensation research so you know how to build the ask in your Google counteroffer.

Brandon Bramley:

Once you have the Google compensation research done and you've gotten the answers to all of the questions you sent, you're ready to draft a Google counteroffer (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/store/counteroffer-examples).

Brandon Bramley:

This is where we take a database approach with Google and we craft the counteroffer to send to the recruiting team. We're gonna present the top end of the range that you targeted best enough for your research and call out any items that aren't competitive based off your due diligence questions. I highly suggest doing this by email, because it gives Google recruiters everything they need to advocate for you and you can simply send your points to the comp team instead of hoping that they're actually going to take notes while you're on the call. Plus, recruiters at Google negotiate offers every day and they're trained in negotiation, so they're going to be ready with tactics to cut you off or steer you in a different direction on that call if you try to counter verbally.

Brandon Bramley:

The final step after sending a google counter offer is to be prepared to handle any recruiter pushback. It's almost guaranteed that you're going to get pushback from a google recruiter, so you need to be prepared for this. They're trained to deter you from negotiating and get you to accept the initial offer, so be prepared to handle that pushback and know exactly what to say to overcome those objections and actually get them to take your concerns back to the compensation team. Essentially, you want to say that you understand their concerns, but nicely read out yours and ask them to take your ass back to the Google compensation team for another look. It might take overcoming a few objections, but once they agree to take it back for a look nine times out of 10, they're actually going to come back with a Google job offer. So you really want them to get them to take it back. We have a full list of objection handlers that you can download from my templates page (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/store/objection-handling-scripts) or find in my course (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/job-offer-negotiation-course) if you want the scripts to know exactly what to say. If you do encounter this pushback From here, the Google recruiter will either come back with a better offer that fits your needs or it's going to be lower than your ass. At that point, you're going to want to decide if it's worth sending another Google counteroffer to push again or if you're ready to accept the updated offer and get locked in.

Brandon Bramley:

One thing I want to highlight is just that negotiating salary is not like how you would negotiate a car at a dealership, right? There's really not that back and forth and you're usually not going to want to send more than two Google account offers. So keep that in mind, because I don't want you to risk coming off as aggressive and jeopardizing the relationship. At the end of the day, the negotiation process should be like you're talking with a friend that's helping you feel comfortable with a move to the new company. So don't use any aggressive tactics, because those usually are going to work against you in these conversations Now. Any aggressive tactics, because those usually are going to work against you in these conversations Now.

Brandon Bramley:

The last thing I want to cover is a few Google salary negotiation mistakes. Before you decide to negotiate a Google job offer, the main item I recommend against is sharing your salary expectations or current pay with the Google recruiting team. This can only work against you, so don't do it. If you actually think about it right, if you're going to throw out a number that's lower accidentally to Google, they're probably going to offer less competitive compensation or at the low end of their pay range, or a huge risk with google and other technologies is they're actually going to down level you, which is very common. So I want you to stay away from that. On the flip side, if you think, hey, it's a better idea to throw out a bigger number, they might think shoot, not sure if I can afford that person, so let's go with a different candidate. So it's not a good strategy and it risks them not even giving you the offer or continuing with the interview process. So don't share your salary expectations (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/resource-center/salary-expectations-answer-on-application) and, if you remember, the Google recruiter knows exactly what they can pay for the role, so you always want to turn that question back on them and learn more about the base salary and the total compensation ranges for the position.

Brandon Bramley:

My second tip or mistake to avoid is making sure that you're actually realistic about what you should ask for in a Google counter offer. Too often I see people ask for way too much compensation that just doesn't make sense for their role. They either get laughed at or it comes off as aggressive and in some cases I've heard it can get an offer rescinded. So don't do it. You're going to want to always avoid that and you should always take a database approach with Google to ensure that you're asking for realistic compensation that they can actually provide. At the end of the day, google does have a set compensation ban for every position and they're only going to pay within those bans for a specific role and level. So don't jeopardize the Google job offer by coming off as too aggressive or asking for unrealistic numbers.

Brandon Bramley:

And finally, don't worry about a Google salary negotiation. You might be feeling nervous, but as long as you follow our strategies and keep the negotiation professional, there's no reason you to risk a Google offer. If you do it right, you should hopefully secure a better Google offer package before starting the new role. So really have confidence in this and make sure you're using proven strategies and get the support you need. If you do need help negotiating a Google job offer, you've got this.

Brandon Bramley:

That wraps up this episode on Google salary negotiation (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/resource-center/how-to-negotiate-your-google-job-offer). I hope this breakdown of Google's compensation structure, our proven Google salary negotiation strategies and negotiation mistakes to avoid help you feel more confident in these discussions. If you are serious, though, about getting the best possible offer with Google or any company, strategies and negotiation mistakes to avoid help you feel more confident in these discussions. If you are serious, though, about getting the best possible offer with Google or any company, I highly suggest that you don't go into the salary negotiation alone. Head over to https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/ to either work with me directly as your salary negotiation coach or check out my salary negotiation courses (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/courses) and tools (https://www. thesalarynegotiator. com/salary-negotiation-templates) on our site. You'll find a link to all of these in the episode notes below, and if you found this episode helpful, please make sure you subscribe, leave a comment and share with someone who could actually use this advice in their career. Thanks for tuning in and happy negotiating.

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