1) If you're a business owner, how do you feel about what you pay your people? Is your hourly pay structure fair and tiered in a way that you're proud to share? We pay an hourly wage of between $20 and $65 an hour, depending on the skill involved. Are your employees grumbling or are they feeling comfortable and secure in their work with you? You express their value to you by loading up on the benefits package, providing a comfortable and secure work environment, and paying them well: they'll work hard in return and give you all their skill, talent, and time.
2) As a wage earner, do you feel like your labor directly affects your results and your income? As a worker at your company, does your knowledge and skill contribute to your own bottom line? If you haven't yet asked for a raise, in the next six months is time for you to start charting your successes and your leadership skills, and schedule a meeting with your boss to review your performance.
If you are not close to the revenue stream of the company, find out ways to add value to the business. Do you have additional skills, ideas, or ways to make the company profitable? Create an initiative and jump on it, you might develop a new branch of the business that benefits everyone, including you.
3) Women, this is for you particularly: Sometimes we just don't respect ourselves enough to ask for what we deserve. One way to practice is to neuro-linguistically program yourself to require a higher salary, or a higher hourly rate, or a higher commission.
Say to yourself: My rate is $___ an hour (and fill in the blank with an amount that is *double* what you currently earn). When you practice saying your new rate, you develop confidence and renewed optimism about your value to your current work environment. We women need to ask for those benefits: we need to *demand* those increases. Practice speaking these higher numbers until you are completely comfortable, then start charging that rate!
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