Hello,   This is Laura Rose, author of the business and time management book: TimePeace: Making Peace with Time, the Book of Answers: 105 Career Critical Situations and Business Marketing for Entrepreneurs  is a certified business and efficiency coach.  And I specialize in professional development, career management, time management, and work life balance strategies.Simply put, I give people the time to be, do and have whatever they want.
I recently recieved the following questions about when to ask for a raise.  If you do the following things, it will be easy to ask for that well-deserved raise.

It’s time to ask for a raise, when you have the following items completed:

1) You have done your homework by knowing the salary range of your role,duties and responsibility  (Salary.com gives you some salary range).  Make sure you are comparing the salary to the tasks, roles, duties and responsibilities that you are performing (versus a job title).  Often times you may be doing Senior Level responsibilities, but your official title is just Level 1

2) You can tangibly and quantifiably show (with numbers and percentage) your individual and team contributes to the company’s bottom line.  This means you can show (with backup data) how much money you made or saved the company.  Regardless of your role or company industry, companies are in the business to make money.  Therefore, every action of every employee can be directly associated with money made or saved.

3) You have investigated the employment climate regarding your role.  This means that you have met with external recruiters to verify that your position is still very relevant, sustainable and valued in the current economy.

4) Outline the additional certifications, licenses, continuing education and training that you have received since your last salary increase.  Quantifiably and tangibly show (with numbes and percentage) how those additional skills, experience, and competence increased your productivity, proficiency, and performance.

5) Be prepared to ask for a promotion.  One of the best ways to ask for a raise is to be actually performing at the next performance level.  If you can tangibly show that you are already working at the next performance level (next promotion level), it makes the salary increase discussion much easier.Alternatives to asking for a raise is to focus on your next promotion level.  Meet with your manager to outline exactly what you need to accomplish and deliver to achieve your next promotion.  Create an Individual Development Plan and a Professional Business Commitment plan that explicitly outline your manager’s expectations and how you plan to acquire those skills and experience.  By making your manager your co-conspirator in your career development, you will have less stressful salary and performance discussions.  It will go from “feeling like you are bragging” — to “checking off your agreed upon list”.

I go into detail in the Professional Development Toolkit  and Get that Well-Deserved Raise online course.