Nathan Eddy, Freelance WriterJanuary 22, 20255 Min ReadCagkan Sayin via Alamy StockNegotiating a higher salary or better benefits can be daunting, but IT professionals can strengthen their case by aligning their contributions with organizational goals and adopting strategic approaches.The key to securing a raise lies in preparation, communication, and demonstrating measurable value to higher-ups. Quantifiable metrics are crucial during salary discussions, as they provide clear evidence of your impact. Key performance indicators (KPIs) to highlight include revenue generation, cost savings, productivity improvements, customer satisfaction, and security or risk mitigation.Demonstrating how your contributions align with these metrics makes a compelling case for your value to the organization.Scott Wheeler, cloud practice lead at Asperitas, says its important to start raise negotiation preparations by understanding the organizations strategic and tactical goals.Taking on projects that are both impactful and achievable shows alignment with the companys priorities. Identify work that aligns with those goals and has reasonable delivery timelines, preferably under a year, Wheeler says.He adds that building a productive rapport with managers is another cornerstone of effective salary negotiations. Understand what your manager values and what they will be evaluated on, Wheeler says. Align your work with their goals and share progress on your projects regularly.Related:He says establishing a personal connection with higher-ups can also help. Knowing what your manager values, both in and outside of work, creates a better partnership and makes communication easier, Wheeler explains.Megan Smith, head of HR at SAP North America, says she agrees the more an employee can master the art of communicating proactively with their manager, the greater the trust they can build.This includes things like sharing the right level of information at the right time, she explains via email.For example, providing a heads up around possible risks in a project, and sharing summary updates regularly of what is being accomplished, helps the manager trust they have the right degree of visibility necessary for the overall success of the team.Salary as Reflection of PerformanceSmith says having a conversation with your manager about your salary is really a conversation about how you are achieving your goals, because a salary increase reflects your performance.Discuss your performance with your manager early and often, so that when you want to connect it to salary, which can be done at any time but recommend at least a couple months prior to the salary review timeline of your company, this is a natural connection, she says.Related:She recommends approaching salary conversations with curiosity, for example by asking your manager how they perceive your salary aligning to your contributions and impact.Get educated on your own point of view, she adds. Do you have any data from internal salary ranges to suggest if you are positioned low?Smith says its important that you dont make it about asking for a raise but rather, make the conversation about an informed discussion about how your salary reflects your contributions, and if that presents opportunity for an increase in the next salary review cycle.IT as a Leadership ProfessionFrom the perspective of Mark Ralls, president at Auvik, the nature of IT work provides ample opportunities for IT pros to show leadership even if they are not in a formal managerial role.Cross-functional or team-based project work allows IT pros to demonstrate the ability to manage through influence, where they help coordinate the efforts of others through relationship building and persuasion rather than formal authority, he says.Wheeler also emphasizes the importance of teamwork and collaboration in achieving goals.Related:Form partnerships, either internally or externally, that can help you deliver results, Wheeler says. Most work requires a team effort, and sometimes moving to a different internal team may be necessary to produce the desired outcome.Documenting and showcasing these successes are critical to building a strong case during salary discussions.Success in salary negotiations also depends on effective communication and the ability to understand and address the motivations of various stakeholders to align everyone with a common objective.Gaining buy-in and achieving desired outcomes by establishing credibility and trust is a key indicator that someone is ready for that next step to management, earning a raise and potentially a promotion in the process, Ralls says.A recent engineering career mobility report by SignalFire indicates specialization is a key way to turbocharge upward mobility -- and with it, salary bumps.Jarod Reyes, head of developer community at SignalFire, says instead of focusing on a general KPI around developer productivity, he would focus on finding a project, or place in the engineering organization where one can become the specialist.We can see in the data that specialization is the key to rapid upward mobility for engineers happy in their current role, he says. We could see engineers who wanted to move into management roles would take paths that developed more broad skill sets, expanding their surface area and sphere of influence.This includes finding ways to lead a project and looking for opportunities to improve the business or reduce costs -- what Reyes calls sure fire bets.He notes that engineers who wanted to move up a non-management path (down a specialist path, like principal or staff engineer) focused on narrowing their skill sets, taking roles where they were expected to be the directly responsible individual like a site-reliability engineer or data architect.Reyes says from personal experience managing engineering teams and building engineering teams for the last 13 years he could say communicating often with the team about the values that are rewarded is very important.Having direct conversations not just annually, but monthly with your engineers is an important way of building trust and earning loyalty, he says. I think more important than upward mobility I have found that engineers really enjoy working on a team that is crucial, efficient and impact oriented.About the AuthorNathan EddyFreelance WriterNathan Eddy is a freelance writer for InformationWeek. He has written for Popular Mechanics, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine, FierceMarkets, and CRN, among others. In 2012 he made his first documentary film, The Absent Column. He currently lives in Berlin.See more from Nathan EddyNever Miss a Beat: Get a snapshot of the issues affecting the IT industry straight to your inbox.SIGN-UPYou May Also LikeWebinarsMore WebinarsReportsMore Reports