Your Best Year Ever continues! All throughout November, Esquire senior editor and the author of 'Works Well With Others,' Ross McCammon, applies his hard-earned experience to getting ahead, making allies, and being less awkward at your place of work.

According to a survey conducted in early 2015 by the salary database company Payscale, only 41 percent of satisfied employees asked for a raise—of those bold souls, 44 percent got what they asked for and 75 percent got some kind of raise. So the first rule of asking for a raise is, simply: ask for a raise. Nerves can sometimes make us dance around the point of the conversation. But in case you weren't sure, the point of this conversation is: "I would like more money." And you can say how much. An employer wants something specific to react to at a time when it seems clear you are unhappy—especially if the employer wants to keep you happy—not a vague sense of your needs.

(Tip: Maybe don't say, "I would like more money." "I'm hoping there's room in the budget to raise my salary" or "Could you increase my salary?" are better.)

Early on, I made the mistake of telling one of my bosses what I did every day as a prelude to asking for a raise. He looked at me and said, "I know what you do." The point he was making with both his words and his facial expression was: "You're better than this." And I was. We all are. 

The question you need to answer immediately after you ask for more money is: what for? The answer is: the future. It's important to ask for a raise not as a reward for past work. Your reward for past work is your salary. You should focus on the things you will be doing, how you will build upon your successes and have even greater successes. For your employer, a raise is an investment not a reward.

And keep in mind that the answer just might be "No," even if you're a valuable employee. The best response to a "no" is to thank your employer for the consideration, state your desire to revisit the request in six months or so, and to express that you will begin working on fulfilling the promises you made when you asked for the raise. Then fulfill them. In six months, when you meet again, give your boss new goals to look forward to.

Understand that when you ask for a raise you're asking your employer to allocate money for something they were not planning to allocate money toward. Though you may not get your raise now, you have put in a request. And, as a result, you're in a much, much better position to get a raise next go round than the person who never asked.  

Headshot of Ross McCammon
Ross McCammon
Writer

Ross McCammon is former special projects editor at Men’s Health and author of Works Well With Others.