E-Mail This Article

Job search diary: manager declines
only offer in eight months

Joblessness takes toll; ex-manager won't take less than he's worth

By Kimberly Blanton, Globe Staff, 7/13/03

(Second in a series describing a laid-off manager's job search)

It is no small matter to turn down a job when one has been unemployed for eight months and is the sole breadwinner for newborn twins, a 14- month-old toddler, and stay-at-home wife.

In a horrendous job market that provides few opportunities, Brian McGrath recently declined the only job offer he has received. Salary was the issue: The company raised its offer but could not match the base salary - in the $70,000 range, before hefty bonuses - he had earned in his last job, as a real estate analyst. He felt his only choice was to decline.

"It was hard to do that because I have been out of a job for awhile," McGrath said. "At the same time, I can take a step back and say, 'Would I, on day one, go into this job not mad to be there but thinking I need to make more salary?' "

In the long, difficult journey toward reemployment, he took solace simply from getting an offer. As he put it, "Someone at least wants to under-pay me!"

Globe Staff Photo/Janet Knott As the sole breadwinner in his family, it was difficult for Brian McGrath to turn down an offer, even though the position paid too little. McGrath used the Burlington office of his coaching firm, Keystone Associates, to job hunt.

While still a candidate for the position, McGrath did everything he could to make it work for him. Taking advice from a career coach hired by his former employer, McGrath left himself open to a position that seemed, initially, below his qualifications. He prepared seriously for the interviews, played out the offer in hopes it would lead somewhere, and negotiated hard to see if the employer would raise the salary.

"People don't appreciate how hard it is to turn down an offer in this market," said Elaine Varelas, managing partner of McGrath's career-coaching firm, Keystone Associates.

But Varelas said her client did the right thing. You are, "looking for the right job," she counseled him during a recent meeting in the firm's Burlington office. "You can get an offer tomorrow, but is it the right job for your career, your future?"

McGrath, who is 31, became unemployed after five years with Meditrust Corp., analyzing the financial viability of properties and real estate transactions. In November, the company closed the operation where he worked. Since then, he has had interviews with five companies.

The stresses of being unemployed are constant, even though his wife, Meredyth, is hardly a high-pressure spouse. She discourages him from pouncing on the first offer that comes along.

The pressure is internal. In conversations with his wife, McGrath battles the mental distractions that come with joblessness. He earned his broker's license and occasionally works at a friend's realty office. That has taken some of the edge off; the job also brings in a little income and relieves the financial pressures.

"I would come home, and she'd be talking to me and I'd be thinking, 'Where am I going to get a job? How am I going to get a job? Am I not doing something right? Why isn't anyone interested? Do I need to change my resume?' There are a lot of things that run through my mind - hourly," he said. "My wife would say, 'Brian, you're going to be fine. You're going to find a job.' "

His first job offer came June 25, from a small, privately held company in the Boston area that invests in and manages affordable housing. He had never worked in that field, but the position looked challenging, and he liked the people who ran the company. He and the prospective employer agreed that his experience and the financial skills required to underwrite assisted-living and nursing-home facilities at Meditrust have much in common with those needed to underwrite multifamily, affordable-housing units. [McGrath declined to disclose the employer's name while it is still trying to hire someone to fill the job.]

The company's interest was apparent immediately. The advertisement was for a newly created position, at "entry-level." A week after he sent his resume, the personnel administrator called. A few days after an initial screening interview with her and two top executives, McGrath was asked to meet the president. They talked for two hours. During these initial interviews, there were no meaningful discussions about salary, but he had a nagging feeling that any offer might not meet his needs.

Two days later, they offered him the job and a $50,000 salary. McGrath declined to disclose the salary he is looking for, which would compromise him in negotiations for future job openings. But he will say he had become accustom at Meditrust to substantial annual bonuses that boosted his total compensation into six-figures. The bonus was an incentive for staying on while the company sold off its healthcare properties and also compensation for a three-year salary freeze.

"I'm realistic" about salary, McGrath said, "but it [the bonus] did set my sights much higher."

In his mind, the initial offer was clearly too low. He made clear to the personnel administrator that he liked the job and asked whether the salary could be moved higher. At that moment, the painful process began: salary negotiation. Until then, his most intense negotiating experiences had been a negotiations course he took while earning a master of science in finance at Bentley College. Keystone's Varelas said many clients do not know how to handle negotiations properly. "You're afraid a company will take advantage of you - and some will." However, she said, smart employers know that an appropriate salary is the best way to ensure that a valued employee is satisfied and remains with the company.

When McGrath pushed back on salary, the personnel manager pressed him for what would satisfy him. One thing he had learned from Keystone: Do not give up a number.

"I said, 'I don't have any fixed salary requirements, but I'd like to keep the dialogue open,' " he said. "You never want to say no. Your negotiating power is the highest once you receive the offer."

Despite the low starting point, McGrath held hopes things could still work out. Keystone's coaches encouraged him to keep asking for more and push the negotiation as far as it would go. In his mind, he knew the salary did not square with the skills necessary for the position. "My thinking was they would like me to the point they might say we should rewrite the position because they would see they're not going to get somebody with the experience they were looking for," he said.

The personnel administrator said she might increase the salary by a couple of thousand. McGrath said that didn't feel right, but he told her he would think about it over the weekend. He and his wife left their babies in the care of grandparents and drove to Newport, R.I., for the wedding of friends.

After the long weekend, the personnel administrator persisted on the salary issue, McGrath recalls, saying that she needed to go back to her superiors "with a number - what about $60,000?' " He responded diplomatically. "I said that that would make it harder to turn it down."

On Monday, he met with Varelas at Keystone, who encouraged him to turn down the job if the salary didn't match what he believes he is worth. The next day, the company's personnel administrator came back with a new offer, $60,000 and immediate vesting in the profit- sharing plan. He thought about it overnight and then turned it down.

"They're a small company, and they don't have the resources that a larger would have. It was harder for them make those salary concessions," he said.

Along the way McGrath learned something that will be valuable when the next offer comes through. Negotiating "is so hard to do but you have to in every aspect of your life," he says. "You're always thinking, 'Oh, they won't meet me. I was thinking they wouldn't even come up to $60,000, but I did it the way I was supposed to do it, and they just did."

And fresh prospects are coming along. He is fielding new job leads, has talked with a Fortune 500 company that may expand its affordable-housing operation, and is hopeful that the next offer will be the right offer.

Last Week: Brian McGrath, 31, discovered the painful realities of the current job market after he was laid off from his job at Meditrust Corp. Nov. 15. An experienced real estate analyst, he was used to finding employment without breaking a sweat. This time, it has not been so easy, but his search has been facilitated by the services of an outplacement firm, Keystone Associates. With their assistance, he has learned to network, to widen his job search, and to stress his achievements. Family responsibilities - a wife and three small children - have intensified his search.

Next: How McGrath learned to interview.

Kimberly Blanton can be reached at blanton@globe.com.

E-Mail This Article