Negotiate your salary

"What are your salary expectations?" is asked early on purpose — to anchor you low before you have leverage. You don't have to answer it directly. Deflect politely: say you're focused on fit first and you're confident you'll land on a fair number, or ask what range is budgeted for the role.

If pushed, give a researched range, not a point, and put your real target near the bottom of it so there's room to move up. The rule: the person with the most information should speak last, and after an offer you have far more information than before it.

Confidence in a negotiation comes from data. Before any offer conversation, build a range for your role, level, and location using multiple sources — public salary sites, levels databases, community surveys, and people in your network doing the same work. Adjust for company stage (a funded scale-up pays differently than a bootstrapped shop) and for remote-vs-local pay policies.

Hold three numbers in your head: your walk-away (the minimum you'd accept), your target (a fair, well-supported ask), and your reach (the top of the realistic band). Anchor conversations around the target-to-reach part of the range.

When base is capped, the total package often isn't. Equity, a signing bonus, a guaranteed early review, extra PTO, remote/flexibility, a learning budget, or a better title can all move — and some cost the company less than base, so they're easier yeses.

Decide what you actually value before the call, and negotiate the whole offer as a package. "I'm excited to join. To get there, I'd need base at X; if that's tight, a signing bonus or a six-month review to revisit would close the gap." You give them options to say yes, instead of one number to say no to.