Which Strategy to Implement? Expanding the Knowledge on the Specific Strategies that Women Do (Not) Use in Salary Negotiations

Research observed an implementation gap: Although specific strategies to support women’s negotiation performance suggested in past research could be very useful, women expect many of them to be ineffective, thereby decreasing their intentions to use them. In a recent interview study, however, women with negotiation experience reported to already implement other specific strategies that, to our knowledge, are unheard of in research. These include (a) inducing the counterpart to give a performance appraisal that later provides a bargaining advantage to women, termed “Asking Tactically for an ‘Other-Promotion’” (ATOP); and (b) thoroughly delineating one’s future engagement at work to legitimize requests, termed “Delineating Engagement and Advancing Legitimacy” (DEAL). Yet, it remained unclear if only a selective group of women (i.e., the experienced interviewees) would use these strategies. Hence, we examined whether the new specific strategies of ATOP and DEAL are more broadly implemented, based on real, observed behavior. Our study (N ≥ 105 negotiation dyads in key analyses) revealed that ATOP and DEAL, unlike past specific strategies, were not characterized by an implementation gap. Moreover, our video coding revealed that ATOP was clearly the most often implemented strategy. As such, especially ATOP is a noteworthy novel specific strategy for women in salary negotiations.