“We go into negotiations thinking we are going to have to fight to the death and unsheathe our sword and battle it out, and it makes us very negotiation afraid, right? It makes us very fearful of that,” Dunlap says. “At the end of the day, you are just having a conversation. You and this other person are on the same team trying to solve the problem of you not being compensated fairly…And so, all you’re doing is working with your boss or your potential boss to find a solution to the problem of you not being compensated well.” She adds that you are on the same team, you’re not trying to fight. “It’s a collaboration, it’s a back and forth. It is not a conflict,” she says.
Talking about money, in any sense, can feel scary at first, especially so for those in marginalized groups when negotiating compensation. Patriarchal narratives like “investing is just for men” and “you will be rich if you work hard” are oppressive and silencing, and that system profits off of us being silent, Dunlap says. “In a society or a system that oppresses you and does not want you to have money and does not want you to have choice and wants to actively control you, the easiest way to do that is to tell you that talking about money is taboo.” All the more reason to shed light on the issue by talking about money more openly.
