Community Discussion: Did you negotiate salary upon receiving your initial offer to go in-house?

In-house counsel weigh on the negotiation process and how they handle total compensation offers.

(Author) Associate:

Did you negotiate salary upon receiving your initial offer to go in-house? I imagine answers vary widely, but how much more did you ask for and how much did you ultimately receive (percentage wise)?

Edit: Thanks all. Is it typical for the employer to counter in these situations? Or is it more often a simple yes/no response? For context, I was offered $170,000 base, but want $200,000. Should I be straight up and ask for $200,000? Or overshoot a bit (like $210,000-215,000), so that if they counter it would hopefully come in at no less than $200,000? - Also, do my numbers seem reasonable/unreasonable?

In-House Counsel Responses:

My first job I did negotiate and got equity added to my offer. It was still a 40% pay cut from what I was making as a 4th year in BigLaw, though. Next in-house gig, I didn’t negotiate cause the recruiter told me they are offering the max in their range and it was a big pay bump from the first in-house gig.
First in-house job I tried, they said no. Total compensation was already good. The second one doubled my yearly equity compensation.
I didn’t negotiate as what I was offered was above what I had asked for.
- Same.
While I was happy with my total compensation, I negotiated for a $10,000 increase (~25% increase) in signing bonus and a $35,000 increase (~9% increase) in equity (RSUs). It was a quick negotiation as I had a new written offer the following business day. I felt like they were eager to bring me on and I leaned into that impression with my negotiation.
Yes, you negotiate. Should you negotiate? Yes, you should negotiate. And by negotiate I mean ask for something you want and see what they say back.
20% more.
I believe that conventional wisdom is to counter with a number that is 10-15% above the offer that you receive and then accept whatever counter they come back with (i.e. don’t expect multiple rounds of negotiations). For what it's worth, I did not counter because I did not have experience in many of the areas that I now handle, and both the company and I knew it. I was lucky to get the offer.
I negotiated and was able to get 20% more equity, but they couldn’t move on the salary. The GC said “can’t” and alluded to specific titles having salary bands that they can’t deviate beyond.
- That is true, but once you join, you’ll learn that the salary that you were hired at is not the top of the band - they want some wiggle room that will enable them to give you raises while holding your same title without them having to promote you to a higher title/salary band.
I tried and was shot down. Was hoping for another $10,000 but was told no for pay equity purposes
I was able to negotiate an extra $5,000 from the max salary band (and I was at the bottom of years of experience at 2. They asked for 3-5 years), but my advantage was that it’s a small market without many experienced contract lawyers and they didn’t want to pay for someone to relocate. It was also low-ish with no equity.
Yes, about 5% but I wasn’t negotiating too hard because I was taking the job regardless.