MONEY - that’s what I want. And more of it, please. But with credit crunching, corporate budgets tightening and natural British reticence showing no signs of disappearing, asking for a pay rise can be hard. Here’s how not to do it:

Lose control. “About a year ago [at another company] a person walked into my office for a review, closed the door and exploded,” says David Valentine, global sales director at the business psychologists SHL. “He demanded a minimum of 25 per cent because at a leaving party everyone got drunk and told him what they earned.” Valentine was able to calm him down - without granting the raise - but having a hissy fit will not endear you to your manager.

Demand equality. This is a tricky one. Sometimes people are discriminated against on the ground of, say, gender, but most people in professional jobs are rewarded according to their achievements. The angry salesman from the previous example demanded equality but was given short and somewhat humiliating shrift by Valentine: “I advised him that what other people earned was not necesarily a guide to what he should earn [and] that what he got was linked to the value he brought to the company.”

Expect to get something for nothing. “People say, ‘I’m good because I feel I’m good’,” says Torsten Muth, the UK managing director of Experteer, a recruitment company. “I say, ‘well, you’re not, because you can’t tell me what you have achieved’.” But don’t go too far the other way, says Julia Gosling, the business director at Mabox, a marketing agency. She prepared her case meticulously but spent so long presenting it that her boss switched off out of boredom. “I spent 20 minutes talking at her rather than having a conversation,” she says.

Think that being your own boss will help. “We had a business-angel forum once where a potential investor asked a start-up entrepreneur what she’d do with the £100,000 investment that she wanted. She answered, ‘I want to earn £50,000 a year for the first two years’. The moment she said it every investor there put their cheque-books away,” says Sally Goodsell, the chief executive of Finance South East, a funding organisation. It may be your business but if you want investment you need to be prepared for the pain of a tiny pay packet in the early stages.

Do it when drunk. “I was at a social function late in the evening when someone decided that the informality [and some dutch courage] would lead to a better result,” says Duncan Howorth, the managing director of JLT Benefit Solutions. “I said that it was not the appropriate moment and to speak later [but] he didn’t. He’d lost his chance.” Don’t risk putting your manager’s back up; it’s an office conversation only.

Threaten to quit. Unless you are genuinely irreplaceable - which is unlikely - this isn’t going to work. Every person interviewed for this article knew someone who’d been left in a pickle when their bluff was called. Even having another job lined up won’t necessarily help. One of Valentine’s staff resigned when his old company couldn’t match a competitor’s promise to double his salary. Shortly after checking the fine print - no pension or benefits meant the overall package contained no rise at all - he sheepishly asked for his resignation back.

Turn into a one-person trade union. “Employers often see a request for a pay rise as a personal attack,” says Ros Kindersley, the managing director of JFL Search and Selection, a recruitment firm. Telling your boss that he owes you a raise because you’re underpaid will put him on the defensive. “I know a woman who went to her boss and said ‘my friend at another PR agency has been given a raise. She’s doing the same job as me so I want the same money’.” She didn’t get the raise and then tried the “I’m going to quit” threat - it all ended in tears. Better, Kindersley says, to create a positive vibe than to suggest that your boss is exploiting you. “Say ‘I’m enjoying my job, I feel that I have achieved a lot . . . I’d like to talk about my prospects and see if there’s a chance of a pay rise’.” This way your boss can feel that he’s rewarding you for work well done.

Become a charity case. “Someone came in to me and said that she was struggling - her mortgage had gone up, her boyfriend had lost his job and she needed more money,” Kindersley says. “I was sympathetic, but her boyfriend is not my responsibility.” Rather than handing out alms, she asked the woman to step up a gear to earn the extra money - which she did.

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