LinkedIn Salary Negotiation - How to Maximize your LinkedIn Offer

LinkedIn is known to be one of the best companies to work for if you value work-life balance. For years they have held the dominant position in career-focused social media, and this has allowed them to take a slower approach to product development. Their bar for talent is still quite high though, and clients we've supported report solid learning opportunities and career growth.

With that in mind, the big question is how competitively can LinkedIn pay compared to other tech companies. The goal of this guide is to equip you with the information you need for your upcoming LinkedIn negotiation. If your situation is unique or you want 1:1 support to ensure you maximize your compensation, please sign up for a free consultation with our negotiation team.

Table of Contents

LinkedIn Offer Compensation Components

When approaching an upcoming negotiation, step 1 is to fully understand the compensation components that will be offered by the company in question. At LinkedIn, a typical Software Engineering offer will be structured like this:

Below is an example from a recent Senior Software Engineer offer at LinkedIn:

LinkedIn Salary

Base salaries at LinkedIn have a set band for each level, and usually it is the portion of compensation that changes the least during a negotiation. The band for each level is about $30k - $40k. For example, the band for Software Engineers in the Bay Area for base salary is from $130k - $170k, and for Senior Software Engineers in the same location, it ranges from $170k - $205k. This is a larger band than we see at most companies. As a point of comparison, Facebook's entry level position (equivalent to LinkedIn Software Engineer) has a range of $120k - $140k.

LinkedIn pay base salary based on the cost of living and market value of engineers in the city they're working out of. For example, if you have an opportunity with LinkedIn in Seattle, and are comparing the base salary with what you've been offered by Robinhood in the Bay Area, your LinkedIn recruiter will likely push back and say "We'll unfortunately not be able to match this because it's based out of the Bay Area, and Seattle comp isn't as competitive".

To learn how to avoid this sort of pushback, and how to successfully leverage competing opportunities in differing locations, setup a consultation with our negotiation team.

LinkedIn Equity - Restricted Stock Units (RSUs)

At LinkedIn, you receive shares of Microsoft stock with your offer. The equity you are granted (i.e. RSUs) is subject to a 4-year vesting schedule: 25% vests at the end of the 1st year (otherwise known as a cliff), then 25% in each of the 2nd, 3rd and 4th years, at a rate of 6.25% every 3 months.

For example, if given a stock grant of $500k over 4 years, the equity would vest as follows:

• Year 1 - $125,000 (25%)
• Year 2 - $125,000 (25%)
• Year 3 - $125,000 (25%)
• Year 4 - $125,000 (25%)

The actual number of Microsoft shares you receive will be calculated by dividing the $ value of your grant by the 30-day trailing average share price the month you join. To get a rough approximation, you can look at the average stock price over the past month.

The band for equity is very large compared to the band for other compensation components. For each level, the band is wider than $150k+. Looking at the range for equity for Software Engineers in the Bay Area, we see it fluctuate between a grant of $176k over 4 years, all the way up to $332k over 4 years.

LinkedIn Signing Bonus

Signing bonuses at LinkedIn are frequently left off the first offer extended by the recruiter. This is a common tactic across many major tech companies for recruiters to assess how much a candidate will be negotiating. That said, simply asking for a signing bonus isn't enough. The comp team will refuse to add a signing bonus onto the offer unless sufficient leverage is provided (e.g. competing offer, retention bonus at your current workplace, etc.). If you don't have strong leverage, don't give up hope. We've helped many clients who didn't think they had leverage negotiate big signing bonuses - you just need to get creative and know the LinkedIn policies.

Compared to other companies like Robinhood and Facebook, LinkedIn's signing bonuses tend to be slightly lower, with Staff Software Engineers signing bonuses maxing out at around $75k, while Robinhood L3 (equivalent to LinkedIn Staff level) can go as high as $100k or even $110k.

LinkedIn Performance Bonus

LinkedIn offers annual performance bonuses. While these numbers are not broadly publicized by the company (and many threads on Blind are outdated), this is the annual bonus information we've seen from LinkedIn offers.

• Software Engineer is 10%
• Senior Software Engineer is 10%
• Staff Software Engineer is 15%
• Senior Staff Software Engineer is 20%

50% of this bonus is based on your performance and 50% is based on company performance. If you score highly on your performance evaluation, or the company does exceptionally well, or both, you could see your bonus increase significantly. LinkedIn performance bonuses are roughly inline with what Google offers.

When negotiating a LinkedIn offer, consider how the annual bonus of your competing opportunity matches up. If it's higher, you could always present your base salary plus annual bonus as a "yearly cash amount". Be mindful of how you phrase this with your recruiter. Performance bonuses are non-negotiable, so your goal should be to increase other components of compensation based on this.

LinkedIn Stock Refreshers

While refreshers are technically offered at LinkedIn, they have historically been very small. Recent internal posts claim that this year refreshers will be increased, but it's too early to tell for sure. Performance evaluations are done on a yearly basis, but even if you get a meets expectations score or above, refreshers aren't guaranteed to be offered. Instead refreshers were more heavily based on how close you are to the total compensation target for your level (basically the opposite of a performance culture like Facebook).

Larger refreshers can be offered, but LinkedIn tends to only give them to folks who are at their 4 year equity cliff, as well as people who are receiving promotions.

Unfortunately, since refreshers are so sparingly given, it's tough to give an accurate target on these numbers. They are also not specified in the offer letter you will receive. One thing to note is that these refreshers vest evenly over 4 years and do not have a 1-year cliff.

Industry Compensation Data

We've helped negotiate a wide range of offers at LinkedIn. Candidates of course need to know the latest role-specific salary information like the LinkedIn data scientist salary ranges or the LinkedIn product designer salary band. However, it can also be useful to understand these salary trends at the industry level. Hence, we have compiled our data for different roles setting the senior (L5) level as the benchmark.

Remember, the data points above are industry wide, not specific to LinkedIn. There are many company specifics at play here. For example, a LinkedIn product manager salary is often above industry average.

LinkedIn Negotiation Process

An upcoming negotiation can be overwhelming when looking at it from the outside, so we will walk you through what to expect throughout the process.

Before diving into that, it's important to understand how LinkedIn's levels differ from other the industry standard (i.e. Google):

LinkedIn Level Structure

• Software Engineer = Google L3, entry level
• Senior Software Engineer = Google L4
• Staff Software Engineer = Google L5 (this is what Google calls Senior Engineer)
• Senior Staff Software Engineer = Google L6
• Principal Staff Software Engineer = Google L7/L8
• Distinguished Engineer = Google L8/L9

If you have not yet received an offer from LinkedIn, there are a few critical mistakes to avoid:

1. Do not share your current compensation. In many states (e.g. California) it is illegal for companies to ask this, so you are certainly within your rights to say "I do not feel comfortable sharing that information"
2. Do not share your compensation expectations. This is a common request now that recruiters are not able to ask about your current compensation. It is certainly harmful to share a low number but sharing a very high number can also be a bad start to the negotiation, as this will increase the likelihood that you are asked for proof of a competing offer. Instead, reply with something along the lines of "Right now I'm focused on the interview process and don't have a number in mind, but I'm confident we will be able to get to a number that works for both of us"

With that out of the way, let's discuss the negotiation process at LinkedIn:

1. After finishing up your onsite, you will hear back from a recruiter within ~1 week. LinkedIn is typically a bit slower than companies like Amazon & Facebook, but it does depend on your recruiter
2. Your recruiter will then reach out to setup a call, often saying something along the lines of "I have some exciting news to share". This is the offer call. Your recruiter may setup this offer call prior to team matching being finalized
3. On the offer call, the recruiter may push you for compensation expectations. However, if properly deflected, they are usually willing to extend an initial offer, which will have been put together by the compensation committee
4. We recommend you take time to digest the initial offer and consider the best point of leverage for your counter offer discussion
5. You will then setup your second call with the recruiter to discuss the offer. On that call you will disclose your counter offer. The recruiter will likely push back and at Rora we build a tree diagram unique to your situation with the most likely objections and the optimal responses to those objections. The goal is to get the recruiter to take your counter-offer number back to the compensation committee as needed
6. LinkedIn may try to give you a deadline on your offer. You can push back on this with your recruiter or Hiring Manager, but always evaluate if the additional time is actually needed to secure an optimal negotiation outcome (in many cases it's not)
7. Once you get an update offer, it is possible to push back again. But your recruiter will likely be reticent to take your request back to the team unless you have new information to bring to the table

There are two primary differences between junior and senior negotiations at LinkedIn:

1. Senior employees are likely to see fewer pressure tactics compared to junior employees. For example, requests for competing offers in writing can be more easily deflected. Generally speaking, recruiters working with these candidates provide more of a white glove service
2. Recruiters will push you more to give them an initial number if you are more senior, rather than providing an offer. Given the importance of senior leaders and the wide range of the salary bands, they are typically hesitant to risk losing a candidate. This means the first number you provide is very important for anchoring the negotiation

Can I Lose my LinkedIn Offer by Negotiating?

This is by far the number 1 question Rora’s career partners are asked. It is a very common and valid fear, especially considering today’s volatile market conditions. But based on our data, what’s the actual probability that LinkedIn would decide to pull the offer?

First, let’s discuss what benefits LinkedIn would get from rescinding your offer. The primary reason a hiring manager would elect to rescind an offer would be a fear of liability with their intended hire - i.e., this hire may cause a scandal, this hire will in no way be able to perform their duties, this hire will be detrimental to LinkedIn, etc. Aside from that, when an offer has been extended, LinkedIn has already invested a substantial amount of time and money into the candidate they’re giving an offer to, and should have a solid understanding of how this candidate will perform in the role. It would be a net loss for the company to go through all those interviews, conversations, and putting together the offer to then decide that they want to cut ties with the candidate – this is a risk they try to mitigate before giving an offer. 

Even in this economy, we have seen clients get increases in their offers from companies of all sizes by making respectful and well-reasoned requests. A company is very unlikely to pull the offer based on negotiation - in our experience across thousands of negotiations, we’ve seen this happen less than 0.5% of the time. And that includes companies that are on hiring slowdown/freezes right now.

Now, there is a fundamental difference between getting an offer rescinded and losing the offer due to headcount. A headcount loss is solely based on the state of LinkedIn and the necessity of the role within the team. This isn’t common but can occasionally happen if needs at the company shift – and is more common with earlier-stage startups. It does not reflect your interview performance or skill level, and oftentimes companies will try to keep in touch with you and share other opportunities once headcount opens up. If your offer was rescinded, the company would not have any interest in keeping you warm. 

Regardless of the low likelihood of getting an offer rescinded, we know that this is a very common fear – and one that often holds candidates back from negotiating! To help mitigate the risk (and increase your confidence while negotiating) - follow these dos and don’ts to lower the probability of your offer getting rescinded:

1. Do keep it professional - avoid getting into politics or making jokes that may be poorly received and make your hiring manager think you might be a liability to the company
2. Do give justification and reasoning behind your ask for increased compensation – this could be based on your market value, another opportunity you have, specific expertise you bring to the table, or the strong relationship you’ve built with your hiring manager
3. Do your first compensation ask over a phone call - in most cases we see a higher rate of success and understanding when the first ask is done over a call versus an email
4. Do demonstrate to your hiring manager that you’re a solid candidate who would be a strong hire by creating and collaborating on an impact roadmap (outlining your 30 day, 60 day, and 90 day goals for getting started in your new role and your understanding of the priorities for this position)
5. Do your best to understand the necessity of the role on this team - How critical is it? How long has the role been open for? This can help you determine the likelihood of the headcount being lost – and also the leverage you may have in negotiating

LinkedIn-Specific Negotiation Advice

Hiring Manager Influence‍

Having a strong relationship with your hiring manager can have a big impact on your negotiation with LinkedIn. While LinkedIn does have a compensation committee that determines what offer is extended, hiring managers are the primary decision maker when it comes to leveling and timelines. We've also found that hiring managers are able to directly influence compensation more at LinkedIn vs Google or Facebook. However, it does depend on the hiring manager, and you will need to find the right balance between calls with the recruiter and with the HM.

Slow Recruiter Responses‍

Even though LinkedIn will frequently give candidates deadlines to respond to offers, that doesn't always mean your recruiter will be prompt in their responses to you. In situations where you're struggling to get a hold of your recruiter, reaching out to the HM can be a great way of checking in and ensuring all is going well. Of course, be mindful of how frequently to reach out to the HM, as this can weaken your negotiation leverage.

High Quality Benefits‍

While LinkedIn's compensation may not be industry leading, their benefits are top tier. These include, but are not limited to, a relocation bonus of $10k+, 401k matching, and a mega backdoor Roth IRA. One thing to consider when negotiating is the monetary value of the benefits that are being offered, and compare those to your other opportunities. However, you should not try to negotiate for different / more benefits - it won't work at large companies.

Not Always Able to Match‍

We've been able to get LinkedIn to negotiate offers for all of our clients by using the right strategies and tactics. The tricky part is that LinkedIn compensation bands max out at lower levels than most FAANG companies. The key to the negotiation is figuring out how to get LinkedIn to beat a competing offer when it's above their band. It's not easy, but we've done it a number of times. This requires different approaches based on each clients' situation.