Welcome back to the Employee Survival Guide. Today we are discussing the conversation that nobody wants to have, but everybody needs to be ready for. The severance negotiation. If you've just been let go, take a breath. It feels personal, but to HR, it's just a transaction. And like any transaction, the terms are up for debate. HR will hand you a folder and a pen. Put the pen down. Here are the five secrets HR won't tell you about the severance agreement. Number one, the first offer is just an offer. It's a state of policies, just a myth. HR loves to say, we can't change this. It's the standard company formula. That is our negotiation tactic, not a law. Exceptions are always made every single day for people who ask, and we do them all the time. They expect you to be too shocked or scared to push back. If you have been a high performer or if the layoff was messy, you have leverage to ask for more weeks of pay than the policy dictates. Number two, this the signature is the product. You are selling your silence. Why are they paying you a severance? If you ever asked yourself that question, it's not out of a kindness of their hearts, of course. They are paying you to sign a general release of claims. This document prevents you from subsuing them for wrongful termination, discrimination, and unpaid wages. This that signature you provide is very valuable and it's valuable to the company. If you suspect you have any legal ground to stand on, like age discrimination or retaliation, your signature just got a lot more expensive. Remind them of the value. You know I talk about this all the time about creating that narrative to discuss your leverage against the company in the form of claims you have. Three, it's not just about salary. Secret number three is don't get tunnel vision on the paycheck, the amount of severance they're going to pay you. HR hopes you only look at the lump sum and forget the rest. Negotiate the entire package. Ask them for to pay your COBA premiums or health insurance for six months. We do this quite often. Ask for accelerated investing in your stock options. Ask for to keep your company laptop or phone. Sometimes HR has a strict budget for salary, but a flexible budget for benefits. Use that to your advantage. Number four, you can't control the narrative. Negotiate your exit story. A standard severance agreement might say you were, quote, terminated. This can hurt you in the future or in future interviews. You can negotiate a clause that dictates exactly what HR will say to future employers. Ask for a quote, neutral reference policy where the only where they, the employer, only confirms dates of employment or a mutually agreed upon letter of recommendation attached to the deal, which normally doesn't happen, by the way, folks. Usually they give a 1-800 work number to call. Control your reputation. It's worth more than cash. Number five, the attorney review bluff. I love this one. The attorney review card is something you should play every single time. HR wants this thing signed fast. You usually will hear you must sign within three days, two days, five days, whatever. When you receive the agreement, it always says, I need this, I need you to take this home and review it within. I'm sorry, you need to take it home and review with your attorney. That's what you need to tell them. Even if you don't have an attorney saying this signals you are serious. You know your rights and you know you and you aren't going to be bullied. Often it makes them sweat just enough to approve the that extra month of pay you asked for. No joke, I make people do this all the time. Uh I have a kind of a pet project of mine is I try to convince people who are former clients and friends of mine to create their own narratives. I'm doing this with a friend of mine right now. He knows the drill. Create that narrative, bluff it like you're playing poker, and you know, tell them you you got an attorney reviewing it and you're getting feedback. You know, just make it, you know, write it out in advance before you say it. And you know, take the script to your employer and saying, My attorney's having this problem with this, and we're is raising claims here, and I got this narrative affidavit I'm I'm going to provide you in a second. You provide the affidavit, it's notarized, and it says you're discriminated against for age, etc. It often does raise the stakes for the employer, so much so that I had a friend of mine, another friend, who uh made several thousands of dollars more than he thought when he used the affidavit format to do that. So remember, you you don't get what you deserve, you get what you negotiate. Stay strong and don't sign until you're ready. Thanks for listening to the employee survival guide. Have a great day.