Offers

2026 Update: Also check out our episode with Andy Harber on salary negotiation.

In this episode, Amy and Susan share tips on handling offers for internships and jobs in government, policy, advocacy, nonprofits, and international affairs. Some resources you might consider using:

Office of Personnel Management (OPM) General Schedule (GS 7 is the rate most undergraduates will enter at while graduate students will enter at GS 9 for MA/MS/Law and GS 11 for PhD).
National Association of Colleges and Employers Salary Data: Note that this is not specific to GPP fields.
Pew Research on Gender Pay Gaps
US Census QWI Explorer

Transcript

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[Auto-generated transcript. Edits may have been applied for clarity.]
Hello everyone. This is Amber Brown and Ahmar Ursani.

We are both GPSI career coaches, and we're here to provide a few updates and a refresh on our existing podcast series.

So some of our episodes use our old community name, but we want to clarify that our new community name is Government Policy and Social Impact.

Or you can just say GPSi, see for short.

We want to highlight our updated career engagement model as well in this episode because it helps us contextualize the work we do.

So I'm going to give you a brief overview of the stages, and you can see more in the show notes.

So it starts with understanding yourself, which is super important for reflection and visioning possibilities,

preparing to the actual search and apply process.

And then finally when you're actually engaging in your opportunity.

So you may also hear in some of our older podcast episodes, a reference to what's called a live chat.

And we wanted to make sure you noted that it's no longer in existence, but instead we have a different resource,

which we have various in-person drop in hours that we had that are GPS specific throughout the week.

And there was also a time that you can meet our career peers. Um, available Monday through Friday for on demand support.

Additionally, we no longer use canvas. All the resources have migrated to our GPS website.

A link again will be provided in the show notes. And our last technology update is we want to discuss Career link.

It's now handshake. So in handshake it's our one stop shop for career related events job and um, job and internship postings.

You can schedule your appointments there and more. And to close, we want to state that our annual Career expo now has a GPS specific focus day,

where employers from our industry come to you to discuss career options.

This, along with our annual Changemaker Summit, which brings local nonprofits to campus, helps you see how you can make an impact on our world.

So thank you so much for listening to this. If you have any additional questions, feel free to reach out to anyone on our team.

Hope you're having a good day. See you. Yeah. Thank you.

Welcome to the GPP podcast for budding politicos, policy wonks and advocates.

I'm Amy Heath Carpentier. And I'm Susan Craig.

As career counselors in Washington University's career center and co-directors of the Government and Policy Work Group,

we walk alongside burgeoning policy wonks, politicos and change agents as they chart their paths to change the world.

This podcast is for you if you're interested in hearing tips and techniques that will position you to find your place in the fast moving,

mission driven world of politics, policy and advocacy. Today we're going to talk all about offers getting them, negotiating them, comparing them,

declining them, and most importantly, how to hold out and accept the one that's right for you.

So it is that time of year and you've made it. You've networked, you've built a target list.

You've applied, you've interviewed, you've waited in an uncomfortably long period of time without hearing anything from your favorite employers.

But now you have an offer. And yet it's not as easy as you anticipated.

So let's talk about how we get through this next set of challenges. First off, let's just start by saying congratulations.

Yay! Happy dancing. So happy for you.

Getting an offer means your hard work is paying off, and you did a good job targeting the organizations and the jobs that were a fit for you.

What's challenging, though, about this time, and this is something we don't really anticipate or prepare for until it's upon us,

is that the organization's timeline is about them, not about you.

So you're likely to hear from one organization, and it's hardly ever your dream job.

So it's so true. And they may offer you an internship or a job, but it's not the right location or something like that.

All in all, it's not the ideal. It's not the bullseye in the target.

Rarely the dream job that comes first. Right.

They're also likely to say that you have a very short amount of time in which to accept or decline their offer.

And then you're stuck wondering whether to accept it. It is a job, which is what you've been stressing about for months.

Or should you hold out for something better which may or may not come along right?

So it is a job, but it may not be the job. Exactly.

So the first thing you need to know is that this is you're not the first person to chart this course.

This happens all the time. And it is not easy. It's really uncomfortable.

And there's no right answer to what you should do here.

I think for some, you know, if you're really cash strapped and eager to move to the location that it might be in,

you might just want to be done right. You've been holed up in your apartment for the last two years.

There's finally an opportunity to live a little bit and get out. I'm sure this, um, might sound relatable, right?

So it is okay to take that less than dream job because it just offers you a chance to be done,

and it is not going to close doors or or take opportunities off the table.

It might not be the best, but you can just move on, live a little and gain some experience that might,

you know, set you up for that dream job down the road.

I think the key here, if you do take this course, though, is to kind of own it and don't second guess it.

Yeah.

Because yeah, you know, if you if you start to ask, oh, what if you find some other application that you still keep applying, just one, you know,

in case something else were to come along, I think then you, um, you know,

that stress that you're looking to keep it, to stay away from it, it takes a toll.

And then you and then you haven't alleviated that stress. So if you do that, take the opportunity and don't look back.

Yeah. I remember someone telling me at this stage, you don't get to know what will happen on the other end of the decision.

Like, you don't get to know what happens if you did take it or don't take it. And if you kind of accept that at the outset, sometimes that can help.

Mhm. But again perhaps this isn't you. Maybe you feel like you're settling or you're not in such a rush.

If you laid the groundwork for what you think is a better fit elsewhere,

then you should feel comfortable saying no, thank you and holding out for other offers.

Yeah, now this is hard. You may get some pressure from parents, peers, professors, others with an emotional stake in your future.

You may be worried about how that connection that you made to get to that offer may be impacted, but this is a professional situation.

And if you've done all the things we talked about in previous podcasts, then you are likely to get another offer in this field.

They come late. It's a just in time sort of place. This is easy for us to say.

It is. And we know this because we've seen hundreds of highly qualified, well situated students sweat through it every year.

And you know what? They always land. Don't.

They always do. Always. Always land. We reassure them every time we see them.

But it's still you who has to sweat. And none of us, every one of you, is different.

Right. So how you approach that's going to be different. So brace yourself for it and be confident that things will pan out if you decide to say no.

It may feel like an eternity in real time,

but we promise you will look back on the weeks and months and wonder why you didn't enjoy the downtime a little more.

I know. Easy for us to say, isn't it? It is so easy for us to say.

But you know, we have that joy of seeing alum out there every year doing wonderful things.

So yeah. Yeah. Okay. So what does declining or accepting or negotiating an offer look like?

I think the most important piece of advice that we can offer is just to say that the,

the most important aspect of your, of how you handle it is just about being forthright.

This field is really about your reputation and trying to play employers off each other or accepting something, only to later decline.

It is really just not a good practice in this field.

And employers in this field know that they are not offering you a huge salary or lots of perks or time to decide.

So it's just be honest with them. If the salary or lack of it means it's not a viable, viable option for you, you just need to tell them.

And I think if you've interviewed with another organization that is really your number one, it's okay to tell someone that too.

They will likely understand. I know I had a student just last year who had a small political consulting firm that offered them a shot,

and then they were having a Hill internship or a Hill interview the next week, and she was really nervous.

And I'm like, they're going to understand the Hill. They want to be on the hill, too.

Um, so when you're trying to navigate whether to accept something or how to communicate,

just air, I think on the side of honesty, it really will be appreciated.

So true, so true. Okay.

So let's say you have that less than ideal offer in front of you, and you have an interview next week with a different organization.

You're supposed to give that first employer an answer before you interview with the second.

It's completely acceptable for you to say thank you so much for the offer.

I'm excited about the possibility,

but I have another interview at an organization that I'm even more excited about or that I am excited about next week.

Would you be willing to extend my deadline so I can explore that offer?

I understand if you have to rush to fill the position, I would just feel better accepting the position if I had done my due diligence,

or I had followed up on all of the possibilities, or all followed up on that possibility, right?

So that's an awkward situation. So you have to kind of you have to kind of walk through that carefully.

But one of the ways is, is again, just to say, I'm really interested.

I really appreciate the offer. I'd like to see this other thing to fruition or to its con, you know, conclusion.

Since I'm already in process, they may want to move on from you at that point, which tells you something about the organization, by the way.

But if they think you're the right candidate, they're likely to respond positively and give you a few extra days.

Yeah, and I guess you should be prepared for them to say no. Um, you know, they might have some constraints that you're not aware of,

or they may have a very long list of other equally qualified candidates that they can pick from.

Um, so there is some risk, I guess, in making that ask.

But again, I think if you are gracious and honest in that situation, um, it's likely to be well received.

Um, so let's I think we should just say this, Amy, explicitly. I know we've kind of implied it previously,

but we really do not recommend taking something with this prospect that you could just turn it down later if something better comes along.

Right, exactly. I think in some fields, maybe this is, you know, acceptable.

But in this mission driven work world, it is just not it is just not appropriate.

I mean, as we said, your reputation and your commitment to the cause,

whatever it might be, that's really what you're selling and walking away from an offer.

Um, except undercuts both of those things, both your reputation and your commitment.

So that's why we recommend. Not a good idea. Yeah.

And many of you are working in relatively small pools where you're going to end up knowing a lot of the same people moving forward,

and just that that kind of carries with you in some ways.

Now, having said that, if you have a Fulbright offer or you get something that's like really crazy or

you have a special extenuating circumstance like a sick family member you need,

maybe that can be you can talk about that separately. And again, that's a different comes in.

Right. That's where the that's where you just tell them the situation and you tell them, you know, how grateful you are for the opportunity.

And then again, they will be understanding exactly, exactly this job you're taking.

It is not a lifetime commitment. It's just for the next couple of years.

It's a step. You're going to get more data in. It's going to help you figure out what you want to do next.

And it's not defining, limiting or closing doors.

So dial down the pressure a bit. Whatever choice you make here is one decision among a lifetime of them to come.

Okay, so let's say you do have an offer you want to accept, but the salary is lower than you thought and you think you deserve more.

How do you negotiate this? First of all, you need to do some research.

It might be a fair offer, given the location or the nature of the work.

And you aren't drawn to this field for the money. Likely. Although you do need to be able to pay your bills, right?

And so we all we all want to be paid well, right? All of that being said, pay gaps based on race, gender, ethnicity are well documented.

We acknowledge that these pay gaps are systemic and they're going to require systemic level solutions.

But that being said, this isn't it. This podcast is about an individual situation, mainly yours.

So, um, it's important for you to do your due diligence again on an individual level.

Being underpaid in your first job can lead to a lifetime of lower wages.

So it's an uncomfortable conversation, but it's an important one.

We have some data on these inequalities, and those will be in the show notes and kind of how to look at that.

But there's also data from the National Association of Colleges and Employers on specific kinds of entry level salaries.

The Census Bureau and we as the career center collect starting salary data itself.

Plus, Susan and I have, you know,

several decades of experience in the field at this point and can give you some sense of what the going salary will be.

The other thing to keep in mind is that we always have the federal schedule of pay as something you can bounce off of as a possibility,

and so there's usually a way to get a sense of where you're going from for the pay negotiation.

So just to explain that a little bit. That's the federal pay schedule. It's you can find it on OPM website.

Just Google like federal pay schedule. And you'll find that and most entry level positions for a recent undergrad would be a GHS seven.

And then there's also a pay based on your locality that would add to that base level.

So that's a good marker to for like if you're working around or near the federal government.

That's kind of a standard that everybody understands.

I think the other thing to remember and and and you can remind organizations of this, if they don't, if they don't practice,

it is that there is an increased commitment in this field of policy and advocacy of of the importance of equity.

So, you know, make sure these organizations are not just talking the talk, but also walking the walk.

Exactly. And then I think there's room to think creatively. Um, this is, you know, something that you may not have encountered before,

but many of these organizations in the advocacy realm and nonprofits, they they just don't have a lot of money.

So paying you more is just it's not an option. But there are other ways that you can be compensated if you, you know, if you think creatively.

So for instance, um, flexible work hours and arrangements or um, even like having some compensation for commuting.

But if you're able to work at home, you know, you don't have to buy work attire as much or commute or buy your lunch out.

Those things can really help you save some money. And we're certainly more, um, open to those arrangements, I would say, post-Covid.

And then, you know, you can also think about time off as a way to, as a,

as an opportunity for compensation that might help you stay motivated and, um, in kind of a high stress job.

Another thing that I think is an interesting option is to ask for an early performance evaluation.

Most people are evaluated once a year,

but perhaps you can bump that time frame up a little bit and that would give you a chance to get a pay increase prior to the one year mark.

So, you know, just think about what it is that you really need and how you might get there.

And if you're going to argue up another thought just real quick is consider if there's

any areas where you could take additional work duties on because of your background,

like is there, you know, always be thinking about that.

Like, what is it that I'm bringing to the table and always talk about it in that setting or in that context.

So hopefully this podcast will help you navigate this challenging time.

Know that we're here to help you work through it all. And you've got this.

Remember, having good offers is a good problem to have. We want the offers.

It means that all the work you've done to network and apply and interview is paying off, and you're doing it right.

So stay positive. You're almost there. Yeah, you're on the right track. Thanks for listening.

And until next time, keep working to imprint your world.