Your chances of getting a pay rise are often not down to how hard you’ve worked or what project you’ve completed brilliantly, but whether you’ve absolutely nailed your pitch. It’s about selling yourself. You need to be confident, strategic and know exactly how to convince your manager that a bump to your salary really is a good use of money.

So really, to get a pay rise you’ll need to know the art of negotiation. “Understanding how to negotiate is a critical skill to ensuring you are properly rewarded for your efforts and time in the workplace,” Rob King, a sales expert, founder of The Client Key and author of Selling Creativity, tells Stylist.

Many of us hear the word ‘negotiation’ and think of hardball tactics utilised by shouty men in suits. The truth is that this is only one (bad) take on negotiating. You don’t have to be bullish or aggressive to negotiate, and there are ways to use negotiation in many different settings.

When it comes to negotiating a pay rise, “You must know whereabouts on a sliding scale you are negotiating,” King says. “At one end you have cold, hard negotiations. These are purely price-led and it’s all about bartering or haggling for the best possible prices, ie wages. At the other end of the scale, you have the warmer side of negotiations, which involve more trust and have more elements than just purely price, although it’s still a factor.”

So, negotiation, yes, but perhaps not as you know it. How do we do that? And how do we get a pay rise as a result? King shares four top tips ahead.

4 expert tips for negotiating a pay rise