A friend wants to re-negotiate his base salary to be within the range of peers in his field. We looked at a salary survey website and found that he is quite underpaid. Can a person re-negotiate their salary? Is it better to quit and then get re-hired?

Absolutely! You can definitely negotiate a pay raise in your career. I recommend people start considering a number of things in order to approach their bosses for a raise.

Its not a good idea to ask for a raise too soon after accepting a job or receiving a pay raise. It is important before these events that you know your value to the company and you negotiate based on your knowledge of the job market.

Not only is a salary an important factor of the compensation package, one can also look at factors like improved benefits, more time off, stock options or stock purchase plan. You may look to other creative compensation strategies to entice your employer to bolster your income.

Before going for a pay raise, one needs to do a number of things.

1) Know your market value - do not rely on just one salary survey source. Also, make sure you trust their data. Self-reported salary surveys are far less reliable than those that are reported by the human resource departments in the industry in your area.

2) Your value-add is a very powerful salary negotiation tool. You should be aware of all the ways you add value to the business and prepare to communicate it effectively to the boss.

3) Get yourself ready to discuss this with your employer. You may need to educate them that you are below the salary range. Either way, you will let them know that you know what the market is.

4) Each person ultimately falls within a certain percentage on the salary scale. Are you a peak performer with lots of years in the industry? You'll need to agree with your employer where you fit within the performance range. Can you command the top salary within your range?

There are so many facets to salary negotiation. You should be prepared to do your research and know your facts. I highly recommend learning more about the art of salary negotiating and turn your career into high gear.

My preference would be to negotiate salary in a job that I was happy with rather than go through the effort of finding a new job in hopes of a higher salary.

One tactic that can give you an upper hand is to first get yourself another job offer. With that as your back up measure, you will have more leverage in negotiating salary.