I’ve been doing compensation work for more than 30 years. And in that time, I have noticed that some compensation professionals make the shift to business partner/consultant, and some don’t.
What do I mean?
When you start doing compensation work, you typically learn how to do the technical stuff.
You learn to develop pay grade structures, geographic differentials, and the various job evaluation methods like market pricing, point factor, and job ranking.
You also learn how to design short-term incentives like bonuses and commissions, and you develop the long-term incentives and strategies that support your employer’s strategic goals.
And some comp people gain expertise in the niches of global remuneration, sales compensation, or executive compensation while others stay in the broad-based compensation realm.
But at some point, if you stay in compensation long enough, you shift from creating rules (aka guidelines, processes, policies, and procedures) and you use your knowledge of the business and partner with the business leaders and others in HR like the HRBPs.
You realize that the standards and consistency that the rules provide are important. AND that sometimes there are reasons to make exceptions because the exception to the rule is going to help the business achieve its goals.
As HR and compensation professionals, we get to help our employers reach their goals by enabling the full potential in others.
We communicate through rewards like cash and equity what is important and the behavior that will positively impact the business goals.
If we are saying “no” without concern for the impact on the leader, the employees, and their ability to achieve the business goals AND meet their individual needs as people, then we need to make the shift.
· Listen with empathy and act with compassion.
· Find win-win solutions to problems but first make sure you are truly solving the problem and not the symptoms.
· And shift your definition of success to include flexibility and adaptability.
People and money are what successful businesses need as their foundation. It is how you utilize those two things and partner with others that makes the difference.
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