I’ve watched company after company announce layoffs. I have read the posts from the employees impacted.

It can be devastating news if you liked your job, manager, coworkers, or employer. It can be happy news if you were ready to leave anyway.

And to those who don’t get laid off, it can be terrible news because you now must do the work of those who are leaving. Unless, of course, you have a manager and company leaders who understand you can’t do the same amount of work with less people.

In today's competitive job market, attracting and retaining top talent has become a key challenge for every organization.

Step 1: Offer competitive salaries and incentives. Offer benefits that meet or exceed the standard provided by other firms.

Step 2: Focus on relationships. Foster a culture of appreciation. Do your employees feel seen and heard? Are they valued and appreciated?

·       Listen in one on one and group settings. 
·       Don’t make assumptions or judge harshly. Ask questions.
·       Demonstrate empathy (it is a skill) and compassion.

Data is the backbone that keeps pay decisions competitive, equitable, and fair.

By data I mean:

1)        The employee, pay, and job data in your HR system is up to date and accurate. I shouldn’t have to say this, but you would be surprised how many employers do not have data they can trust.

2)        The compensation data (think salary surveys) you use to benchmark your jobs is statistically reliable and valid.

Have you ever been asked to do higher-level work to “prove you can do it” before you get the promotion?

Often employers will ask employees to perform a higher-level job as an “acting manager” or as an “interim executive” before they get the official promotion.

It feels like they are just getting more work out of you without paying for it. Yes, that is what they are doing. Of course, you are doing your regular job in addition to this acting role.

So, ask for an acting allowance. That is a reasonable request.

A manager told her team of HR data analysts to stop sending out the weekly and month reports they created.
 
The analysts were worried that their internal customers would be upset because the reports were needed. The manager reassured them that the reports that were critical to decision making would be requested. Someone would say, "Hey, I didn't receive ABC report. What's up?" Then the analyst could send the report.
 
Less than 10% of the reports the analysts created regularly were missed and requested. This freed up the team to refocus their energy and time on making those essential reports better.

Here is what I am seeing in recently published compensation planning (salary budget) surveys.

·        WorldatWork – U.S. Total Salary Budget Increases, Projected 2025: Average = 3.8%; Median = 4.0% 

·        Payscale – U.S. Total Increase Planned for 2025: Average = 3.5%

·        Culpepper – U.S. Projected Base Salary Increases in 2025: Median = 3.5%; Average = 3.65%; Mode = 4.0%

Yes, these reports have data for other countries in addition to the U.S. They also have data by industry, employee category, and other factors.

Nearly 50% of employees in the U.S. will be covered under pay transparency laws by 2026. Where do pay transparency laws exist today in the U.S?

1.        California

2.        Colorado

3.        Connecticut

4.        Hawaii

5.        Illinois

Success means different things to different people.

·        Success should be related to a person's own personal belief system and values.

·        Success can be measured in specific outcomes, as a process, or as a state of mind.

·        Standards for success can be related to personal, social, spiritual, academic, or employment goals.

And when I work with employer clients, I ask them how they will know if the compensation project that we help them with is successful.

Often, they haven’t yet thought about their success metrics or outcomes.  Sometimes that becomes part of the deliverables we help them define upfront as we also develop the project plan together.

Employers: Do you have training materials for your managers, so they know how to talk about pay with their employees?

• 57.8% of organizations do not train managers on pay communications.

• Manager training becomes more likely the larger the organization grows.

• Just over 50% of large organizations (5,000+ employees) train their managers.

• Only 25% of small organizations (< 100 employees) train their managers.

Have you seen an increase in questions from employees about their pay?

Have they shared job posting pay ranges with you for jobs they view as comparable to their own?

Sometimes forget that we need to maintain our people. That means checking in consistently and asking questions.

Ask Jerry what is keeping him up at night? Why? Because he yawned a lot during the staff meeting today and hasn’t interacted like he normally does. He isn’t as energetic or alert. And you know that he is leading a project team that has some major deliverables and deadlines in the next month.

Ask Mia how her baby is doing and how she is doing? Why? Because she came back to work from parental leave last week, and you know that the transition after a leave can be a challenge.

1.      Pay transparency happens when employers post the wage range that they reasonably expect to pay for a position.

2.      Pay transparency happens when employers make reasonable efforts to announce, post or otherwise make known all opportunities for promotion to all current employees on the same calendar day and prior to making a promotion decision.

3.      Pay transparency happens when one employee shares with another employee what they are earning in base pay, bonus, sales commission, and/or equity.

Employees have strong feelings about their pay.

Each of us wants to feel valued and appreciated. We want to be compensated fairly for our time, effort, skills, and results.

We compare ourselves to our peers and that impacts how we feel about our pay.  

If you believe that you are being paid less than your peers for similar work, it can lead to frustration, resentment, and even demotivation.

With more employers publishing their salary ranges on job postings, employees have more information on what competitive pay rates are.

Employees are asking more questions about their pay. They are asking for increases if they feel they are underpaid.

You are spending more time on pay related communications and training. Some of you are being more proactive instead of reactive.

I predict that as more U.S. states and non-U.S. countries have laws requiring pay disclosure there will be a trend toward less complex pay policies and guidelines. With the need for more pay transparency, the overly complicated pay structures and decision-making processes some employers have will be changed.

Is it a realistic goal?

• Achieving full gender equality could take close to 300 years if the current rate of progress continues. (Source: UN Women and the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs)

• Gallup defines equity as fair treatment, access and advancement for each person in an organization.

• Fair means impartial and just. It is without favoritism or discrimination.

Open communication around pay is one of the most important aspects of employee engagement.

I’m writing a custom salary survey proposal and asked my team members if they had developed this type of survey. I want someone else to review what I’ve written before I send it to the potential client.

A custom or bespoke survey is a questionnaire sent to employers that gathers data on jobs. Data points like base salary, short-term and long-term incentives are provided by employers and then a third party like Prosper Consulting summarizes the results.

Typically, there is a need for this to be done because data does not currently exist for this niche of employers (industry) and/or jobs in other salary survey products.  

A compa-ratio calculation is an employee’s base salary as a percentage of the base salary range midpoint.

·       To calculate compa ratio, you divide the employee’s salary by the salary range midpoint, which will give you a decimal figure. For a percentage figure, you can multiply this number by 100.

·       If the compa-ratio is 100% then the employee is paid the midpoint of the base salary range.

If the average compa-ratio of a group of employees is 90% to 110%, that is good news.

It starts with confidence. Confidence is that feeling of being able to rely on yourself. You’re sure of yourself and your abilities.

Next is commitment. Confidence leads to commitment. Not the up and down commitment but the kind that is unwavering. Commitment means you do what it takes no matter what. It is that dedication to get from Point A to Point B, so you build the necessary habits and never give up.

And finally, there is the competence or skills that you develop because of your commitment. Competence is when you get better at something. It is the ability to do something successfully or efficiently.

Fix the data in the “system of record.” By data I mean job data and employee data.

If you are using an Excel file and fixing the grade, job family, job title, and/or target incentives before you can start an analysis, you have a problem.

Go into your HR system of record (Workday, Paycom, Paycor, ADP, SAP, etc.) and fix it there so the next time you pull a report you have clean data.

And please add grades with their minimum, midpoint and maximum to your HR system.

One of the things we don’t talk about as much as we should is the opportunities gap.  The pay equity gap exists. Part of why it exists has to do with the fact that women don’t have the same access to opportunities as men. 

Women are underrepresented in higher paying leadership roles.  And promotion gaps are also a part of the problem.

So, when I hear that an employer has a plan for how they find, and fix pay equity gaps I am thrilled.  But then I ask about how they are going to find and fix the opportunity gap that exists, I often get asked, “What do you mean?”

One of the fundamental activities of HR is to ensure that competitive base salary ranges and incentives are assigned to jobs.

The range from minimum to maximum provides a boundary within which base pay decisions are made.  They tell the hiring manager, employees, and candidates what the employer is willing to pay.

However, I have had several C-suite leaders lately who what to avoid conflict in relation to pay decisions. They want everyone to feel good. They don’t say no when pushed by their direct reports to pay above the pay range assigned to a job that is based on external market data.