Talking Turkey about Tradecraft

As we approach the Thanksgiving menu, we should note that there is no standard cookbook of approved recipes for the compensation trade.  It is wanted.  More and more professionals seem to be searching for the master source of all compensation best practices.  They stand to be disappointed, because it does not exist, despite some limited options. 

To the dismay of the lemmings who try to find the end of the line so they can copy the collective wisdom of those who went before them, there is no one comprehensive or authoritative encyclopedia of compensation tradecraft wisdom with universal application in all industries and for all circumstances.  Some professionals have been creating a variety of interactive mechanisms whereby folks can get immediate tips on pay tradecraft, but it is difficult to keep up with all the questions.  Besides, the reference materials have limited effectiveness when so many asking questions don’t know how to state their issue or can’t understand the answer.

Even as the demand for compensation answers grows, the supply of competent answerers has been shrinking. With all employers reaching at different times that disconcerting bump in the road where pay increases cease (or pause or hesitate or however you want to characterize your particular unique belt-tightening phase), not everyone feels the same constraints simultaneously.  Nevertheless, when enterprises have no money for pay increases, they have less need for skilled Total Reward experts, HR generalists and Compensation specialists.  The profession faces a cumulative shortfall of experienced people due to this overall trend to minimize compensation activities and even lay off compensation staff.  Consulting vendors stand ready and eager to become outsource suppliers for the abandoned internal functions.  Meanwhile, new entrants to our profession are not being fully trained in the skill sets so vital for current needs, much less being exposed to the variety of circumstances and differing optional solutions that will polish their diagnostic and prescriptive competencies for future challenges yet unimagined.

This is the time to Talk Turkey.  To be blunt, the old pros with diverse experience and deep broad backgrounds are disappearing and the new kids have no idea what to do or how to do it.  Lacking much more than superficial basic training (and even that being extremely narrow and very limited), they frantically search for authoritative guidance on important policy and practice issues.  That makes them very vulnerable to mistakes, scams and undue reliance on fast-talking used-car salesmen now peddling pay solutions.  How can they not be easily fooled or misdirected, when they have had little or no exposure to the range of practical tradecraft wisdom that exists?

That essential vulnerability goes a long way toward persuading me to be more forgiving to those who would demand that those in the know immediately forthwith deliver that secret sauce being selfishly hidden from relative newcomers.  The arrogant attitude of entitlement is quite off-putting.  It also disguises the unfortunate fact that their insistence on prompt presentation of The One Answer displays an utter disregard for the rigor of careful academic research and the disciplined analytical thinking that underlies most tradecraft.  Yes, there is a tremendous amount of art in the Total Rewards field, but that art is best applied by those who have mastered the science aspects.  Without knowledge of psychological theory and a familiarity with the range of compensation practices, any one factoid will be worthless or even dangerous to those who attempt to willy-nilly apply one solution to every problem.  Diagnosis should always precede prescription.

The quickest best short-term solution to this dilemma of looming tradecraft ignorance would seem to be the various internet options:

• the Online Community of WorldatWork exists for Total Reward association members and visitors who openly share knowledge and trade tips, open to anyone;
• in addition to the WorldatWork Resource Center with online materials reserved for members,
• basic books like Planning Wage and Salary Programs and The Compensation Guide,
• various open blogs like this for beginners and HR news links,
• specialized public blogs like this Compensation Cafe and others of Ann Bares, who supplies links to lots of related blogs,
• insider blog/websites like Paul Hebert's, Howard Rishers’s, Chuck Csizmar's and others,
• free online courses and free tradecraft textbooks, and the
• Society for Human Resource Management’s HR Advisor section, reserved for members only; 
• ... we need to create a long list of helpful references like the above, which are just from my memory or from habit.

While we gobble down our Thanksgiving repasts, it might be well to consider the future of our profession.   What other helpful free HR directories and comprehensive no-cost compensation advisory or referral sources can you think of?

 E. James (Jim) Brennan is Senior Associate of ERI Economic Research Institute, the premier publisher of interactive pay and living-cost surveys. Semi-retired after over 40 years in HR corporate and consulting roles throughout the U.S. and Canada, he’s pretty much been there done that (articles, books, speeches, seminars, radio/TV, advisory posts, in-trial expert witness stuff, etc.) and will express his opinion on almost anything.

Image: Photo of the Week - Wild Turkey at Wallkill National Wildlife Refuge, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service

Comments

[Laura Schroeder]

A rousing commentary on training v. experience! Talking turkey indeed.

[E James (Jim) Brennan]

'Tis the very season for turkeys to gobble-gobble.

[Paul Weatherhead]

Thanks for the list of compensation resources, Jim.

A couple of great college compensation textbooks can be bought for a song on Amazon.com: "Compensation" by Milkovich, Newman, Gerhart; and "Compensation Management in a Knowledge-Based World" by Henderson.

Edward Lawler has some great books: "Strategic Pay" and "Rewarding Excellence".

Jay Schuster and Pat Zingheim have some classic books: "Pay People Right" and "The New Pay".

The "How To" series of WorldatWork publications are written in easily digestible chunks and are inexpensive: http://www.worldatwork.org/waw/bookstore/html/bookstore-howto.jsp.

To identify those practioners who take the compensation tradecraft seriously, a nice set of initials such as CCP, CBP, GRP, CSCP, and CECP can be obtained through WorldatWork's certification program: http://www.worldatwork.org/waw/home/html/society_home.html

[E James (Jim) Brennan]

Thanks, Paul. Those are all excellent additions.

[Windsor Lewis]

This was an excellent post; I really enjoyed it. :+)