Can't Ask Don't Say: The Stigma of Compensation Conversations

In talking to young professionals, as I've had lots of opportunities to do in the past few months, both in focus group sessions as well as individual conversations, I often hear a particular theme repeated.

They have many questions about their compensation. They wish both that the topic could be more openly discussed and that it could be more acceptable to ask what's on their minds.  They are frustrated with what one young technology professional called the "hush hush" nature of the subject.

They believe that there is a stigma attached to asking questions about their pay, that the mere act of bringing up the subject will brand them as a troublemaker, a malcontent, someone who is only there for a paycheck and not interested in the work or the organization.

In an effort to bend to propriety and expectations, they stockpile their questions and concerns for the annual salary review conversation.  But this works about as well as having managers collect performance feedback throughout the year and then dump the entire load on the unsuspecting subordinate in one conversation.  Not the best timing, process or set-up to ensure employees are clear about their pay opportunities.

And we are squandering the chance to pass along and reinforce the story of our reward programs - to shine a light on the path we want interested and motivated employees to follow in order to maximize both their earnings and the success of the organization?

 Is it a training thing?  An accountability thing?  Who is falling down on the job here - is it us ... or the managers?  (I suspect it is probably both, in all likelihood.)

Do we need to create stigma-free pay conversation zones?  A quarterly Pay Armistice Day? 

Just some Friday thoughts and questions.

Ann Bares is the Founder and Editor of the Compensation Café,  Author of Compensation Force and Managing Partner of Altura Consulting Group LLC, where she provides compensation consulting services to a wide range of client organizations.  She earned her M.B.A. at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School and is a bookhound and aspiring cook in her spare time.  Follow her on Twitter at @annbares.

Creative Commons image "Quiet Please" by ell brown

Comments

[E. James (Jim) Brennan]

"Gunnysacking" is as bad as it is common. Management sensitivities and human nature being what they respectively are, I see limited prospects for swift or major improvements.

When my book on the topic didn't immediately change the world, I became resigned to taking smaller and slower steps for progress. Leveling is always superior to the alternatives, but it scares all parties. Yes, there are better options than the status quo mutual "surprise-party" practices, but Prentice Hall denied reprint rights to others who wanted to republish an update.

Best at this point to stimulate visitors to suggest their most successful methods to demystify total rewards and to defuse potentially contentious conflicts over compensation matters.

[Dan Walter]

Ann, Great article.

It;s funny that you could have replaced the words pay and compensation with the word "sex" or "death" and you would have had the same young people 8-10 years earlier.

Perhaps it is less that they are uncomfortable than it is that compensation professionals are uncomfortable. Could it be that we do not feel like we can really explain our profession? Can it be than we build the aura of mystery around the topic because we don;t want to explain things that either don't make sense, or that we may not do as well as we wish? Might it be that we are embarrassed by the fact the compensation professionals are not great at asking questions about their own compensation so we put this feeling onto everyone else?

Just thoughts....

[Patty Tanji]

Love this article. I just had this conversation at church of all places. From a spiritual perspective, bare with me, we often talk about prosperity. But today the prosperity message was all about cold hard cash and attracting more of it. Somehow we have screwed up the definition of worth to mean "how much money do you make?" versus a person's worth on the planet as a creative, joyous, beautiful being that has great gifts to give beyond those we give to our employers (who pay us for these services). Can we decouple the two so skills and talents on the job are NOT equated to gifts and talents we give in great services to the world. I really think there is connection. Might this stop the jealousies and demoralization about who gets paid more than others? Yah I know, too woo woo and perhaps the workplace is not the best place to talk about higher powers. But, its kind of fun thinking about it!

[Ann Bares]

Jim:

Oh come on, you can spill a few trade secrets here, can't you? ;-)

Dan:

I can't really disagree - if we dig to the root of the problem, we may well find that it's as much about our discomfort in explaining/defending than anything else.

Patty:

What an interesting comment! Not too "woo woo" at all. Yes, perhaps we should be able to decouple our skills and talents on the job from our greater worth and gifts in the world - and maybe that would help remove some of the emotion from compensation. But the "coupling" is there for a lot of reasons - not only because there is a degree of social pressure that leads us to tie our personal "worth" to our paycheck - but also because so many of us are so invested in our work (for the wrong reasons sometimes, for sure, but for some of the right reasons as well) and want to have our caring efforts, our hard work and our sacrifices recognized and appreciated.

Great points all - thanks for sharing them here!

[E. James (Jim) Brennan]

The value of the human being and the value of the work they are paid to do are two completely different concepts. One is infinite, while the other is a limited and situational commercial decision.

OK, Ann: here are some freebies...

In a prior corporate life, every new supervisor (up to VP level) took a Basic Supervision course including training on pay-setting by the former compensation manager and on performance appraisal by the head of the MBO program, including role-playing practice. Making the effective supervision of subordinates a mandatory evaluation field for every people-manager tends to hold their feet to the fire by providing consequences.

A simple but complete Pay Administration policy model resides in the WorldAtWork Sample HR Policies section, as well.