This is the right and fair for everyone thing to do. If the employee feels they've been giving too much before now and they are owed a promotion or monetary re

This is the right and fair for everyone thing to do. If the employee feels they've been giving too much before now and they are owed a promotion or monetary reward I'm afraid they did it wrong. This is based on my own experience in different work places: You never offer your skills in advance without a clear and objective promotion/development plan in place - even though, it's still a risky bet. Of course you could still do it if you're in it for other rewards (glory, respect, fun, work/life balance). Once you have worked your ass off, they know you can do it for less, so what's the incentive on giving you anything extra? Keeping you around? No one is irreplaceable. There has to be development in place, so the employer feels they're making you better, which in place brings them more money to their pockets. Otherwise they'll just squeeze you like a lemon, which is actually their job. Ninja edit: Actually, touching back in 6-12 months is NOT the right thing to do. You should setup monthly one-on-one meetings to follow up on her progress and fine tune anything that's not going as expected. What you want is an employee that improves and ideally overperforms, you don't want to just not pay more - that's not a recipe for success.