Throwaway4job wrote: > open salaries would be problematic for me, because I've made some bad bets on new hires who are overpaid compared to what they deliver,

Throwaway4job wrote: > open salaries would be problematic for me, because I've made some bad bets on new hires who are overpaid compared to what they deliver, but where it's not reasonable to fire them either. Open salaries would give you precisely the leverage you need to reduce those employees' salaries. "Your initial salary was X, expecting better-than-average performance. Your performance has been comparable to Amy and Ben, so your salary now matches theirs." They would either accept the reduction or would leave, without you having to fire them. The bigger problem would be it would tend to reduce the variance in salaries (why does Carl get 50% more than I do?), which may result in under-paying top performers, reducing their incentive to stay.