9 ms·

That's why I am for salary transparency. These issues would go away quickly if people knew what everybody else is paid.

bilbo0s 8y ago
You should be careful with that though, because it can cut both ways. I was a part of a company early in my career where certain people were being paid less than others, only the thing was that the big, BIG, bosses didn't know about it. They were told what the average pay was, but they thought that was the pay level that all of the workers were receiving. Long story short, when the whole thing came out, imagine their surprise, (and delight), to discover a class of workers who would happily work for cheap. The big, BIG bosses proceeded to demand that everyone take a paycut. (Well, everyone who was making more than the average.) So a whole lot of colleagues ended up leaving and looking for other jobs etc. In the end, it didn't really help the people on the bottom at all. I was just a lowly intern, but that experience definitely taught me a lesson about how the corporate world works.
- toomuchtodo 8y ago
  It sounds like the system worked as intended.
  - bilbo0s 8y ago
    Touché. I guess I never thought about it that way.
- pkaye 8y ago
  At one workplace, I and a bunch of others were software leads/managers who rose up through many years hard work, promotions and raises. A new VP of engineering joins and finds out about our salary during the next review. He berates us individually why were are paid so much. What he didn't realize is the team leads did the heavy lifting for development at this company. Many of us said nothing and just looked for new opportunities. From what I heard, projects quickly fell behind schedule, got cancelled. The VP was eventually fired.
  - infinite8s 8y ago
    And he probably just moved on to a new opportunity.
    - pkaye 8y ago
      I've looked him up. He is working on a "startup" idea but I don't think he has gone anywhere with it.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  "I was a part of a company early in my career where certain people were being paid less than others, only the thing was that the big, BIG, bosses didn't know about it. " That's pretty weird. Usually the bosses know what everyone is making or can find out. Looking at cost is one of the main duties of a boss.
  - GlickWick 8y ago
    Not that weird. There are lots of employees and the big bosses tend to only see birds-eye views like project/staffing budgets. They care if a team of 10 costs 2.5m/year. They don't dig into why unless they have a problem with the budget to begin with.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      Interesting. In any case, bosses already have salary transparaceny if they care so giving transparency to employees wouldn't change this particular case.
      - vetinari 8y ago
        They don't have the need to dig into individual salaries, only once they want to start optimize (read: where to cut down) the salaries. Otherwise, it doesn't help with overall goals.
- pjdemers 8y ago
  I worked at place where we did stack ranking, but added a formula that basically divided rank by salary. Anyone making more than about 1.2 times the average of their piers had to constantly justify it.
RodericDay 8y ago
I love that every time someone brings this amazing obvious solution up, some dumbass chimes in "why, you can check glassdoor?"
briandear 8y ago
With salary transparency, wouldn’t everyone be paid less? (Not a challenge, just a curiosity.)
- toomuchtodo 8y ago
  I'd argue everyone gets paid more, as lower paid staff will churn more rapidly for higher paying positions, and in a tight labor market pay must rise to attract talent to roles. With that said, you should always be interviewing for your next role, as you will never get a salary bump at an annual review near what you would make switching jobs. Always Be Interviewing. You are looking out for you first.
- tdb7893 8y ago
  Why would you say that? I figured it would give employees more power in salary negotiations so I figured the salary would go up mostly.
  - TomMarius 8y ago
    Because in most cases there are some or even many people who are available to work for less. The management then would argue that "you can't earn more than they do for the same work, everyone would have to get a raise but there is no justification for that". Secrecy makes it an individual discussion as a by-product.
    - yholio 8y ago
      In either case, managers would not entertain talk about a raise unless there ware actually not that many people willing to do the same work for less. So a secret negotiation allows them to hide that information from the rest of the workers and only compensate those aware of their market worth. An open negotiation would not lower compensation for the latter since they can always just quit, it would raise salaries for the less informed.
      - sokoloff 8y ago
mjevans 8y ago
That should include everyone up through the top. Including their options and bonus etc.
- sethammons 8y ago
  not everything is your title+tenure; someone with the same profile might not have the same impact as another. I could see someone getting upset about another person making more and thinking they should be equals when the other person has a greater positive impact on the organization. I'm not as much a fan of open transparency for all positions, including options and bonuses, as I am in favor of published ranges for each position that are reflective of the overwhelming majority of folks in that role at that company.
  - bsanr 8y ago
    That doesn't really solve the problem of the opposite situation, nor of the one that was originally under consideration: when a worker with greater impact is paid less, or when workers of similar impact are compensated differently. For that, you do need an accurate understanding of how your peers are compensated. I make less than peers I objectively outperform, and I would not have known unless they had told me personally. If that information had been accessible during my last review, I would have pressed for higher pay, but now that that's passed, both I and my employer have to worry about what my next step is. This could have been avoided if they'd been more transparent up-front.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      "I make less than peers I objectively outperform" From my experience you can go to management and tell them that you think you should be paid X. If that's within the normal range you often get the raise. At my first company in the US I was told that everybody is making as much as I was offered so I said yes. After half a year I found out that most people made 30% more. I talked to my CTO and told him that I want more and I got more than 30% without much hesitation. I wouldn't worry about asking for more. They won't fire you.
- 8y ago
ken 8y ago
How? As in, what is the actual mechanism by which this issue would go away? These "workers dependent upon Oracle for sponsorship to remain in the United States" are supposed to do what with that new information, exactly? Threaten to leave the country? I hear this a lot from well-paid tech workers. Just two days ago I responded to a comment here where someone said the solution was for people to "just negotiate better". Right. That's why I am for unions. Get professionals to negotiate on the workers' behalf, and have everyone agree on precisely the factors (experience, etc) that should be used for determining salaries. Then nobody is dependent on either the goodwill of their employer or their own bargaining skills for a fair salary.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  In this specific case the person didn't know she was underpaid. Once she found out she pointed it out and got more money. She wasn't dependent on sponsorship.
  - ken 8y ago
    In other words, the way to deal with an company which is behaving unfairly towards you is to tell them a piece of information they already know, and then depend on them becoming more fair. You’ll understand why I’m suspicious. If this worked reliably, why would anyone need to file a lawsuit over $400M in lost wages? Wouldn’t the company have just fixed the problem when they first saw it? Unions exist in fields and countries where wages are more transparent, too. Transparency is necessary, but not sufficient. That’s why we have a free press, but also elections and courts.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      "In other words, the way to deal with an company which is behaving unfairly towards you is to tell them a piece of information they already know, and then depend on them becoming more fair." You don't depends on them but on an individual basis you can point this out and often you can correct this for yourself. They will still try to screw other employees. And yes,unions are a good way of ensuring this doesn't happen.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

You should be careful with that though, because it can cut both ways. I was a part of a company early in my career where certain people were being paid less than others, only the thing was that the big, BIG, bosses didn't know about it. They were told what the average pay was, but they thought that was the pay level that all of the workers were receiving. Long story short, when the whole thing came out, imagine their surprise, (and delight), to discover a class of workers who would happily work for cheap. The big, BIG bosses proceeded to demand that everyone take a paycut. (Well, everyone who was making more than the average.) So a whole lot of colleagues ended up leaving and looking for other jobs etc. In the end, it didn't really help the people on the bottom at all. I was just a lowly intern, but that experience definitely taught me a lesson about how the corporate world works.

toomuchtodo 8y ago
It sounds like the system worked as intended.
- bilbo0s 8y ago
  Touché. I guess I never thought about it that way.
pkaye 8y ago
At one workplace, I and a bunch of others were software leads/managers who rose up through many years hard work, promotions and raises. A new VP of engineering joins and finds out about our salary during the next review. He berates us individually why were are paid so much. What he didn't realize is the team leads did the heavy lifting for development at this company. Many of us said nothing and just looked for new opportunities. From what I heard, projects quickly fell behind schedule, got cancelled. The VP was eventually fired.
- infinite8s 8y ago
  And he probably just moved on to a new opportunity.
  - pkaye 8y ago
    I've looked him up. He is working on a "startup" idea but I don't think he has gone anywhere with it.
maxxxxx 8y ago
"I was a part of a company early in my career where certain people were being paid less than others, only the thing was that the big, BIG, bosses didn't know about it. " That's pretty weird. Usually the bosses know what everyone is making or can find out. Looking at cost is one of the main duties of a boss.
- GlickWick 8y ago
  Not that weird. There are lots of employees and the big bosses tend to only see birds-eye views like project/staffing budgets. They care if a team of 10 costs 2.5m/year. They don't dig into why unless they have a problem with the budget to begin with.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    Interesting. In any case, bosses already have salary transparaceny if they care so giving transparency to employees wouldn't change this particular case.
    - vetinari 8y ago
      They don't have the need to dig into individual salaries, only once they want to start optimize (read: where to cut down) the salaries. Otherwise, it doesn't help with overall goals.
pjdemers 8y ago
I worked at place where we did stack ranking, but added a formula that basically divided rank by salary. Anyone making more than about 1.2 times the average of their piers had to constantly justify it.

RodericDay 8y ago

I love that every time someone brings this amazing obvious solution up, some dumbass chimes in "why, you can check glassdoor?"

briandear 8y ago

With salary transparency, wouldn’t everyone be paid less? (Not a challenge, just a curiosity.)

toomuchtodo 8y ago
I'd argue everyone gets paid more, as lower paid staff will churn more rapidly for higher paying positions, and in a tight labor market pay must rise to attract talent to roles. With that said, you should always be interviewing for your next role, as you will never get a salary bump at an annual review near what you would make switching jobs. Always Be Interviewing. You are looking out for you first.
tdb7893 8y ago
Why would you say that? I figured it would give employees more power in salary negotiations so I figured the salary would go up mostly.
- TomMarius 8y ago
  Because in most cases there are some or even many people who are available to work for less. The management then would argue that "you can't earn more than they do for the same work, everyone would have to get a raise but there is no justification for that". Secrecy makes it an individual discussion as a by-product.
  - yholio 8y ago
    In either case, managers would not entertain talk about a raise unless there ware actually not that many people willing to do the same work for less. So a secret negotiation allows them to hide that information from the rest of the workers and only compensate those aware of their market worth. An open negotiation would not lower compensation for the latter since they can always just quit, it would raise salaries for the less informed.
    - sokoloff 8y ago

mjevans 8y ago

That should include everyone up through the top. Including their options and bonus etc.

sethammons 8y ago
not everything is your title+tenure; someone with the same profile might not have the same impact as another. I could see someone getting upset about another person making more and thinking they should be equals when the other person has a greater positive impact on the organization. I'm not as much a fan of open transparency for all positions, including options and bonuses, as I am in favor of published ranges for each position that are reflective of the overwhelming majority of folks in that role at that company.
- bsanr 8y ago
  That doesn't really solve the problem of the opposite situation, nor of the one that was originally under consideration: when a worker with greater impact is paid less, or when workers of similar impact are compensated differently. For that, you do need an accurate understanding of how your peers are compensated. I make less than peers I objectively outperform, and I would not have known unless they had told me personally. If that information had been accessible during my last review, I would have pressed for higher pay, but now that that's passed, both I and my employer have to worry about what my next step is. This could have been avoided if they'd been more transparent up-front.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    "I make less than peers I objectively outperform" From my experience you can go to management and tell them that you think you should be paid X. If that's within the normal range you often get the raise. At my first company in the US I was told that everybody is making as much as I was offered so I said yes. After half a year I found out that most people made 30% more. I talked to my CTO and told him that I want more and I got more than 30% without much hesitation. I wouldn't worry about asking for more. They won't fire you.
8y ago

ken 8y ago

How? As in, what is the actual mechanism by which this issue would go away? These "workers dependent upon Oracle for sponsorship to remain in the United States" are supposed to do what with that new information, exactly? Threaten to leave the country? I hear this a lot from well-paid tech workers. Just two days ago I responded to a comment here where someone said the solution was for people to "just negotiate better". Right. That's why I am for unions. Get professionals to negotiate on the workers' behalf, and have everyone agree on precisely the factors (experience, etc) that should be used for determining salaries. Then nobody is dependent on either the goodwill of their employer or their own bargaining skills for a fair salary.

maxxxxx 8y ago
In this specific case the person didn't know she was underpaid. Once she found out she pointed it out and got more money. She wasn't dependent on sponsorship.
- ken 8y ago
  In other words, the way to deal with an company which is behaving unfairly towards you is to tell them a piece of information they already know, and then depend on them becoming more fair. You’ll understand why I’m suspicious. If this worked reliably, why would anyone need to file a lawsuit over $400M in lost wages? Wouldn’t the company have just fixed the problem when they first saw it? Unions exist in fields and countries where wages are more transparent, too. Transparency is necessary, but not sufficient. That’s why we have a free press, but also elections and courts.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    "In other words, the way to deal with an company which is behaving unfairly towards you is to tell them a piece of information they already know, and then depend on them becoming more fair." You don't depends on them but on an individual basis you can point this out and often you can correct this for yourself. They will still try to screw other employees. And yes,unions are a good way of ensuring this doesn't happen.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]