If Transparency be the Path to Fairness, What Else (Besides Pay) Must We Reveal?

Would pay transparency (sharing pay details) make pay more fair?  Respondents to the recent KnowHR pay transparency survey were almost evenly split between answering "yes", "no" and "maybe".

As I am being made to understand it, revealing employee salaries is expected (by those answering "yes" and "maybe" above) to lead to fairness by virtue of the fact that employees will then have the information they need to judge the equity of their own paychecks compared to what others receive.

Or will they?

Education, experience and performance are among the factors that legitimately affect compensation, according to the Department of Labor.  Will employees, armed with information on their coworkers' salaries and seeking to judge the fairness of their own compensation relative to others, also have access to the details of their peers' education, certifications, work experience and performance appraisal documentation?  How else can they be in a position to judge the appropriateness of others' pay compared to theirs?  Or would we simply turn them loose armed with half of the relevant information and let them draw their own conclusions about the other half?

Where, exactly, would we draw the line here?  I'm just asking...

Image:  Creative Commons Photo "Magnifying Glass" by Tall Chris

Comments

[E James (Jim) Brennan]

Short answer = "resolution" (or "spine").

Exposure can just make pay more contentious, unless you have a really good storyboard ready.

Skill (KSAs), effort, responsibility, working conditions and such are all justifiers, but you would be well advised to keep your answers general. To carefully avoid all ad-hominem counterattacks and challenges to proper exercise of managerial discretion, I'd clearly by state just that. It is the role of management to make the tough calls and they are accountable to the owners rather than to the employees. What makes YOU worth YOUR pay is none of your co-worker's business, nor is theirs yours.

"Fair" is not a compensation term; it is NOT a synonym for "more," either: but it is typically in the eye of the beholder. Companies should be more focused on what is necessary and proper, and not what the troops would like.

[Frank Roche]

Um....wow...that is really the slippery slope. What a fabulous logic process on this. Pretty soon we'll just turn over our full identities to our coworkers and let them come up with the "Worth Algorithm."

[laurie ruettimann]

How much did you get paid to write this post? I demand to know, and I want someone to pay me more. :)

[Sharon - good solutions]

Wow! This is incredible and a very dangerous idea. Just as an example of how this might work - my son and son-in-law both worked for the same person for over a year. My son earned more simply because his work was worth more to his boss. But in my son-in-law's mind, he should have earned more or at least the same as my son because he had a wife and child to support and my son didn't. So every time they got paid my son-in-law felt like he had been treated unfairly. It created a spirit of jealousy and strife. Not a good idea.

[Ann Bares]

Jim:

Sounds like you and I sit firmly on the "its none of your business and management has the right to make tough pay calls" side of the argument.

Frank:

If that happens, I predict that debating and challenging the "worth algorithm" could become a nearly full-time occupation for some workers.

Laurie:

Well, let's say you deserve the punk rock premium, which is 50% more than the geek rate I get, so your pay should be 150% of mine, which is 1.5 times zero, which is ... zero...

Man, we are both underpaid ...

Sharon:

Great story and illustration of yet another very slippery slope - basing pay on "cost of living" rather than "cost of labor" (or what their skills and their job are worth).

Thanks - all - for the great comments and discussion!

[Frank Roche]

Ann, that "worth algorithm" could be a huge one. Imagine what could happen. Consulting heyday!

[Ann Bares]

Frank:

I see your point. Time to roll out that iFractal/Altura collaborative venture known as "Work Algorithms R Us"!

[Paul Weatherhead]

Ann,

I admire your way of synthesizing an issue down to its bare essentials! That's why when the Paycheck Fairness Act gets an open hearing (remember the promise for more transparency in government), we're going to have you come to Washington, DC to testify!

Thanks for the insightful observation!

Paul

[Ann Bares]

Paul:

Let's hope the PFA does get the benefit of an open hearing (I do remember that promise...). From Cara Welch's latest post, sounds like we shouldn't expect that bill to surface again until August. Thanks for the comment - and for your patience with the commenting mechanism today!