100: Centenary Edition

[00:00:00] Does your workforce understand what and why behind the way you pay?

[00:00:04] And I think the future benchmark of can you have that conversation over a couple of coffee

[00:00:09] is one that compensation in HR professionals should really hold themselves to?

[00:00:14] I love that. So you're definitely leaning into the where we're going in the future.

[00:00:20] So it's a sign of a good brand when you know it's got the endeavity in it,

[00:00:23] compared to the changing environment.

[00:00:26] Are you ready to dive into the dynamic world of compensation management?

[00:00:31] Join us on a journey where we unravel the latest trends, tackle your burning questions

[00:00:36] and explore innovative strategies that are shaping the future compensation

[00:00:40] all with a coffee in hand.

[00:00:43] Welcome everybody to this episode of Comp and Coffee. And today is a special because today is our

[00:00:50] episode. So we're in celebration mode today here and we're going to be a little self-indulgent

[00:00:55] and do a little bit of reflection. Brief bit of history, the podcast can back in January 2018.

[00:01:04] Kudos to you if you've been following us since then. That was under the pay factors brand

[00:01:09] which was then obviously acquired by Payscale in 2021. We love the podcast. We knew you

[00:01:19] who have been running it. I've been doing it now for probably about eight months, maybe more.

[00:01:26] I think. But we really wanted to just spend some time today celebrating our birthday episode.

[00:01:35] And I bought a couple of special guests along with me for this special episode.

[00:01:39] I have Heather Krueger who's seen a director of corporate marketing. So Heather is my

[00:01:44] content queen and my content creating friend. We have huge amounts of fun here at Payscale

[00:01:52] and thinking about all the wonderful ideas for podcasts, for research, for conference

[00:02:00] for all the kind of amazing content that we create here. And generally just debating what's going

[00:02:05] on in the world of work. So very pleased to have you here Heather. And I'm also joined by Zach

[00:02:11] Jason, who's manager of HR here at Payscale. So Zach until recently was my HR business partner.

[00:02:18] So he is my oratory on all things HR. So I wanted to get him along to come and talk about some

[00:02:24] of these topics here today. So welcome Heather and welcome Zach. Do you want to both say hi,

[00:02:29] introduce yourself to the audience? Heather do you want to start first? Yeah happy to. So thank you

[00:02:36] for having me Ruth. I think this is my second time on Comic Coffee. It's been a while since my last one.

[00:02:43] I am happy to be here as Ruth knows I love talking about the world of HR. I'm a marketer

[00:02:50] by trade, but my passion and interest is truly the world in future work. So I'm going to be here. Zach?

[00:02:57] Yeah, thanks Heather. Thanks Ruth for having me. As Ruth shared, I am the HR Manager at Payscale.

[00:03:03] I lead a team of HR business partners. Most recently been supporting our marketing and revenue

[00:03:09] employees, but now supporting our product engineer in GD teams. And it like Heather and Ruth that

[00:03:16] I've been in HR for quite some time and really enjoy talking about it. So thank you for having me.

[00:03:21] Well great to have you both here. So before we do some reflecting, I thought I'd just quickly

[00:03:28] lean into the name of the podcast because we can't often get asked about why is it called

[00:03:32] Compon Coffee. It's funny story actually because Compon Coffee was the name that Payscale

[00:03:38] pay Factor sorry, launched the podcast under. At that time that happened back in 2018, I was still

[00:03:44] working for Curo, the company that I co-founded. We were partners with pay Factor's. We did a lot of

[00:03:50] thought leadership with them and I had been running a breakfast session called Coffee and Com for about

[00:03:55] three years prior to this. So we had a little fight about the name, the brand where did it come from.

[00:04:03] I love Compon Coffee so we'll stick with that name. Why do we call it Compon Coffee? Well I think

[00:04:10] the original intention has carried on. The aim was to create an environment where we could have

[00:04:16] conversations about compensation as if you were basically having a cup of coffee with your

[00:04:21] pals. Quite often depending on the size of your organisation, you may be just a band of one person

[00:04:27] in your organisation and so we wanted to provide a forum where we could talk about the

[00:04:32] topic you wanted to talk about. You could feel like you were having a cup of coffee with friends

[00:04:36] and talking about the problems of today breaking news and all those kinds of things. So I

[00:04:44] also also like to quite think about what our audience is doing when they're listening to the podcast.

[00:04:50] So maybe I think they're listening to it as they make a cup of coffee in the morning.

[00:04:55] Walking their dog in the morning, I know I got off to this into podcast when I'm walking

[00:04:59] that where I listen to most of my podcast is on a plane. It's been quite a bit of time on a plane

[00:05:05] going backwards and forwards across the pond. So Heather, I know you were a fan of the Compon Coffee

[00:05:11] brand. Tell us why you're a fan and we also lent into that quite heavily at World at Work

[00:05:17] for Awards Conference this year. So give me a thought slash definitely. So this is where the

[00:05:22] marketer comes out. So Compon Coffee is so catchy. But the reason why I think it has even developed

[00:05:31] more merit, letting originally started with, is where we are today as employers and work forces

[00:05:42] and where we're moving towards with changing dialogue around Penn.

[00:05:47] Compon Coffee started off as a podcast and environment for compensation professionals to learn

[00:05:52] more about compensation, you know, have that virtual cup of coffee with one another. And we want

[00:05:57] to nurture those spaces. So at World at Work this year we actually, you know, we made our space

[00:06:02] made our booth a like a pseudo coffee house and we wanted to bring people in it. We wanted to have

[00:06:08] you know that conversation about Compon over a cup of coffee. But where I see our

[00:06:15] field and our practice going in compensation is the mark of great compensation is going to be

[00:06:24] in the future. Can you have this conversation with an employee over a cup of coffee? Have we as

[00:06:30] employers and workers become so uneducated, mature and familiarized with the practice of compensation

[00:06:38] that we can have that, you know, this is the reality of work. We are all here to be paid,

[00:06:44] to do work we enjoy in the best of cases and we want to have those conversations simply and easily

[00:06:51] over a cup of coffee. So I think that's a really good aspirational vision for the Compon Coffee

[00:06:56] brand too. You know, at World at Work we had a slogan on our booth, you know, does your workforce

[00:07:03] understand what and why behind the way you pay? And I think the future benchmark of can you have that

[00:07:10] conversation over a cup of coffee is one that compensation in HR professionals should really hold

[00:07:15] themselves to. I love that. So you're definitely leaning into the, you know, where we're going in

[00:07:22] future. So it's a, it's a sign of a good brand when you know it's got the gravity in it can pivot

[00:07:26] to the changing environment. So Zach, are you a podcast fan? I am your favorite. Where do you listen to

[00:07:33] podcasts? I do enjoy podcast through and I like you enjoy them while I'm walking or running on

[00:07:40] the treadmill if I'm doing some quiet work and I throw podcasts on and listen to one working.

[00:07:45] So my favorites are, you know, I hear that here. People managing people, people,

[00:07:51] people, crowdgloans so you can see just if they're in different mix of HR podcasts that I enjoy

[00:07:56] listening to. I'm great. Well, I know a couple of those. I'll have to go and look at some of the others.

[00:08:03] I hate it here as heavy use of podcasts. Yes. All right. So heavy use if we're going to talk about

[00:08:09] conference later on today. I'm going to be on a panel with the Heber Act conference. So

[00:08:13] thanks for that call, Zach. Okay. So time for a little reflection. Let's be self-indulgent.

[00:08:20] I think at the grand old age of 100 we can do that. So we're going to take three episodes

[00:08:26] that Liz Sheffield, my podcast partner in crime, our content manager has selected for us.

[00:08:31] We're going to quickly reflect on what was covered in those episodes and then we're going to

[00:08:35] think about what's changed in the world since then. So the first one that Liz picked for us was

[00:08:41] episode 25 that was broadcast back in May, 2019. And in this episode we were joined by Kim Taylor

[00:08:50] who's at here. Still here at Pace Gale, Kim and I will regularly do podcast and webinars

[00:08:54] together. She is our VP of compensation services and consulting. So Kim came on as the expert

[00:09:00] guest and they talked about salary structures and she covered the basics of what they were

[00:09:06] and how to put them in place. And at that time was really talking about the importance of

[00:09:11] maturing your pay practices to create pay structures and about how has an organization once you get

[00:09:17] to particular size, you need to start thinking beyond the employee and the price for the employee

[00:09:24] to thinking about the relatively of jobs and employees within them. So kind of moving away potentially

[00:09:30] from job-based pricing to market pricing, to pay grade or level-based pricing. And that was probably

[00:09:38] pretty prussian because if you think about that May 2019 was actually when the first state-based

[00:09:45] pay transparency legislation was passed, Colorado was passed in May 2019, didn't come into

[00:09:51] effect to 2021 in Colorado. But since then, we have seen a huge push by organizations to

[00:10:03] mature their compensation practices so that they can comply with the legislation in terms of

[00:10:08] posting pay ranges but not only that thinking about the impact on existing employees, so big movement

[00:10:15] happening since that podcast was broadcasted. So Zach, I'm interested to hear from you how you

[00:10:21] think things have evolved in terms of adoption of salary structures, especially the journey we'd

[00:10:27] been on here at pay scale. Yeah this has been a unique one for us specifically. We had an office

[00:10:33] in Denver. We weren't a full remote organization when that legislation was passed. And so we saw

[00:10:39] the real time impacts as an organization and decided that even though not all states were

[00:10:47] abiding by legislation or having to abide by legislation, we were going to go ahead and post our

[00:10:52] ranges. So we kind of pushed forward with our transparency for our employees and set that expectation

[00:10:57] hopefully for others to do the same and kind of meet us where we're at. You know next for us as

[00:11:04] far as a leveling perspective we're currently working with leaders to identify the correct

[00:11:08] leveling and titling for their teams. Our next steps in that process are to roll out this framework

[00:11:15] company wide and work with our employees and managers on how to speak to those career paths,

[00:11:20] how to have that career conversation in one-on-one's on a regular basis. So that's kind of our

[00:11:27] next steps in our transparency. So we're going on our maturity journey definitely in terms of salary

[00:11:34] structures which is what we're seeing in our customers and reflected in our research, our

[00:11:38] compensation best practice. We search you know one of the key trends that we saw. We've been trying

[00:11:43] to look at you know what, how can we see practitioners responding to the legislation and it's definitely

[00:11:49] either pushed to deploy more salary structures, simplify salary structures, focus on job architecture,

[00:11:57] even things like addressing job descriptions. So Heather you went back to listen to that episode

[00:12:02] what were your takeaways from that? Well not only listening to the other side but you know to the

[00:12:08] point that you made around Colorado legislation and legislation being a root of a lot of a lot

[00:12:16] of the evolution of compensation that we're seeing today. When you think about like take that big

[00:12:23] step back and go okay but why legislation? Why are we at this point now? What, what lawmakers

[00:12:30] and leaders are looking to solve is gender and racial pay disparities, pay disparity based on

[00:12:37] non-compensible factors. And so to your point Ruth you know Kim offering this very pressure

[00:12:44] perspective the reason for pay transparency legislation is to equal the playing to some extent,

[00:12:49] for workers to give workers traditionally disadvantaged or held back by salary history,

[00:12:58] disclosure, more of an opportunity to increase their wages as they move from job to job.

[00:13:03] One of the points that was raised in episode 25 was this a student insight, this is an

[00:13:10] a department level thing. It's about creating levels within the organization. Now there's some

[00:13:15] exceptions to that which they acknowledge. Sometimes you pay higher or higher paying or faster moving

[00:13:22] roles. You, they use an example of tech companies and I think you could extend it to service based

[00:13:28] companies. You can tend to see structures broken out when the people in those functions are

[00:13:35] manifesting the product or a tech company. Software developers going to have a higher pay premium

[00:13:41] maybe a higher structure for a professional services business, you're going to see that with consultants.

[00:13:48] So it's not about structures creating this monolithic view of how you pay but it's about having a

[00:13:56] sound and rational and systematic approach so that we can fulfill the root intent of this

[00:14:05] changing legislation to help close those gender and racial pay gaps. I thought it was funny,

[00:14:12] when the podcast took what I could only describe as a while the term talking about markets of

[00:14:18] one or structures of one and have been at pastial long enough that I just was like oh no no no no

[00:14:24] this isn't that right you do it. Yeah but yeah it's not that long ago, you know it's five years ago

[00:14:32] and normally changes happen in compensation that quickly but we just seen a fundamental shift

[00:14:40] in thinking and as you say Heather it's centered around this premise of how do we ensure we're

[00:14:46] able to make that comparison of comparable work, equitable work however you know whichever jurisdiction

[00:14:52] you're focusing in that you want to do and that's really you know what's driving this change

[00:14:56] that we've seen since that episode of 25. Yeah one of the examples there the podcast just in episode

[00:15:06] 25 were referencing as well was this notion of maybe you see a pay difference between front end

[00:15:13] and back end dev based on the skills but for whatever reason that brought to mind the equity

[00:15:21] loss of lawsuits that we've seen around warehouse versus retail and when you think about front end

[00:15:27] dev versus back end dev there's this interesting correlation to be made about warehouse versus

[00:15:31] retail when the jobs are fundamentally similar yes they require different skills in some ways you know

[00:15:43] but more than that you see a gender divide in those roles and you know that reality how are we

[00:15:54] breaking that down and making the practice to your point rules move forward in a faster and

[00:16:00] more meaningful way for the practice yeah and you know that's obviously what we're all about

[00:16:07] in terms of advancing here at pay scale you know we see that as part of our responsibility in

[00:16:13] helping employers tackle that problem and I know exactly from the experience here at pay scale

[00:16:20] the leveling is is fundamental to our DIV strategy as well you know in terms of being able to give

[00:16:29] you mentioned it like career frameworks being able to equip managers to have

[00:16:33] progression conversations so that you know we can make sure that we're applying consistent

[00:16:38] decisions around progression in the organization I know that's something you'll quite

[00:16:42] half ton at the moment I think clear expectations to everyone understands what is the

[00:16:47] responsibility of each role what I need to do to be in that role maybe where the gaps are

[00:16:53] that I have today and then speaking with your manager like how do I get to that? So also transparency

[00:16:58] is key to all of that and really moving the needle there yeah so our next episode was episode 50

[00:17:08] and this went out in May 2020 we'll remember what we were doing in May 2020 yep we were

[00:17:16] in pandemic times and the episode talked about you know just as everyone was adjusting to the

[00:17:21] new normal of working from home and the country was starting to reopen and businesses were focusing

[00:17:26] on how to bring people back to the office post the COVID-19 shutdowns and so in this episode

[00:17:33] it was Matt Villen-Russ and they talked about approaches and challenges organizations are working

[00:17:38] through to safely efficiently open offices while meeting the evolving expectations and concerns

[00:17:44] of talent. So four years on where are we at? Well for those of you who saw everything would

[00:17:51] turn to as it was before we have not all gone back to the office and remote work is still very

[00:17:58] much with us and is really reshaping our labor markets. We've seen organizations trying to encourage

[00:18:05] employees back to work mixed success and we've seen RTO mandates that have really done some damage

[00:18:12] in terms of talent retention in organizations so Heather you said you're a keen observer of like

[00:18:21] take on where we are now. So I was thinking about this and reflecting on it and May 2020 really

[00:18:31] struck me because I was like four years ago and that number of all feels wrong because it feels like

[00:18:38] way more than four years but we've been a little bit more the four years ago. At this point

[00:18:45] so a little bit contrived to say like cats out of the bag and many workers can work from home but

[00:18:50] we have shown that many workers are able to work from home. We can effectively and consistently

[00:18:58] deliver our performance and you know there's the occasional travel needed sometime.

[00:19:04] I think my boldest hottest perspective on RTO particularly RTO mandate is who is delivering the

[00:19:16] we have to go that bad message. And full disclaimer I'm about to say some like classic gatekeeping

[00:19:25] statements right now but like if you are a worker or a business leader in a position that might

[00:19:34] be defined as a more traditional household with only one working partner and maybe you don't have

[00:19:41] any caregiving responsibilities whether children or elders. I don't think you should get to make

[00:19:49] a call on RTO because such a fundamental aspect of our functioning society is our need to

[00:19:57] care for others and be present in our families and in our lives and this monolithic

[00:20:03] return to office go back to the way it was when part of the merit of what we experienced through

[00:20:10] pandemic is the way it was wasn't working for the majority of people mental health wasn't

[00:20:18] in a good place for mental health got worse during the pandemic but we're climbing out of an era

[00:20:25] of residents as proof that you're working into one of demonstrated impact. You don't have to

[00:20:37] physically in a cheer at work to show that anymore and as workers we all know that we all feel that

[00:20:44] so yeah that's my real goal take on RTO and one of the reasons why I work at your

[00:20:49] pay scale because we are not really going to have to go back to the other side. And it is interesting

[00:20:53] because you talked about I mean you know my guess is that CEOs of organizations saying people

[00:21:00] have got to be back to work and they're not productive unless they're in the office I always love

[00:21:04] Paul Wolf quote Paul Wilson our board here at pay scale he's also a HR thought leader

[00:21:09] you know he said your culture isn't built by the walls of your office which I love that quote

[00:21:15] but I also think about different perspectives of different groups of employees here because

[00:21:20] I have a daughter who has just started work at professional services firm here in London

[00:21:25] and she's really struggling because she she kind of moved to be in an office where she's being

[00:21:34] and I do worry that they will have a slower ramp because they're not necessarily getting

[00:21:41] you know the everybody in the office around them that potentially we all had when we

[00:21:45] started our careers but you alluded to Heather this has been our experience at pay scale

[00:21:50] we've been remote sex since the first of January 23 I keep saying or was it 22 23

[00:21:57] technically we were remote before that but we went we were a remote at that point we didn't have

[00:22:02] yes we did have some office look each and another few people would go in occasionally but

[00:22:07] yeah we're coming up on you ears into a remote first you know guidance and I think our employees

[00:22:15] love it they love the flexibility they love the ability to work kind of from wherever they like there

[00:22:20] are some boundaries that we put in place and they do have to notify us if they're working out

[00:22:24] of the country but for the most part they're able to work from where they're most comfortable

[00:22:29] and I think that's really important and we see that show up in the work that they bring to us at

[00:22:35] pay scale and it's it's it's really great I do think that there is a little bit of missed connection

[00:22:43] that we constantly have to be monitoring so that could be a good and a bad thing we at pay scale

[00:22:49] having executive team that very much supports us getting in person getting together collaborating

[00:22:54] building that connection so that when we do come back home to a remote environments we're

[00:23:00] able to still collaborate with one another we're still able to work and get yet things done

[00:23:04] like we need to so I think that those in person or friends maybe they're not all the time

[00:23:10] maybe it's one's a year twice a year those are still really important and to others when it does

[00:23:15] require some travel from our employees but I think that time is really beneficial for the success of the

[00:23:20] organization. I'm presumably you've had to rethink some of the talent life cycle processes

[00:23:26] to make them adapt to the remote environment like onboarding for example I'm thinking of.

[00:23:34] Yes yeah to your plea earlier our employees are coming to us newer and their careers

[00:23:39] are having a more difficult time ramping as you discuss it you can't necessarily look to your

[00:23:44] laughter you're right and it's a good question of your co-worker even your manager in real time

[00:23:48] you might have to slap them you might have to wait for response and sometimes that's

[00:23:53] difficult to do especially when you're newer in your career that that could derail you from working

[00:23:59] on a project or anything that you have to accomplish. I also managers have to learn to adapt

[00:24:06] to this new environment as well it's much harder managing someone remotely than when you kind of

[00:24:11] see them in the office you manage a relatively you know good-sized team Heather how have you had to

[00:24:18] think those back to to your point around mentorship and learning as well people managers and

[00:24:29] HR teams like the way that we're focused on coaching and mentoring and learning

[00:24:33] has really fundamentally shifted when we were all in the office together I wasn't in the

[00:24:40] office at Pacekiel but I think about my last role you did almost Ed Osmote the learning you know

[00:24:46] sitting next to each other and there's folks on your team who are like listening to the way you

[00:24:50] deliver a presentation or hey I'm going to take this client call you know they don't need to know

[00:24:56] you're there just like pop in and listen and like learn that way that sort of stuff is

[00:25:01] much harder now and so being deliberate about the learning experiences I think is critical

[00:25:08] but in some ways it's also like made me a better manager if that's a funny thing to say like

[00:25:15] I can't just walk by and be like hey what do you do in and like distract them from their flowstate it's

[00:25:20] like it really does provide the opportunity to nurture productivity

[00:25:28] also I sound like a terrible manager right now so I didn't do that before I did it but like

[00:25:35] even those moments where you were like oh what's happening with this and it's like

[00:25:41] you pause and you refer like oh do I need to know that right now or can I send an email with hey

[00:25:46] just like get this information to me like at your convenience or by this time like

[00:25:51] it makes us better at nurturing and supporting the productivity of those around us while still

[00:25:58] also having those connection and collaboration points yeah so a lot of change I think we'll continue to

[00:26:05] I think we'll continue to see you know us adapting to those remote environments

[00:26:13] so the last episode we're going to reflect on today is episode 75 which was broadcast

[00:26:19] October 22 so I had joined the podcast by this stage so this was my self-built and rust

[00:26:26] and at that time we discussed the new phenomenon of quiet quitting we talked about what it was

[00:26:32] worked to rule was it engagement problems and how HR and compensation professionals should respond

[00:26:41] so a reminder if you can't remember it quite quitting you know was based around the concept

[00:26:46] that you were still performing your duties but you're no longer subscribing to the hustle culture

[00:26:51] mentality that work has to be your life and there was a lot of debate at the time about you

[00:26:56] was it real was that what it was really about we broke some of that down in the podcast

[00:27:03] and really kind of questioned whether whether it was really a question of work like balance

[00:27:08] or a broader question which I thought it was around the decline in employee engagement that

[00:27:13] we were seeing in the workplace so Heather I can see you're going fired up for this one

[00:27:19] you go for it first tell us you were thoughts on this one there are so many things to say about

[00:27:24] this I'm going to see if like it's like like that first and foremost Ruth when I was

[00:27:30] releasing the podcast I love that you reminded everyone of definition of it that idea of

[00:27:36] your still performing your duties but no longer subscribing to the hustle culture this was touched

[00:27:42] on in the episode but when you just talk about quiet quitting in terms of the headline that definition

[00:27:48] is lost there is some merit to this notion of doing your job and doing it well but not grinding

[00:28:00] and I think the employee engagement conversation is an interesting one to dig into here

[00:28:06] there are some old research I think it's old research at this point I heard it at age

[00:28:11] 10 or 10 maybe 2016 2017 from Dr. Moon who's now at Columbia University and what her research

[00:28:20] showed was that when you look at measures of employee engagement and work a hallism you couldn't actually

[00:28:28] distinguish the two and that you know this is almost ten years ago at this point that has stuck

[00:28:35] with me and at least once a year I think about that research because today when you think about

[00:28:42] employee engagement like we as business as we have ourselves wrapped around this idea of employing

[00:28:47] engagement because it yields to things like productivity and business performance but I always pause

[00:28:53] and ask the question like is it employing engagement that we're seeking or is it grind culture that

[00:29:00] we're seeking is it the hours so that we can hit our performance metrics in our business metrics

[00:29:06] because if you can't tell the difference in the data how do you know which one you want

[00:29:12] and what are those distinguishing features of genuine employee engagement that make people want to invest

[00:29:21] more than their duties in the success of themselves and their role in their career in the business

[00:29:28] so yeah that's what's your point of view on employee engagement versus work a whole is

[00:29:32] them well the feeding boundaries is super important here right like understanding when enough

[00:29:37] is enough when an employee needs to unplug go recharge we want them to come back tomorrow prefo

[00:29:44] and so it's it's really about knowing when is enough is enough and when you're maybe pushing

[00:29:50] your employee just a little bit too much and I think those signs are going to present themselves

[00:29:54] right maybe it's rushed work maybe it's you're sensing an attitude or you're hearing

[00:30:00] we're rushed responses there are different social cues that you can look at and and see when

[00:30:06] an employee might be upset or might be being pushed a little bit too far and so I think creating

[00:30:12] those healthy boundaries and revisiting those boundaries on a regular basis and ensuring that

[00:30:18] holding each other accountable to that employee and manager

[00:30:24] what was your take on quite quitting at the time Zach and was it something

[00:30:28] you felt we were experiencing here at Pisco? I do think we were experiencing it we were hearing about

[00:30:34] it and you know some of our exit interviews maybe not from the person it was leaving but maybe

[00:30:39] they were exiting and they noticed it up their co-workers and so it's it was really about doing

[00:30:44] interviews re-engaging managers of employees especially and a remote environment where you can't just

[00:30:50] turn your left to your right and check in on that person you have to be a little bit more

[00:30:54] intentional about that slack message or setting up that zoom call at the right time and so it's

[00:31:01] it's really knowing about you know checking in and ensuring that you're listening watching

[00:31:07] and I think it was representative of the time of the tension that was in the workplace and I don't

[00:31:13] think we're done with that tension yet you know the tension between power to the employee power

[00:31:19] to the employer and I've seen a lot of people jump in and play with you know softening labor

[00:31:25] markets wage rates potentially coming down yeah the employer has power back again well you know

[00:31:31] I'm not there you know I think there's a lot more tension to play out and we really need to

[00:31:36] think about how we radically move cultures on and shift the culture to a place where the employee

[00:31:45] has choices you know about where they work when they work how they work and while that's the

[00:31:52] same time ensuring you know that we achieve productivity as a business and I think that tension is

[00:31:58] still really real in a lot of businesses today I don't know what any thoughts closing thoughts

[00:32:02] are you doing that for this to me is the the root and the interesting part of all of these conversations

[00:32:10] is when you think about pandemic driven layoffs at the start of the pandemic and then you think

[00:32:15] about you know just like the crisis of consciousness that we all experience going through the pandemic

[00:32:22] and you know in the episode where Bill and Matt and Russ were talking about predictions for

[00:32:35] what's ahead in the May 2020 episode no one predicted the great resignation but the great resignation

[00:32:41] was really a reflection of how workers felt they were treated during the pandemic and then you

[00:32:51] can pendulum and the thing that's interesting to me is there's meaning in all of these justs when we

[00:32:59] say these headline statements like quiet quitting bill reference ding your wage it's not these these

[00:33:07] statements are not about an anti-employer sentiment but it is I think about calling attention

[00:33:14] to what is today like the operating principle nurtures an adversarial dynamic we have not fully

[00:33:23] moved away from these notions of human as capital when we apply these capital principles and this

[00:33:30] is not like an anti-capitalist perspective but when you apply capital principles to people you are

[00:33:37] going to get capital dynamics and capital dynamics are push and pull supply demand they aren't inherently

[00:33:44] adversarial because they represent the binary movement of a system of up and down

[00:33:52] and if we want to get to a better way to your point is we need to think about what are workers within

[00:34:00] organizations and how do we nurture dynamics that foster things like choice and partnership

[00:34:10] and well-being and we're not quite there yet it's not so we can't get there on the economic operating

[00:34:16] model that we have but we're not there yet it's quite exciting times that to be an HR

[00:34:24] practitioner because we're seeing such transformation in the workplace is that what you're feeling

[00:34:29] so are you just fading see for stress about what the world needs to be done all of the above

[00:34:35] I think it's a fun time I think as HR professionals we're going to continue to be pressed

[00:34:41] for transparency I think we've talked a lot today about pay dreams piracy that I think it's going

[00:34:46] to extend even beyond that I think people are going to want to constantly mill more maybe why

[00:34:51] we're making business decisions why we're bringing in headcount and so I think as HR professionals

[00:34:56] as leaders we're going to continue to have to figure out what is the right amount of information

[00:35:01] to be sharing and what is the right time to share that patient great well thank you both for doing

[00:35:08] that little bit of reflection on me and helping us to celebrate this our hundredth episode

[00:35:13] but the celebration is on over we've got more celebrations to come we are about a week and a half

[00:35:19] way from conference which is pay scales annual virtual conference have that your in charge of

[00:35:26] making that show get on the road do you want to tell us a little bit about that how our audience can

[00:35:30] engage yes definitely so conference as the title indicators all about comp and I really do

[00:35:37] think that's the most exciting thing about this event it offers keen and practical insights

[00:35:42] to compensation professionals or those responsible for comp not as broad as rewards not as broad

[00:35:48] HR practices but really dedicated focused on calm it has the added benefit of you will never

[00:35:55] be able to say the word conference correctly ever again if you attend conference um or

[00:36:04] I can prove this because my husband does not work at pay scale and always says it's conference now

[00:36:09] even when he's talking not his education book is conference but the teams at pay scale have

[00:36:16] dedicated themselves to bring really impressive practitioner voices to bear in this years event

[00:36:21] I am as you noted earlier root the session that you're moderating with heaven, heaven,

[00:36:27] surica and Jessica on day one or keynote I'm so excited about that one because it's all about

[00:36:33] the urgency or compensation practices in modern age are how do we get back to the basic

[00:36:39] fundamental foundational building blocks that make things like engagement and culture possible

[00:36:44] and why comp is going to be a key variable in that formula for success there's a few others

[00:36:51] that I'm excited about choosing the right salary data to ensure fair and competitive pay on day one

[00:36:58] and the thing to call out as well is that the main event all of this education and all of these

[00:37:03] sessions it free to attend like we at pay scale were just jazzed about come up so we like to

[00:37:09] conference for free but we also offer like deeper dive educational workshops at the end of each day

[00:37:17] and that's to give folks leading compensation in HR teams a little bit of a fast ramp on key

[00:37:24] practices so one of the workshops that we have is best practices for suitable

[00:37:29] pay structure we're going to cover pay ranges internal and external equity foundations for leveling

[00:37:35] you know if you're getting started on your compensation journey and you want to do so in a way that

[00:37:40] has an eye towards equity in the future that's a great workshop because it's small group it's

[00:37:46] practical and it's low cost all things considered developing a pay calm strategy is another workshop

[00:37:52] on the third day that's also top of mind as you're navigating these no practices I should have muted my computer

[00:37:59] sorry really you want to make sure that you have equally internal communication set up

[00:38:08] and then of course reporting so for teams that want to dig deep on market pay and pay factors

[00:38:12] reporting we've got workshops for that so go to pay scale.com forward slash comp for rents

[00:38:20] never say the word correctly again that means no you're late so you can guide our we will include the

[00:38:28] in the episode notes if you follow us on LinkedIn it's all across our LinkedIn I've been

[00:38:34] posting this week about the sessions that I'm in Vulgan so I've been including the link there so

[00:38:38] you can follow me root on us on LinkedIn thank you both for giving your time today and audience hope

[00:38:46] you enjoyed the celebrate tree episode let us know what you think at coffee at payscaled.com

[00:38:52] and if there's a topic that in a past episode that you enjoyed that you'd like us to revisit let us

[00:38:57] know and make sure you register for conference thank you very much