The other day, I received an intriguing email string with a couple of articles and an attached document. It turns out that my colleague Lacey Partipilo had received this email from one of her clients and then she forwarded it to another colleague, Tyler Meuwissen, and me. I was fascinated and shocked by what I found in the attached Google Doc: a bunch of wage data that appeared to have been crowdsourced from people all across the country.
When I began to reflect on some of the problems and risks that we could run into by lending credibility to this data, I knew it would be the perfect podcast discussion, so I decided to bring my colleagues, Lacey and Tyler, in to talk about it.
My First Impressions of Crowdsourcing Wage Data
As I scoured the document, I found not only wage information, but several variables such as sexual orientation, race, gender, salary, job title, years of experience, and location. This led me to believe that the document was being passed around to help employees find out what others in their field were paid in order to help them negotiate salary. I wondered, could this be a method that brings transparency to compensation?
I know that there comes a point where we all question whether we’re being compensated fairly, or whether our compensation is hinging on a variable that we hadn’t considered. It sure would be nice to have the information that an employer has when deciding on fair compensation, but could there be problems with compiling information this way? These were the types of ideas that I tossed around with Lacey and Tyler.
Appearances Can Be Deceiving
When I asked Tyler what he thought about this method of gathering wage data, he noted that he thinks that “the foundation behind this data is the perception of a job, what job duties are, and job function, which can create issues.” This is especially prevalent when, according to Lacey, the spreadsheet lists “inflated job titles” but doesn’t indicate the specific duties of each of these positions.
Tyler provided an example: “A design manager in one company could [have a] completely different [role] than a design manager in another company. One could manage people. One could not manage people, just processes. And that leads to a variance in pay, which can give the improper impression that this position commands a larger or lesser salary than it does.”
What About the Vetting Process?
And that brought us to the topic of vetting. PayScale, Glassdoor, and other employment data sites have “verifiable […] certified compensation professionals going through the data, verifying that it is accurate and vetting it against job duties, job functions, [while] talking to HR and finance departments,” Tyler noted.
However, with a spreadsheet like the one I found in my email from Lacey, the lack of checks and balances equals potential exaggeration or, in worse cases, completely false data. Tyler even pointed out that an employer, with less than good intentions and an eye for his bottom line, could “go on that spreadsheet and input lower salaries” to keep current employees from leaving.
Doing Away with the Stigma
Tyler, Lacey, and I then began to explore the stigma associated with discussing compensation. Tyler thinks it’s time for a change. Instead of keeping compensation private and personal, he said, “I think there’s a need for organizations to get in the forefront of how they’re communicating compensation […] and to also project their compensation philosophy and compensation strategy to their employees.” This lets them know that they’re valued and allows them to plan for their future, giving employees a sense of security and less of a desire to look where the grass appears to be greener.
Lacey agreed, encouraging employers to put into place “a well-documented philosophy” on compensation and to keep an open dialogue with employees. She said that if a company’s employees were circulating a document containing crowdsourced wage data, she would probably have concerns about the transparency between the leadership and the employees. If companies want to avoid this potential mutiny, communication and honesty are key.
Want to Hear More?
Click below to listen to the full podcast about employee wage data crowdsourcing, and find out what transparent compensation looks like.
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