139: RealTalkHR: ”What the COMP?”

Speaker A: Foreign.

Speaker B: Welcome back, everybody, uh, to another conversation about hr and, uh, with my friends Bobby and Chris Therone. This is the HR revolution about. It's a revolution of HR for the evolution of business. And we're here with our coffees in hand to talk about. What everybody's talking about here in upstate New York, or New York in general, is the compensation disclosure agreement, um, which officially went into effect on September 17th, uh, right after those Sunday Night football games. Um, really excited to have this conversation with two prolific, uh, leaders in their own craft, um, to just talk about, um, what this means for not only employers. Um, what does it mean for employees that are currently within their organizations, as well as those applicants, the potential and future, uh, employees of organizations? What does this level of transparency mean? What is the opportunity? What are the potential, um, roadblocks, um, that organizations face? Um, but ultimately, what is the silver lining in such a transparent law to be passed to force, um, organizations to start to really think about how they're compensating people? Um, is it a common practice? Is it clear? Um, does it provide enough clarity to build accountability across our workforce, to really help them m, attract, retain, develop and engage that top talent? So, without further ado, I wanted to quickly introduce Bobby and, uh, have Bobby quickly jump, uh, us off in today's Real Talk HR conversation about comp.

Speaker A: Yeah. Thanks, Kevin. Chris, nice to see you again. I'm excited to have this conversation. You know, it's funny, just a couple years ago, um, there was a, There was a study that was released by, by US employers that basically said that 19% of, um, employees within organizations, uh, were prohibited to talk about compensation at all. And then another 31%, um, were discouraged to talk about compensation. So add those two numbers up, right? That's 50% of employees that can't have open, transparent conversations within the workplace about compensation. Look how far we've come, you know, in this world now. I think it's a great thing. I think that people need to be able to, you know, talk a little bit about, you know, what they're earning and how much they're making, because it's only going to help the next person in line. It's only going to help your peer. It's only going to help your colleagues. So, um, we'll. We'll get into some of the pros and cons, uh, I know, throughout this episode, but excited to be here, Kevin. Thanks.

Speaker B: That's awesome. Bobby, thanks for, thanks for sharing those additional, uh, data points. 50%, I commonly say, and Chris and I were joking Last week that this is like every business leader's worst nightmare. Right. Because I go back to when I first joined the workforce, and that was almost, uh, the first business rule that was bestowed upon me, right.

Speaker A: As that.

Speaker B: That. That nurturing. Right. Um, never talk about your compensation. Um, and that's something that even my parents and my grandparents had shared with me.

Speaker A: Right?

Speaker B: Is you don't share that with friends and family. It's something that you keep private, um, to yourself, not to be braggadocious, but also not to, um, potentially send the wrong message to the individual.

Speaker A: So.

Speaker B: So it's kind of societal, um, as well, um, that compensation has been something that, um, we've been so fearful of discussing, but now that we are right, and maybe that 50% that Bobby just talked about has pushed us to increase compensation to actually keep pace or keep track with inflation, which we know employers, um, were falling behind, um, quite significantly. And then we saw that gap between men and women. Right. Continue to not get smaller. It's. It's almost stayed at that 82 to 85, uh, cents on the dollar that we've seen. So I'm excited. Chris, how are you feeling about compensation disclosure?

Speaker C: Yeah, I think. I think to your point, Kevin, this is. It's been a long time coming, and it just shows the evolution along the way. Um, and I think it's a timely topic for us as we think about the UAW and the, you know, potential strikes that's going on with the United Auto Workers union. So I think that pay, you know, not. Not just in terms of. Of transparency of pay, but also equity. Um, you know, are organizations afraid of this? Maybe if they've been hiding things. Right. Yeah. So how your organization responds to this, how your organization is, you know, preparing itself for this and then moving forward, I think will say a lot about your organization. And do you want to be an organization that, you know, values equity, that. That shares transparency and builds trust between the employer and the employee? I think this will go a long way to help do that.

Speaker B: I love what you said, too, because we've all sat through those interviews, we've all heard the sales pitch, right, about how great the organization is, how. How equitable, inclusive. Right. And how they pay for performance. Um, it's kind of fascinating, um, because at the same time, with. Without transparency, we blame. Right. And I get more concerned. And Bobby had talked about it before we got on today's episode about the whole performance conversation. Right. Because performance and compensation on that side had been so subjective, um, and instead of objective, in most cases, and that only spells disaster for organizations like you said, that are hiding it, um, or maybe putting on or painting a pig, right. Or looking through rose colored glasses. Um, but organizations just like James Sharp that we had a few weeks ago, Chris, they were ahead of the curve, right? And they just said, hey, if it's coming in California, it's going to be in New York, it's in some of these cities that you had shared in Ohio. Why not do it across the country? Because this is a best practice and albeit I know we'll see employers that work around, right. The law. Um, and I think we heard rumblings in New York City when they passed it that Amazon and some of those large organizations were not going to hire level executives in New York State anymore. Um, and that was their real threat to New York State to show, hey, you're going to lose some taxable income and high income earners. Um, but the state didn't really care, I guess. Um, they knew that they had the backing of other states and this was kind of the way of the future. So what are you, what can we just talk about? What are the risks, right, for an employer? Um, so current employees now have access to even more information about employer. Yes. Skip Glass door. Yes, we can see how the managers are, well, how highly rated the CEO and the benefits packages are. But now we even have more transparency when it comes to the number one priority or assumed number one priority of the active talent market, which is compensation. What is the risk, Bobby? What do you see as the greatest risk right now for organizations?

Speaker A: Well, I think first and foremost, Kevin, Chris, I think that, you know, organizations really have to make sure that their house is in order. Right. I think the organizations that have been, you know, looking at pay compression practices, you know, on a regular basis, looking at their comp philosophy, you know, and sort of, you know, kind of massaging that on an annual or semi annual basis are the ones that are going to, you know, do really well, right? Because they've been, they've been thinking about this, you know, kind of ahead of time here, you know, however, those organizations, you know, that are now forced to kind of scramble at the last minute. Um, you know, I think there's, there's some risk there, right, because you know, as you're rolling out, you know, your scales, right, you certainly want to make sure, um, that, you know, you're, you're being equitable to your current population as well. So that's, I think, you know, top of mind, sort of the first risk is those organizations that have been Thinking about this for quite some time. Um, you know, and have been practicing good compensation, you know practices and have put those into play year over year are going to do well. And those that are kind of, you know, coming in late to the game, uh, you know, it's going to be rush time.

Speaker B: Crawl, walk, run. I love how you said get your, get your house in order. But in all the work that I've done around this over the last year has been number one about compensation philosophy. Um, Bobby. Because it gives you, you know you're going to have those middle managers get asked the questions first and if they don't have a good answer and um, they're kind of eluding the question about that compression or how, how are we possibly hiring for, for somebody in that role. And I've been here for 20 years and they're making more than me arming them with that insight and information to give the clear direction as to why. Um, and that only I think starts with a compensation philosophy from, from the top down. So I loved how you said get your house in order because if you can be transparent internally it helps essentially build that trust. Um, and gives them more of an example as to we've thought about this instead of a fire drill, um, that I think most organizations are going to find themselves in. Chris, what do you, what do you see as the greatest risk for employers?

Speaker C: Yeah, I think you just hit it and saying about trust Kevin. And it comes down to the trust that employees have for their companies. There was a recent research uh, that was published in February of this year from the Harvard Business Review that showed the results of a SHRM study. And on the SHRM study 73% of workers said they're more likely to trust their employers if they're providing pay ranges. Right. So 73% are more likely to trust their companies about the same amount said uh, you know, they'd be less interested in applying for organizations that don't share the pay range for each of these positions too. So what's the biggest thing for risk? From my standpoint, it's that that trust or creating building trust within organizations who are transparent or for those that this is going to be a difficult journey to get them there. Really risking that, that trust factor between them and their team members.

Speaker B: Yeah. And then you, then you'll have turnover but less uh, resilient of a workforce. The grass is always apparently gre um in other pastures. Right. With those types of individuals that are in a non trustworthy environment, those high trust environments, it seems like they get more out of their employees. Um, I was just in an organization yesterday doing some focus groups and we didn't. There was not one complaint.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker B: In a high trust environment, which I found fascinating. It was more constructive feedback. Uh, right. What, what can we do to go to level.

Speaker C: Yeah, correct.

Speaker B: And it's, it's fascinating. But to your point, I'm sure there's going to be organizations that only share compensation ranges in those specific states that they're to a law. Um, but to your point, if I saw that as an employee, what is that, what is that employer's brand or reputation at that point? So I loved how you said that because I think those that don't get on board, um, and make it kind of, um, common practice or habit. Um, and to continue that conversation, uh, internally, it's one thing that we have to disclose the compensation ranges on the front end. Right. And we fight so hard to find this talent and bring them in. But just like onboarding kind of usually is lacking in performance reviews and stay interviews and whatever names that we want, these are just general conversations that we can expect are going to be more common. Um, having, having that interaction with their managers. Because if a performance review is not associated with a compensation increase, that becomes even more challenging of a discussion with that individual because where, where can they go? Um, and if this perception that I can't go anywhere here, maybe there's a better opportunity somewhere else with more mobility for myself. So I love that. What about prospective candidates, Bobby, you being more on the talent acquisition side, what are you hearing in some of those states? And maybe, maybe you've seen it. Um, are they coming more informed? Do they come with more questions? Less questions? Like this level of transparency, I think skips through a lot of the BS questions that we're afraid to ask because we're still uncomfortable really being in the driver's seat as a candidate. Um, it's not commonplace for our generations and generations before us. Um, what are you seeing? Do they come in with more or less questions? And, and I guess do you get more to the heart of the conversation as to what am I doing for that comp range?

Speaker A: You know, I think this is great for the job seeker. Right. Because we're already in a, in a candidate market, you know, job seeker market today I think we're still at, you know, somewhere around a 2 to 1 job posting to available candidate market. So you know, not only are you, you know, kind of able to, to pick and choose, um, you know, what jobs and what companies, you know, match your interest, but now, you know, in many cases you have the ability to sort of understand what those jobs are paying. So I think, you know, from a candidate's perspective, I think they're feeling really, really great. Right. And again, there's so much, um, you know, good that that comes about from having these pay transparency ranges in, you know, terms of, you know, uh, pay equity and things of that nature. But I think it allows that, you know, that interview process now to be a little bit more of a two way street because candidates are now sort of armed with this information. So if that particular range that you see on a job posting is, you know, not what you're looking for in your next opportunity, um, you're simply just, you know, going to choose to go elsewhere. Right. And so not only is that helping you in your decision making process and not wasting your time, but, um, at the end of the day, um, it's helping employers, you know, weed out individuals who might be, you know, kind of wanting more or, you know, whatever it might be, or, you know, unqualified for a position. So I, you know, ultimately I think it's a, it's a really good thing. Um, and you know, I'm kind of excited to see where it goes next.

Speaker C: Yeah, I'll just add on that, Bobby. I agree with you 100% and I look at it as, this actually creates, I think, a benefit for both candidates and for the internal recruiting departments or external that you're working with. Here's a quick story. We recently had an open position and uh, we put it out there before the pay transparency law went into place. I think we had about 300 applicants for the one position. Once pay transparency went in, we had about a hundred. Right. So that's less time that the recruiter has to spend screening through resumes looking for information on the candidate side. You know, different companies call different jobs things all. Are you a specialist? Right. Are you, are you a generalist? How are they titling their positions? Isn't always easy to decipher when you're looking at open positions. So knowing now what that range is, that's going to help you as a candidate say, okay, yep, that looks like a good fit for me. That's within my range, what I'm looking for versus nope. That's obviously, you know, not what I'm looking for, not what I, what I want. I'm not going to apply or wasted or we're getting rid of all that wasted time. And then when you're actually having the screening interviews and the dreaded salary question comes Up. Uh, now we, you know, we can, we can approach a little bit differently. You've seen the job, the salary range, you know, as we posted it, assuming that that fits within what you're looking for, fantastic. We move on. Right? So I see this as a big benefit not only for candidates, and I've spoken to, you know, networking groups where there's job seekers, and they told me quite blankly, this is great. I love being able to see what the range is because that's going to tell me, hey, here's what the organization, you know, values for that position. Here's. They've done their homework, right? So they're competitive in that, in that pay range, and it's a lot easier for them. There's a less, I think, stress going into it because they know they don't have to worry about the dreaded salary question during the interview.

Speaker A: So.

Speaker B: You know what? I love that you brought up Chris, which I think is like, just hilarious. As I'm sitting here reflecting is, um, how many HR leaders are happy about this?

Speaker A: Right?

Speaker B: Um, because I go back to the talent acquisition. How many back. How much back and forth is there with a hiring manager for a new position or to backfill a role that somebody left, right? Um, and I think it gives them an opportunity to elevate that talent conversation, right? And really start to get the business and that hiring manager to think, what is that HC for that particular role? And is that cost? And are we seeing an investment or return on that investment from that cost of human capital? And then it kind of gets you into the next conversation of business structure. We talk about titles. We talk about titles. Were the compensation bonus of old, right? Um, you got a promotion. But everybody said, oh, congratulations on the promotion. Did you get a raise? No, didn't get a race. Got more. Got. Got more. More responsibility. Because that was businesses saying, okay, they want to move up in an organization, let's just give them a title. And a title that's not backed in any form of compensation philosophy or modeling. Um, so I guess it forces organizations to now think, are we, Are we paying for performance? Do we pay for skills or do we pay for experience? And it really is kind of this level setting in organizations during this revolutionary time that I think I get excited because it could be that fresh new page of the journal of that entire organization's model to start to really say, well, what is the talent market? Is it 2 to 1? And if it's 2 to 1, how do we start to prioritize and understand what skills that we need today and how are we going to develop tomorrow's skills needed, um, to continue to be successful. So I see it as a great opportunity to both of your points because it is that fresh start. Um, and maybe it's that perfect opportunity for that introspective view of leaders to understand why do we even offer compensation to begin with? Um, and how do we look at maybe more total rewards to look at the entire package of how we're supporting the holistic wellness and satisfaction of an individual employee. So fascinating stuff.

Speaker C: I mean, I don't want us to be naive about this either. Right. So there was a reason why companies did not publicly disclose salaries for a while and it was, you know, maybe they're paying for experience, maybe they're paying for, you know, a tight labor market. Um, so I think it all goes back to Bobby's point about having your house in order.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: You know, yeah, there's benefits to it. Yeah, it's going to be helpful. Yeah. It helps to build trust, uh, within prospective team members or employees and current ones. But there's some work that needs to be done. Right. And if you haven't had a, ah, an equity refresher, you haven't looked at your comp plans or your philosophy for a few years from now. Yeah, you may have a pretty big, you know, hill you have to climb to get there. So hopefully these companies have been doing it since.

Speaker B: Who's at fault though, right?

Speaker A: Chris?

Speaker B: Um, I have had tons of conversations and I was in very high level meetings with CEOs, CFO, COOs, and I was the one that broke the news. This is coming, right? So like at the same time, we're so busy in hr, this is something that should have been starred, underlined and dotted on every priority list since January, since the New York State announced that this was coming. It was not right in most organizations that I, I was in. Um, and who's at fault? Right? Because finance, now, that's going to blow up. Consider your budget. Right. You don't want to lose a lot of people if you haven't been doing the right thing. Your, your budget just got ballooned, um, for next year, especially for human capital. And when you give comp, you know, you can't get that back. So it'll be interesting to see how organizations kind of start to formalize their philosophy and strategy. But I think starts back to Bobby's point is laying the right foundation. Foundation allows you to point back to something, allows you to build off of, um, but if you don't have A solid foundation. I don't really see how this transparency is really going to help. Um, but I love it too. At the same time, Chris, when you said from an applicant perspective, I think that trust. Right. Rebuilding that trust with a workforce that may not be very trustworthy. Right. Of business, given the pandemic and the trauma that they experienced. Um, one of the other things I wanted to kind of talk about that, not to be naive, is the, um, growth of the side hustle. I found it fascinating. My wife was just sharing some Gen Z information and over 50% of Gen Z have a side hustle. And that's something that was so foreign and still foreign to businesses to even understand how could they possibly work two jobs? That means I'm not getting everything out of that person. So it's, that's another phenomenon that's happening at the same time. And maybe this is what economists started to say is when we start to transition to that contingent worker economy. So kind of interesting stuff. Um, but let's, let's switch gears a little bit. Let's talk about what organizations are doing or can start to do today if they feel like they're behind the eight ball. Bobby, where would you start? You're a leader of an HR organization, you have a good relationship with finance and see the CEO, um, where would you start?

Speaker A: Yeah, so as, as it relates to, to, to the pay transparency, Kevin, and compensation things of that nature. I think.

Speaker B: Yes.

Speaker A: Well, the, the first thing is, right, is, is you have to look at, you know, internal equity first. I think you have to look at your current employees. And I think even before that. Let me take a step back. I think you have to really, if you haven't already done it, you have to really create and develop and make sure that your compensation philosophy is in line with your organizational values. You know, how are you going to position yourself from a compensation standpoint? Are you going to lead the market? Um, are you going to be sort of market matching? Are you going to be lagging the market? Maybe you're a smaller organization and you don't necessarily have the financial resources, but, um, that you can sort of, you know, do some other things that, that really engage your employee base and things of that nature. So I think you have to be honest with yourself first as an organizational leader or leader of human resources to understand, you know, what is that compensation philosophy look like? Um, you know, and then start to really dive into that, you know, internal, you know, equity, you know, where are, you know, what are employees, you know, being paid? Um, you know, how, how have we come up with our pay ranges, you know, today? Are we classifying jobs, are we not classifying jobs? All of those things are really important because I don't, I think if you don't get that internal piece, right, um, you know, you're, you're going to risk a few different things, right? You're going to risk kind of coming out to the market and looking sort of, you know, kind of disorganized. And then, you know, the old, the age old saying is, you know, uh, you know, compensation gets people at the door, you know, through the door, and then benefits kind of keeps them. Well, now that compensation is kind of coming out, right, um, for your internal employees, you know, you can risk, you know, truly kind of losing trust and faith as Chris kind of mentioned as well, if you're not doing that. Right. So it can kind of be a double edged sword. Um, you know, if you're not laying that groundwork as we talked about earlier.

Speaker B: Yeah. I go back to the TAs and the hiring managers. Are they going to be skilled and armed enough to evolve that conversation that they're having with that potential candidate?

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: How quickly can you have the compensation conversation but then go towards that total rewards philosophy that you also have as an organization? Because to Chris's point that even that Internal posting from 300 to 100 now, you got to be a little bit more selective as you continue to dwindle down that talent pool and people that are already struggling for talent without disclosing the compensation and then can convince somebody or sell somebody on the opportunity or the role, they not even going to have that at bat. Um, so, but I look at that

Speaker A: as a positive Kevin, actually too, from an external standpoint. And I'll say it because of what Chris said. Right. You know, I was talking with some college students the other night and you know, they were all sort of applying at, uh, different levels of the job interview process and they're asking me, when do I, when do I ask that, that salary question? You know, when, when can I talk about money? Right. And it's funny because we think that's just the job seekers mentality, but oftentimes the employers, you know, prior to this paid transparency were kind of thinking the same thing, you know, when do we bring this up? Right? And so what that does is it, it moves people through the process. They get to the second round, they get to the third round, and then all of a sudden we have this conversation and we're not aligned. Right. So you either better have, you know, A quality backup candidate ready to go, or you got to restart that process. So, you know, I look at, you know, hopefully at some level, metrics like time to fill, time to accept things of that nature will, you know, start to. To look a little bit better. Um, because we're kind of, you know, able to have these conversations a little bit, you know, kind of upfront in the process.

Speaker B: I'm not, I know having conversations with my friends when they're going through the interview process. I'm always like, you didn't ask comp on the first interview. Like, why do you even want to waste your time in their time? And they'll go through like eight interviews before having that conversation. Right. Which is just crazy to me.

Speaker C: It is. It's staggering.

Speaker B: But, Chris, as I'm sitting here listening to Bobby, and maybe this tees you up, but, um, I think about kind of the adverse. Right. So the financial lens, profitability. If profitability is that number one value of an organization, does this push organizations to look at digital transformation more? Right. And automation, does it get organizations to start thinking a little bit differently towards talent?

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: Do I actually need this person or not? Um, can I augment that with AI? Um, so maybe it forces organizations to really look internally, too, to improve pro process, to maximize performance. There was this one CEO that I listened to that said pay. Basically, he would look at roles, he would pay people significantly more. I think it was. It was either Zoom, um, or Netflix. I can't. I think it was Netflix, how they first got started. But basically would pay to his philosophy more than anybody else on the market because he would get somebody and that person would do the job of four people. And. And I, ah, kind of found that to be an interesting philosophy because of Bobby's point that negotiation is sometimes the most critical to an organization's success to buy a talent for less than a value that that particular individual brings.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker B: Um, so maybe, maybe there's some other silver linings that forces businesses to look a little bit differently, um, at their entire approach too.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: And I think to your point earlier, Kevin, when you talked about working with finance and even if you're doing internal equity and you realize, hey, maybe we're. We're below here and we have to make internal adjustments so finance has to account for that. We have to start putting that into the budget, just like the pandemic forced us to really look at it transformation and go light years ahead of where we ever thought we were going to do so. You know, companies going fully remote in six months, where they thought it was going to take them three years. But, you know, due to the pandemic, I think this law put into place may for some companies to say, okay, great, we're going to increase our labor budget, but where can we now make some, you know, advancements? Is it A.I. uh. So can this drive A.I. uh, transformation? Because we're kind of forced to right at this point, knowing that our budgets are being spent perhaps in this area. So I think that's a really interesting point. I think to build off of Bobby's point earlier about what do organizations need to start doing now if they haven't been fully prepared for this? Um, I think it's, it's just upskilling and providing the awareness to leaders, to managers, to team members. To your point, Bobby, if we had a compensation philosophy, if we're going to lag the market, but we never posted any of our information and none of our team members really knew that was our philosophy. Well, we're going to have to tell them now. Right. Because we're going to have to show and be upfront. And I think, Kevin, to your point earlier, you want managers and leaders who are able to fully articulate the why behind this to ensure that we're not losing trust, we're not losing any of the, you know, we're not risking any of that with our, with our current team members or future team members number.

Speaker B: But doesn't this also disrupt if we're talking about going that far back? Because we are kind of talking about going a little backwards. Um, first to. To. To crawl, walk, run, sprint. Um, doesn't this throw a monkey wrench into succession planning?

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker B: Career road mapping, individual development. Right. I think some of these organizations have focused on those, those, those areas. Right. But now this kind of does throw a level of disruption into that because that now also has an additional layer of transparency too. So whatever they do, um, I always say establish a common language. Right. To your point, communicate and educate, um, all levels of management and leadership teams. Because you know this is going to happen whether you wait for it to happen or not. I used, I like to be a little proactive and know that people are going to come to you with questions. And maybe it's only 50% of your team, to Bobby's point. Right. Maybe still 50% of people believe or don't know that this law exists. Um, how long does that last for? Right. So it could be coming almost waves. I think younger generations, those that are involved in this area know it. Right. And they'll go immediately. I Plan to. Right. I'm not lying. I plan on going to see what, what, what, what they, what ranges that my company is posting too. Um, but even a sales management um, training that we are. SWOT analysis that we had. I told one of our area presidents that hey, this concerns me as an employee for our service staff and our sales professionals. And Bobby, I think you were kind of talking about that a little bit in some of these areas that had to go in the comp disclosure before New York State and before New York City and you saw almost uh, you mentioned like a leveling of compensation but you are also concerned that it might impact organizations, sales organizations. Right. That pay compensation for performance. Do you want to kind of dive into that as to why you're concerned and what, what they need to be aware of? Um, because there are a lot of organizations in that sales um, service model. Um, given that that's the primary GDP of, of. Of the United States.

Speaker A: Yeah, no, absolutely. So you know, I think, I think just to, just to be upfront. Right. The, the good and you know by, by miles and miles is that you know, pay transparency, you know, ultimately leads to pay equity. I think that's first and foremost. Right. But I think you know, as we think of you know, pay transparency and potentially some of you know, the um, sort of behind the scenes effects that it can have on organizations is more of this kind of pay leveling structure. Right. So if you're bringing people in, you know, kind of at a certain rate and your internal employees, you're, you're really looking at compression and kind of making sure that you know, um, there, there's not huge deltas there. Um, you know it begins to be sort of everybody is kind of paid around the same level. So you know, does a pay per for performance culture look a little bit differently? Um, you know, and things of that nature. So I don't believe at this point in time there's really been enough, you know, kind of data out there as, as we kind of mentioned, you know we're started, we're sort of at you know, the just the beginning stages of this whole journey with pay transparency. But you know, it's certainly something to kind of think if you're an organization that's a pay for performance culture, um, you know, what is, what does that look like going forward? Is there you know, a big enough spread in between your high performers and your low performers?

Speaker B: Well, I love and too. Right. In any sales think about that. Right. Because uh, how does that go into their total compensation? Right. So a Sales role, entry level, sales role. Or I will tell you, recruiters reach out to me all the time and say, hey Kevin, we got this new sales role. It's great opportunity and it's $400,000 a year. Now when you start to fact find and ask questions, that person's been there for 10 years. They're not in upstate New York, they're in, um, metropolitan Atlanta. And you're like, great, how the hell are you comparing me with that market and with that person with those skills and telling me that I can make 400,000? So in sales there's relatively this, um, level of safety that you give up in your base compensation with the opportunity and that distance and that gap. To your point, Bobby, I just wonder how many people won't go towards sales, um, because they just see the lower compensation and that lower guaranteed compensation and might start transitioning into other professional spaces too. Um, to your point, that's, that's really interesting to start to think about because yeah, their comp will be so significantly below most of the other full time positions.

Speaker A: I think it goes back to Kevin, to something that you kind of teased up earlier and sort of this, you know, gig economy or side hustles and things of that nature. You know, I, um, think there's, there's two reasons why people kind of look at the side hustle or you know, kind of owning their own business or starting their own ventures. One, you know, it's that unlimited or uncapped potential. Right? So, you know, that's, that's something to kind of think about is now we're putting ranges out there. There's, there's a cap there.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: Ultimately, um, the other side of it is, you know, of course, is more the intrinsic motivator of, you know, I, you know, can't get this particular skill in the workplace or I can't exercise this particular muscle in the workplace. And what I'm doing today, so, you know, I'm going to create a side hustle to do that. Um, but, but, you know, but I think it's a good point. You know, if you're in a position like sales or you know, where you have, you know, unkept, you know, potential, does that, does that encourage more folks to kind of leave, uh, you know, their, their particular job to kind of go into a field like that, does

Speaker B: it allow organizations to start to really, and we've been talking about it for quite some time, but evaluate other labor pools that they haven't previously considered because that could be a significant raise, even though Right. If they look at their traditional market, they're falling maybe in, in the middle, but to a hostess, to a bartender, to a waitress, that is a huge raise with benefits that they've never had before. Therefore, they would be more willing to take that compensation because they haven't yet realized the value that they potentially bring to an organization. Organization. So maybe it just gets people thinking a little bit more strategically, um, instead of firing from the hip. And I think that's kind of what we're seeing right now is so reactionary to the market. But organizations like Chris's and, and James's and, and those organizations that just said, hey, we're doing it in one state, let's just do it all across the country. Um, I'm sure that was way more work than just focusing on New York State. Um, but it also allowed them to step ahead of their competition because they were the ones being transparent first. And if you're first to transparency, um, I think in this market that's really what people are buying. Um, so, and I also think it's an opportunity to, to we've been flirting with it, but equity, right, and, and equity and diversity and inclusion and belonging. I think I've always said, right, that it all starts with equity. If you can't pay men and women the same, then how can you support a diverse culture? Who, what diverse individual would want to come? If I know a man's making a dollar and I'm making 82 cents, given that I feel like my performance, and if I looked at my performance reviews, I'm actually better than, and I'm still making 82 cents to the dollar. So I, I, I, I think equity, I, I think this is a great opportunity. Again, some people might have low marks, right? But how does that build or rebuild an employer brand? Um, and I've seen great examples here In Rochester, like ESL, something they've done for 10 years, 15 years, is share those numbers continuously with the market to allow them almost to take in that information and come up to their own conclusion. But it's pretty cool when an organization is being transparent with something that we've been told, um, we can't know and can't tell others what we're making.

Speaker C: And I think that's it. I mean, at the end of the day, it's about equity and looking at this as, oh my gosh, there's a new law that now we have to adhere to. Um, I think that's the wrong approach. I think if you look at this as, hey, this is the good thing to do for our business. At the end of the day, this is going to help us. It's going to increase trust within our team members and our employees. Um, you know, and it's the right thing to do. And I think that that's really the approach that organizations need to take. What will the downstream impacts and effects be? I think maybe we'll have another conversation in six months. Yeah, we can talk about it. Right? Are we seeing, you know, mass exoduses?