Show Us the Money!!! Why Adding the Salary to a Job Description is Critical to Equitable (and Timely) Hiring
Show us the Money!!!
Why Adding the Salary to a Job Description is Critical to Equitable (and Timely) Hiring
At Hustle Hunters, we’re committed to transparency and equity and therefore strive to provide as many details in terms of compensation to candidates up front as possible. Here’s why we include the salary ranges on JD’s for the roles we work:
Pay Inequity
People are not paid equally for their work. This is well researched and documented, and rampant across the tech industry. Even within teams that try to avoid unfair policies, the existence of our inherent bias, especially if left unchecked with education, salary bands and other guardrail measures, can lead to severe inequities. Candidates that identify/present as women, gender fluid, non-binary, LGBTQ+, fat, Black, Indigenous, Latinx, older, caregivers often make signifigantly less than colleagues doing similar work. If you’re reading this and aren’t sure it happens - I challenge you to engage a few women you know closely in the discussion around their experiences with pay inequity. Creating, sharing, and sticking to pay bands is an important step in building equity into pay policies.
Compared to each $1 earned by non-hispanic white men in the US…
Check out www.EqualPayDay.org to learn more about this data and movements to make change here
Defined and transparent salary bands are one of the best ways to ensure equal pay within an organization
Candidate Experience
Most people work to make money, supporting themselves and often immediate and extended families. Especially within the tech industry where salaries tend to be higher than median wages across other industries - there tends to be a coyness around salary bands assuming that whatever the number - it’ll be enough to “live on.” This flippancy around salary is stemmed in the privilege of being able to evaluate an opportunity where the money isn’t an important evaluation criteria. Sharing salary ranges upfront on a job description shows candidates that a company recognizes the need to support themselves and potentially their families (immediate and extended). Fringe benefits can be really valuable too, but pale in comparison to cash compensation.
The team that scoped the role are the experts in what will be expected from this hire. Candidates are just learning a role as they begin the interview process, and are usually ill equipped for identifying the salary they’d personally want for doing this role without learning more details and doing additional research.
Interviewing and been asked what your target salary range is?? 81Cents and #HIREBLACK just put out some AMAZING resources on how to navigate this challenging question while continuing to research the market and understand the role.
Hiring Team’s Time
Hiring teams are stretched thin already! Ensuring alignment on compensation early in the process lets everyone focus on conversations with candidates that are in the right range, and making their experiences great!
But what if candidates are scared off by the salary range and would have loved the job if they had the chance to learn more first?? While that might happen occasionally, if that band is the budget - hiding the number won’t change the end game. And especially in a more remote world, and with startups in varying early stages of funding, chances are that candidates will make assumptions that a salary range they can’t see is even lower than they expect, deterring them from pursuing what might have been in their range afterall.
Nothing speeds up time to fill like already being aligned on logistics (our record is 29 days from search opening to having offers accepted by 2 candidates)
Candidate Experience
Transparency goes a long way in building trust with candidates
Candidates are presented with more options than ever in terms of available opportunities, and will prioritize their time towards roles that they know check their “boxes” from the start
Legal Compliance (Hustle Hunters is not a legal advice firm)
The Equal Pay Act of 1963 prohibits compensation discrimination based on sex
While there is no federal regulation against discrimination based on weight, some state and municipalities are beginning to move towards protecting workers
Go a step further
Create defined pay bands across the business
Internally, have a defined understanding of what constitutes different salary points within the range, before there are any candidates in the funnel, will help ensure pay equity even within the bands
Example: With a $130-150k range, the lower end could be for a proven executor, middle for someone who has experience building out the strategy and managing executing against it, high for someone who has experience managing teams that do this work
If you’re tempted to pay a great candidate beyond the defined salary band, consider that the market has shifted and maybe the entire band needs to be adjusted (including truing up current employees within that band)
Champions of this pay equity and startup hiring work that we’re paying attention to and actively learning from:
Monique Arrington of Arrington Case by Case
(see more from Monique about Candidate Experience and moving folks through the funnel in “Session 3” of our webinar series here)
81Cents Pay Equity initiative
We’d love to see other resources you’ve learned from in the comments!