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This article comes from the official account of Wechat: ID:chuappgame, author: etc.

"in order to bridge the pay gap, the open pay system is by far the most effective tool we know."

During the game developers' conference in March, Matt Skenbari, CEO of game company Lightforge Games, shared some of the company's practices on pay transparency and the effects of implementing an open compensation system. Skenbari worked for Blizzard for 10 years before joining Epic Games as UI director of Fortnite. In 2020, he co-founded Lightforge with several former colleagues.

"I'm not trying to convince everyone that they have to do this, that they have to have an open pay system." "instead, I just want to plant the seed," Skenbari said. When I first heard about the concept, I thought it was crazy, and it was likely to bring all kinds of unexpected side effects and negative effects. But after three years of practice, now that we have employed nearly 40 people, I can say unequivocally that the open pay system has brought us great success. "

Skenbari is explaining to the audience why Lightforge decided to introduce the system, and what are the pros and cons and why public compensation should be considered. Skenbari first explained: "Open compensation means that management will disclose all salary information about all employees within the company, including the employee's name, position, rank, and any other factors that may affect the compensation. Employee compensation must be a specific figure, not a broad range, and compensation in the form of bonuses and equity is included."

"you may ask, will it cause a lot of trouble for the HR department if someone emails colleagues' compensation information to all employees? why are some companies willing to do this? next, let's talk about it in detail."

Mr Skenbari revealed that Lightforge decided to adopt open pay at its inception and saw it as part of the company's core values. "We thought, as a new company, where can we try to change? since we are eager to recruit a group of like-minded peers, we naturally need to pay special attention to the need for talent."

Forty-six percent of all full-time workers in the United States were born after the 1990s. "this is important because researchers often use an intergenerational perspective when trying to identify future trends. One of the biggest trends in the workplace today is that young employees attach great importance to corporate responsibility and transparency."

Skenbari mentioned in his speech that the results of a Gallup survey showed that employees generally appreciate employers who care about their well-being, have a sense of morality, and focus on diversity, fairness and tolerance. In the United States, due to the growing mistrust of the old employment system, there is a trend of "big resignation" and "lying flat" among young people.

Skenbari stresses that lying down, corporate responsibility, a decline in the quality of life and a decline in disposable income compared with previous generations are common topics for young Americans to talk about. "as employers, you have to realize that this is the environment we live in. of course you can complain and yell at the sky, but it would be foolish to ignore the thoughts of nearly half of your employees."

Employees' expectations of corporate responsibility are growing. Goskenbari points out that open pay also helps to promote equality within the company. To further illustrate this point, he quoted Morella Hern á ndez, an associate professor of business administration and researcher at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, as saying in an interview with the New York Times: "salary secrecy masks structural inequalities." make these inequalities permanent. "

Mr Skenbari adds that if companies keep employees' pay secret, neither employees nor management have enough information to combat structural inequalities. He also mentioned that a study by Payscale, a US compensation statistics website, showed that there was a clear correlation between pay transparency and pay fairness.

"to close the pay gap, the open pay system is by far the most effective tool we know. So if a company claims to be committed to creating a fair and just workplace environment for all, why not use this efficient tool?"

In recent years, state governments have continued to pay more attention to pay transparency, which is also an important trend. In New York, California and Washington, for example, companies are required to list salary ranges in job advertisements. "so I think pay transparency will become more and more important. given the needs of many employees, are you ready to compete with companies that use open pay systems?"

How to implement it? "how to implement an open salary system? it's simple, you just need to open the salary scale within the company." "at Lightforge, all employees can see this payroll without having to overcome obstacles or get permission," Skenbari said. "We put it on the front page of the human resources section and use it as part of the training for new employees."

However, Mr Skenbari said public pay did not mean sharing because the gaming industry had a "history of harassment".

In his speech, Skenbari shared a template of the employee pay scale, which includes core information about employees, as well as their base salary and any possible variable pay (such as equity, etc.). According to him, inspired by the social media company Buffer, Lightforge has a standardized compensation structure and job level system.

A template of a public compensation table shared by Skenbari during his speech details the core information of each employee: "there is a complete system for all positions, from programmers to designers. At the same time, there are levels (primary, middle, senior) and more detailed hierarchies. At each step, we detail expectations for employees, specific responsibilities, and compensation that is more important to them."

"employees' pay is linked to their responsibilities and performance, which means that when we recruit new people or consider whether to promote an employee, we can talk to them around the level, not the salary. Therefore, the salary of employees does not depend on whether they are good at contract negotiation, but on whether their performance is up to standard."

"but a standardized pay system is not the same as fixed pay." "at Lightforge, the salary of the top-paid employee is about 3.1 times that of the lowest," he stressed. "We want to clarify what we expect from our employees and let them know how the salary is calculated. It is very important for us to let employees understand the company's expectations of their work and the salary at each step."

When it comes to the pros and cons of an open pay system, Skenbari points out that it helps companies hire: many job seekers say the system is attractive to them and is the main reason they decide to submit their resumes. In addition, it helps persuade candidates to accept the Lightforge position because it "builds a sense of trust".

"many colleagues from marginal backgrounds thanked us, which was one of the reasons why we decided to adopt an open pay system. We believe it has also attracted more women to apply for Lightforge positions, breaking the stereotype that we want to hire more women, but they don't apply."

"most importantly, with the open compensation system, we have the opportunity to recruit potentially larger, more trusting and diversified talent."

As mentioned earlier, the open compensation system also provides employees with a clearer career promotion path and encourages them to communicate openly. " Many people want to inquire about the salaries of their colleagues, and if the company asks for secrecy, they will inevitably make all kinds of guesses-it's because of human nature. If an open pay system is adopted, it is natural that fabricated messages will not be disseminated. If a company believes it has a reasonable compensation system, why not use facts against guesses or made-up stories? "

However, these public conversations can also pose a challenge to the company.

Employees may also feel another kind of unfairness. "there is no doubt that an open pay system will certainly force companies to engage in more difficult conversations." Skenbari admits, "for example, we sometimes have to ask employees,'do you think that person is higher or lower than you? the subtext of this sentence is:'do you think the other person should be paid more or less than you? but in order to ensure that we provide our employees with fair pay, these conversations are important."

Mr Skenbari added that by disclosing the pay system, Lightforge wanted to normalise employee discussions around pay. " Sometimes we still need to negotiate compensation with our employees, which is also a tricky task. I talked about the job rating system within the company earlier, but to be honest, after just a few hours of interview, it is very difficult for us to objectively assess whether a candidate should get a 3.2 or 3.3. In any case, we must share our reasons with the whole team and set goals that each employee must achieve. "

Skenbari also mentioned that Lightforge has an open compensation system from the beginning, but if a company that keeps employees' pay secret decides to adopt an open compensation system, it is likely to have to go through the pain of transition and take a while to get used to it.

"I don't have any experience in this area, but imagine a scenario where someone leaks all employees' salaries within the company, what happens next? Is the management afraid that employees think that the company's salary system is unfair, that some excellent employees are underpaid while others are highly paid and incompetent? We may have done our best, but we are still unable to put an end to unfairness. Such being the case, why not take the initiative to solve the problem? If your company still has salary issues that you don't want others to know about, why not face it? To be honest, they are not as secret as you think, because people always communicate. "

At the end of the speech, Skenbari advised the audience to do more research on the open pay system in order to take the next step.

"you can think of it as a journey, taking a small step first: learning, talking, reflecting, sharing, and then announcing the salary range. Find the problems that scare you and solve them. If you are part of a team, you can understand your rights and talk to colleagues, HR and CEO around the topic of compensation. Under US labor law, employees have the right to discuss salary with other employees in the workplace. "

"I believe from the bottom of my heart that both employees and employers will benefit from the implementation of an open pay system."

This article is compiled from: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/what-is-an-open-salary-policy-and-should-you-consider-having-one

The original title: "What is an open salary policy and should you consider having one?"

Original author: Marie Dealessandri

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