The Roadmap to Pay Transparency for UK organisations – Pay and Career Paths

In our last article we covered the all-important foundations on the journey to pay transparency. We talked about the importance of knowing where you are now and documenting a clear reward philosophy, principles and policy to guide and inform your pay transparency efforts. Even if you already have these in place it is a worthwhile exercise to revisit them and consider some of the critical questions – would your leadership team be comfortable disclosing current pay ranges if required? Leadership engagement is pivotal so before embarking on designing any reward structures or programmes it is vital you pause here to ensure you have a unified vision and approach.

So, what comes next? Your Leadership team are on board, you have a clear philosophy and principles and you have a robust levelling framework. In this article we will cover the next stages of the roadmap which are all related to pay and career paths, the ‘heartland’ of reward, and perhaps the most labour-intensive areas to work through. Let’s break it down into simple, manageable stages.

Step 4 - Benchmarking Roles

The next step of the journey is all about benchmarking, we know this is essential for understanding how roles compare to the market, but what are the key considerations?

• Benchmarking Methodology: Select appropriate data sources / surveys and determine the benchmark point – refer back to your reward principles about market position
• Location Dependencies: Account for regional differences that may affect salary expectation, if any
• Data Inclusion and Frequency: Define what data is included in benchmarking and how often it’s updated.

Now is also a good time to take stock of job descriptions and make sure they accurately reflect role requirements and align with your levelling framework. Job descriptions should use consistent language and accurately describe role requirements, they should also use inclusive, non-discriminatory language and align with your job evaluation and benchmarking processes.

Step 5 - Creating Salary Ranges

Perhaps one of the most critical steps in your journey will be establishing clear salary ranges. They should be developed from your benchmarking pinning your midpoint to your agreed market position e.g. median and should have justifiable minimum and maximum salary points. Address situations where employees fall outside of these ranges and establish robust policy and governance on all pay decisions throughout the employee lifecycle. Differentiate between individuals in a role on pay within ranges using agreed and shared criteria. All of these critical steps and decisions will pave the way for successful pay transparency.

Step 6 - Career Progression and Development Framework

Linking career progression to pay is vital for transparency. A framework should be developed which includes levelling, job families, and clearly defined career paths. As part of the framework, it should include all areas of competencies and progression (such as typical career paths), all of which then align with HR processes like recruitment and performance reviews. This is both about developing upwards and across in an organisation, employees should understand and have sight of what opportunities are available and what they need to do to get there. As referenced in step 5, there should be transparent and fair criteria that link career progression and pay.

So, once you have tackled these significant steps and are well on the way to achieving pay transparency, there is one final stage to tackle and that is communication. We will cover this in our final article. Please do check back in to see how we advise you tackle this area and achieve your pay transparency goals.

For now, do reflect on how you might approach the steps we have covered today and again if you are doing all of these things already are they fit for purpose? Would they stand up if you were to be more transparent with employees about pay? Are they helping you achieve your pay transparency goals or do you need to rewrite the rule book? If so and if you need our help, we have many years of experience across the team in all of these areas and would love to support you in your journey. Please contact our CEO, Victoria Milford , on victoria@rewardheads.co.uk or rewardsolutions@rewardheads.co.uk