Dear Liz,
I'm a supervisor in a payroll processing company. I like my job a lot.
Our clients are great people and our company is growing. I supervise four client service reps. They are all good workers and awesome people, but one of them, "Lila," is giving me some difficulty right now.
Lila is a fantastic worker. She's a great team member. Her issue is that she's very unhappy with her pay.
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We start people at $13.50/hour on a non-exempt basis and they get a $.40/hour raise at their three-month anniversary date. In this area that's a decent wage for an entry-level job. After one year they get another raise, usually about $1.00/hour.
Two of my employees are earning over $18/hour now and we also have overtime and fantastic benefits including 100%-paid health insurance, a casual dress code and a company-paid lunch once a month (which is a lot of fun on top of the free lunch).
You can see that I spend a fair amount of time in sales mode!
I believe what you say about the need to sell applicants on a job opportunity. That's what I do. When I hired Lila seven months ago I sold her on this opportunity and she's done a great job.
Of course I want to hire people who will like it here. However, it is easy to find qualified people because of our location and our working atmosphere. We are always flooded with applications and when I am interviewing applicants, it can be hard to decide which person to hire.
Lila says to me often "I like you and I like the job Doran, but it's not enough money."
Lila got her raise at three months so she's earning $13.90/hour now or about $29,000 per year before taxes -- but with overtime she could easily earn $33,000 which is not bad for someone in their first job, without a degree.
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Lila doesn't have any college credits, which is fine because we don't require it. She is really smart. The longer I supervise people, the more I wonder about the real value of a college education and whether it makes sense for so many employers to require a four-year degree.
Lila has asked me for a pay raise about three times in the four months since her three-month review.
I set up the pay scale with HR and my boss. We looked at a lot of data. I can't justify giving Lila a raise now when I've never done it for anyone else before, including people who have been here for years and have worked their way up the pay scale.
Our starting pay is already the highest around.
We're not here to take advantage of anyone. I truly believe we offer a great opportunity and the proof of that is that my employees are happy and they refer their friends to work here.
I'm proud of our company and my little team. I don't know what to do about Lila, though. She has to wait five more months to get another pay increase. I can't give her more overtime than I'm already giving her.
What should I do?
Thanks,
Doran
Dear Doran,
Your pride in your company and your team is evident. I'm happy for you that you can bring yourself to work every day to take care of your teammates and your customers.
A supervisor is often thrust into situations where they can feel more like a life coach than a boss.
There are two aspects to compensation. One is the market rate, which you have researched. It is never a bad idea to take a fresh look at salary surveys to see what may have changed over the past year as the market for talent has heated up.
Since you are thrilled with your team and they seem to be happy, and since you haven't heard that wages are a problem for them thus far, you may not need to overhaul or tweak your pay schedule right now.
The other aspect of compensation is your communication around pay -- something most employers do a miserable job at, if we are honest. That's okay -- you can raise the bar!
You can talk openly with Lila about the gap between her pay expectations and your department's pay schedule.
The watchword for a conversation like that is "empathy." Here's how such a conversation might go:
Lila: Thanks for meeting with me, Doran. You already know how I feel. I like you and I like the job, but I need to make more money.
Doran: Thanks for telling me that. I say the same thing back to you -- I like you a lot and I'm glad you're here. I want to lay out our pay schedule for you and get your thoughts.
Lila: If it's still the thing where I have to work another five months to get another forty-cent-an-hour increase, I've already heard it. I'm not trying to be rude, but I have bills.
Doran: Of course. I know you do. I drew up this calendar. Let's look at it. When you started here seven months ago last May, you were earning $13.50 an hour. Then in August you got that forty-cent-an-hour increase to bring you to $13.90 per hour. When you hit your one-year anniversary this coming May, you will get another pay raise assuming things are going as well as they have gone since you joined us, as I am confident they will.
Lila: And how big is that increase, normally?
Doran: I would say around a dollar an hour. It sounds like a small amount but that's two thousand dollars a year, before overtime. If you got a one-dollar-an-hour raise in August, your pay would be $14.90 per hour, which is about thirty-one thousand dollars per year. With overtime, of course, it will be more.
Lila: Well, I don't know if I can pay my bills on that.
Doran: I completely understand. Do you want to talk about that -- about bills? I am your supervisor at your job, not a financial counselor of course, but I might have a suggestion or two.
Lila: Listen, I trust you Doran. Whatever you want to tell me, I want to hear it.
Doran: Well, let me say for starters that I know it's not that easy to make everything work out financially when you start a new job. It's hard. It takes time to figure out where the money will go and there are always unexpected expenses. It's stressful, I know.
Lila: It's true. I feel like this: I work full-time, shouldn't I be able to pay the bills on my salary and have a little money left over?
Doran: Absolutely, and the hardest time to do that is just after you start a new job, and probably for the first year after that. The longer you stay here the more you will get paid. Some of our folks as you know are earning good money in this department.
Lila: I don't want to have to quit before I stay here long enough to get paid what I need.
Doran: I understand if you decide that our company doesn't work for you. If you felt that you had to go and work somewhere else I would give you a good reference. I feel good about our compensation plan. I've looked at other companies' wages and benefits and I feel like ours is pretty good, but I also understand that paying the bills is a huge headache for almost everyone.
Lila: I have to think about it. I guess -- the thing is, it's not just my pay, I have a lot of stuff on my plate.
Doran: I hear that. talked to Rebecca in HR at headquarters and she gave me a 1-800 number that our employees can call when they are overwhelmed. Everybody gets overwhelmed. The whole job of these people who answer the phones at the 1-800 number is to help our employees when they have too much on their plates.
Lila: I mean -- they're going to help me pay my bills?
Doran: They have financial advice and tips that I don't have. It doesn't even have to be a financial issue. These guys help employees with legal problems, substance abuse issues, relationship issues, you name it. They help people with problems they might be having with their teenagers or health issues or anything.
Lila: What kind of company does that?
Doran: It's called an Employee Assistance Program. Our company signed up for this service earlier this year. Any of our employees or their dependents can call the EAP. It doesn't cost anything. You just call the 1-800 number and they'll talk to you.
Lila: Why not, right? It's not a bad idea.
Doran: That's how I feel. We all have so much stuff going on -- money stuff and just the logistics of day-to-day life. It can be overwhelming. It can make us feel like we're not equal to the task.
Lila: Of being a grown-up, you mean?
Doran: That's right. Sometimes being a grown-up stinks. Sometimes there's too much going on and it's too stressful. Who doesn't feel that way sometimes?
Lila: Thank you, Doran. You're the best.
Doran: I'm on your side, Lila. You can talk to me whenever you want.
Lila: You know I'm going to do that!
You will grow new muscles talking with Lila, and your conversation will be good for her and for you whether she stays with you or leaves. We all know that is extremely challenging to manage your life in almost any geography when you're earning fourteen bucks an hour.
When you sign up to supervise people in your team members' pay range, you simultaneously sign on to navigate this territory over and over again, more and more confidently and fluidly every time. Of course, you will also keep a close eye on prevailing wages!
One more thought: if you can figure out how to have your reps work from home some or all of the time, that will save them a lot of time and trouble and save them money on transportation.
If you can supplement your company's fantastic health-care program with an equally awesome flexible-work and/or work-from-home program, your employees will love you even more than they do now!
All the best,
Liz
