Pay equity is a way to flush out race and gender discrimination when creating and maintaining wages. Workers today are pushed into various jobs which because of their race or gender are historically underpaid
How do you firmly approach the subject of pay equity within your organization?
1.Acknowledge the impact the pandemic has had on your business but communicate your intent/strategy and commitment to evaluating existing pay inequity within your organization.
2. Communicate transparently about how pay equity aligns with your organizational DEI strategy. – Why this is the right thing to do and good for everyone.
3. Plan for and conduct a Pay Equity Audit to determine where inequities exist. Be sure to to review compensation, raises, bonus programs, etc., in preparation the audit.
What is a Pay Equity Audit?
4. Using a cross section of data such as job description, department, in role, date of hire, education, age, race, gender, and other variables, analyze the information to determine if and where there is an opportunity to rectify an inequity AND any policy or practice that created it.
5. If the organization isn’t in a place to address this all at once due to the financial strain of COVID-19, decide what’s feasible now, and create a plan to prioritize and address within a certain time a specific time.
6. When increasing compensation due to pay inequity, be transparent with the employee so they know you’re doing something tangible to address it.
7. Update, or scrap policies that don’t support your pay equity goals. Conduct periodic audits periodically to monitor.
