When it comes to empathy at work, there are a hundred different ways to infuse empathy into your operations and systems – in real, practical, non-emotional ways. One of those ways is to look at compensation strategies and professional growth and development.
Today, Scott Trumpolt talks about empathy in compensation that leads to better employee engagement and more strategic growth. We discuss both the pitfalls of pay transparency leading to a dead end, but also the upside in how it catalyzes your company to reflect on and improve internal practices. He talks about how compensation is more than just salary, and the overlooked piece of career architecture – a concept that supports the Clarity pillar of empathetic leadership. Scott shares why programs fail, but culture shifts succeed, the #1 element to think about in determining competitive compensation structures, and why empathy is vital to ensure that compensation is about a one-on-one conversation and not a one-size-fits-all proposition. Scott also shares how HR leaders can strengthen credibility with business leaders and move the needle on company growth.
To access the episode transcript, please scroll down below.
Listen in for…
- Driving solutions aimed at employee engagement.
- Why compensation is not a one-size-fits-all solution and needs to be tailored to your employees and organization.
- Balancing pay transparency and directing packages and compensation for the individuals.
- Why job titles and compensation matter.
“There’s a reason why compensation is not in finance. Yes, I use a lot of numbers, but we do it in a completely different way, and we are impacting the individual directly.” — Scott Trumpolt
Episode References:
- Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel Pink
- The Empathy Edge: Rhonda George-Denniston: Why Betting on Your People Leads to Market Domination
About Scott Trumpolt, Managing Director & Compensation Consultant:
Scott Trumpolt’s career is defined by a seamless evolution from corporate leadership to independent consultancy, reflecting over 30 years of expertise in compensation planning, HR leadership, and rewards strategies. For 18 years, Scott excelled in the corporate world, holding leadership roles in HR and Compensation across the United States and Germany. In 2012, he launched Trumpolt Compensation Design Solutions (TCDS) to provide bespoke solutions tailored to the unique needs of organizations worldwide.
Scott’s corporate experience provided a solid foundation for mastering market-based pay structures, sales incentive plans, and job classification systems. Transitioning into independent consultancy, Scott has spent the past 12 years leveraging this expertise to deliver innovative, client-focused strategies. This blend of corporate insight and entrepreneurial innovation allows him to navigate compensation challenges from both perspectives, creating high-impact solutions that drive organizational success.
Scott’s global reach includes projects across North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America/Caribbean, reflecting his adaptability to diverse work cultures. He is a Certified Global Remuneration Professional (GRP), holds a master’s degree in Human Resources Management, and has maintained an A+ Better Business Bureau rating, underscoring his commitment to excellence and client satisfaction.
From Our Sponsor:
Keynote Speakers and Conference Trainers: Get your free Talkadot trial and enjoy this game changer for your speaking business! www.share.talkadot.com/mariaross
Connect with Scott:
Trumpolt Compensation Design Solutions: hrcompensationconsulting.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/scott-trumpolt-m-a-g-r-p-257a6b317
BBB profile: bbb.org/south-east-florida/login/page/0/?li=1
Connect with Maria:
Get Maria’s books on empathy: Red-Slice.com/books
Hire Maria to speak: Red-Slice.com/Speaker-Maria-Ross
Take the LinkedIn Learning Course! Leading with Empathy
LinkedIn: Maria Ross
Instagram: @redslicemaria
Facebook: Red Slice
Threads: @redslicemaria
FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Maria Ross 00:04
Welcome to the empathy edge podcast, the show that proves why cash flow, creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. I’m your host, Maria Ross, I’m a speaker, author, mom, facilitator and empathy advocate. And here you’ll meet trailblazing leaders and executives, authors and experts who embrace empathy to achieve radical success. We discuss all facets of empathy, from trends and research to the future of work to how to heal societal divisions and collaborate more effectively. Our goal is to redefine success and prove that empathy isn’t just good for society. It’s great for business. When it comes to empathy at work, there are 100 if not 1000 different ways to infuse empathy into your operations and systems in real, practical, non emotional ways. One of those ways is to look at compensation strategies and professional growth and development. Today, I talk with Scott trumpholt about empathy in compensation that leads to better employee engagement and more strategic growth. Scott brings more than 30 years of expertise in compensation planning, HR, leadership and reward strategy, after nearly two decades in corporate roles across the US and Germany, he founded trumphold compensation design solutions, where he spent the past 12 years helping organizations worldwide craft tailored, high impact pay strategies. A certified global remuneration professional with a master’s in HR management, Scott blends deep corporate insight with entrepreneurial agility to share complex compensation challenges across cultures and industries. We discuss both the pitfalls of pay transparency leading to a dead end, but also the upside in how it catalyzes your company to reflect on and improve internal practices. He talks about how compensation is more than just salary and the overlooked piece of career architecture, a concept that supports the clarity pillar of empathetic leadership. In my book, Scott shares why programs fail, but culture shifts succeed, the number one element to think about in determining competitive compensation structures and why empathy is vital to ensure that compensation is about a one on one conversation and not a one size fits all proposition. Scott also shares how HR leaders can strengthen credibility with business leaders and move the needle on company growth. So many great points in this one, take a listen. Welcome Scott, to the empathy edge podcast. I am really excited about our conversation today, because, as most of my listeners know, my work is really about results driven practical empathy in an organization, and I talk a lot about operationalizing empathy in ways that people don’t think of as empathetic. And today we’re going to talk about empathy in terms of compensation and recognition strategies. And this is going to be something I really think that our listeners, especially our listeners in HR and team leads, will get a lot of benefit from. So welcome to the show today.
Scott Trumpolt 03:17
Thank you, Maria, and thank you for the opportunity to address your audience, your listeners, your viewers, appreciate
Maria Ross 03:24
it. Love it. Okay, so before we dive in to all the things, we want to know your story. How did you get to this work as a compensation consultant? What was your
Scott Trumpolt 03:33
path? Well, my path really was. I was initially after college, I was working in a different discipline, just for a few years, and I decided to get my master’s degree in Human Resources Management, and when I did that, it just so happened that they created an opening for me in the company I was working for, and I had a wonderful opportunity to be mentored by several folks within that organization, real mentors that tried me out in it was like a dream job, because although it was very entry level, they tried me out in all different aspects of human resources, and then they saw that I really had an aptitude for compensation, very raw, very rough, but nevertheless an aptitude, and that has taken me forward for the past 30 years, 18 of those years were in the corporate world in various compensation planning and design roles. And then for the past 1213, years, I’ve been on my own, and what I have really focused on as an independent compensation consultant is how to link something that’s viewed very much as a black box. It’s kind of in the shadows compensation. And how do you turn that into a way that supports the idea of employee engagement, in a specific way, that supports the business but also supports what the actual employees are looking for? For, yeah, to get at the companies that they’re at. So that’s really been my mission. I’m certified as a compensation professional, and I have all these years of experience, but what it ultimately boils down to me is working with clients that really want to get beyond just the basics of compensation and to really drive solutions aimed at employee engagement, right,
Maria Ross 05:21
right? And you know, you’re making me think about years ago, I read a book called drive by Daniel Pink, and I’m going to put it link in the show notes, and it was so eye opening to me, because it was all about The Surprising Truth that motivates us. And so often when we think of compensation in our minds, we think more money equals the incentive for people, right? And people are driven by different things, and there are studies that show the state of workplace empathy. Reports that have been done by business solver of the last 10 years now show that people are willing to work for less pay and even sometimes more hours, if they’re working for an empathetic leader, and not to say that we want to, you know, make everybody work for the least amount of money. But I find that very telling about there’s a thinking out there that money is the only motivator, and it’s the only element of compensation, right when it’s really a much more holistic view, and it could differ from person to person. So just because I might be motivated by money, the person I’m hiring might be motivated by flexibility or mental health benefits or something else. So talk a little bit you have this concept called Career architecture that I think ties into this. Yeah, talk a little bit about
Scott Trumpolt 06:37
that. Yeah. Well, one of the things that people need to understand out there is that when you look at compensation, as you alluded to, it’s a big range. Potentially, it’s not a one size fits all pay level for an employee, and employees all want to get paid fairly. But how you get paid along the spectrum of a range for a job depends on a lot of different factors, and one of the factors that companies really want to zero in on is this idea of career development and that links to career architecture. Career architecture is simply the idea of linking both business needs and employee skill development. Career development needs to market based pay. So for example, if you’re hiring an accountant, well it’s not just a matter of hiring an accountant. You might be hiring a cost accountant. You might be hiring a tax accountant. You’re not just hiring an intermediate an accountant, but it might be an intermediate level accountant. Might be a senior level. Might be an expert accountant. All of these pay differently. And so what career architecture opens up is the opportunity to provide a vision to an employee coming into an organization, saying, this is only a starting point with your pay. Okay? What’s more important is how you progress along that pay spectrum and what it means. It doesn’t mean just staying here year after year, grinding out. It’s the idea of acquiring new skills that support the business need and stimulate your interest as an individual. Now this gets into the point you talk about some people, people spend a lot of their time working in an organization, a huge bulk of their time, they want to feel that they’re part of something bigger, yes, than themselves, and they’re not just a mere cog. So the closer that an organization can kind of lay out a road map of saying, Look, we’re not, we’re saying that different jobs pay differently with the organization. You don’t have these skills right now, but these are skills that we’re going to need in the business, and you’re interested in doing them, we want to grow you to that next level. So pay becomes a really a living thing. It’s not, for example, we see that nowadays, employees are very interested in pay transparency, so the companies, a lot of states, are mandating put out the pay range for the organization. That’s all well and good, but it’s kind of a dead end, because all it is is a set of numbers. The employee may look at it and say, well, this ask is making me ask more questions than I’m getting answers. Do I get the top part of the range? Do I get the middle part of the range? What exactly, and it can actually be a little bit deflating to an individual. What an individual really needs to understand is that pay is a living thing, and you grow with that, and the more we can make that connection between career development. This is what career architecture is. All about specific career development, but not just about things that you want to focus on as an employee, but also things you want to focus on an employee as an employee, but that are linked to business needs, right? It may mean. Is you need to get your skills in a different department within the organization that you come into to then come back. Sometimes you have to move sideways to get the skills that you need. And all of these are linked to pay different compensation levels. And if we can get that right, if we can provide a future for employees, and not just a static snapshot in time that’s going to lead to employee engagement. And the interesting thing here is, and here’s the empathy piece to all of this, we need to rely on human resources. Can develop this career architecture. They can link all these different opportunities to pay for employees, but it needs to become the one on one conversation between the employee and their immediate manager. We’ve done a great job over the years managing, teaching managers how to discipline employees or to follow various compliance but one of the links that I believe that can promote the idea of empathy with employees is having that direct manager who’s so important, this has been proven time and time again, is so important in the idea of employee engagement, that relationship, yeah, we can foster that relationship by providing say, Hey, you’re here today, but That doesn’t mean you’re going to be there tomorrow. Here’s the pathway going forward for you, and it can even start in the hiring process. We’re not going to lay out the whole career pathway for an employee, but if we can convince employee, prospective candidates out there beyond the pay range, that this can be a ladder that leads to other things within the organization and can expose you to different functions. Is, for example, if you work for a global organization, you might be able to entice employees by saying that, you know, we have opportunities in other countries. For example, when I worked in corporate I worked overseas for a while in Germany. So and I wanted to do that because it allowed me to learn a lot more about global compensation, and not just the US perspective, but for an incoming employee that knows, hey, I’m here today, but I might want to focus on other areas in the future to show them the overall career architecture that a company has can be a way of drawing them into the organization, and then once you have them in the organization, be able to develop that one on one dialog between managers, and I think that can help in the area of empathy. Absolutely, you can get into real
Maria Ross 12:37
specifics. Yeah. And also, you know, we talk about, I talk about in my work now in my book, clarity is one of the pillars of being an empathetic and effective leader. And I mentioned to folks in my workshops that career progression maps are a form of empathy for people, when people know what’s possible and they know what’s coming, and they know the direction they’re going in, and you can hold them accountable to here’s what’s expected at each of these stages. We can’t hold people accountable to expectations we haven’t set. So what I love about what you’re saying is you’re creating a picture of getting companies and HR teams to think beyond the one job they’re hiring for, and to really think about painting a picture for people of where they can go within this role, but having that one to one conversation of, does this even interest you? Right? What are you interested in, and where can you go with this there? I’m sure you’ve seen the data out there that talks about what Gen Z wants in workplace culture. Yeah, is not necessarily more pay. They want career development. They want professional development. They want to join a company that’s going to invest in them, even if potentially they might leave in three, 510, years. And I’m going to put a link to another episode in here, when I interviewed the chief learning officer at TBWA, Rhonda George Denniston, their philosophy at that global ad agency, that global media company, is, we know you’re not going to stay here forever, but it doesn’t mean we don’t invest in you while you’re here, so you’re performing at your peak capacity while you’re working for
Scott Trumpolt 14:16
us. Yeah, not only that, though, it promotes the culture, yes, of what you’re talking about. Because even if they leave, and I’m sorry I kind of interrupt you, but this is very important point that I wanted to stress on your point, and that is that even when people leave, other employees in the organization can see that kind of dynamic happening. Yes, it’s modern, there can be visibility to it. They’ll see someone moving. And I worked in an organization when I was in corporate that did this. They would take someone from the logistics area, and they would slowly move them into a different area of the company, much like when I started in my career. So you get providing models, and that strengthens the work culture, so it’s not a loss when they’re going
Maria Ross 14:57
out the door, right, exactly, and all of that. But it sounds like, in your view, all of that is wrapped up in compensation.
Scott Trumpolt 15:04
Yeah, yeah, it’s all it’s all directly linked. Because this is the thing, again, that people it’s not a question of paying everybody exactly the same. Human beings are all different, and they bring different skills and competencies to the table, as well as the potential to learn, and that can be part of the interview process up front is understanding, not only are they really good for this job, but do we get a sense of their long term potential? And that’s where the career architecture fits in. And again, it’s not something we’re making up. It directly links back to the market today. You are an intermediate tax level accountant. How do we get you to the point where our business needs we need you to be an expert level tax accountant within our organization. What kind of skills do you need? And again, who’s going to foster that? Their immediate manager, their immediate manager is not going to know all the business needs for the next 10 years, right? But they should have a pathway, at least for the next few steps, because management are supposed to be strategic, and they’re supposed to be proactive, and we are investing this money in their most important resource, they’re deployed. So that’s where I think the empathy needs to be totally geared. It’s the immediate Manager. You can have the CEO stand up and give a motivational speech and all that good stuff, but the really good piece is going to be that dynamic between the immediate post management.
Maria Ross 16:33
Well, people join companies, but they stay or leave based on their leaders, based on their immediate managers. So I would be remiss if I didn’t kind of get more curious about your perspectives on pay transparency, because as a woman, there’s a history of inequity with certain groups being offered different levels of pay, and so my initial reaction to your perspective is no Pay transparency is good because we need to all be playing from the same playbook so that no one can lie to me and say something different to somebody else, or whether I’m black or brown or Asian or gay or whatever. So tell me a little bit about how you view that in the context of being transparent to avoid bias and to avoid inequity, but also to your point, making sure that we’re gearing packages and compensation to the needs and the desires and the goals of the individual. How do you see that balance happening?
Scott Trumpolt 17:33
Well, let me tell you, this is a great question, and I’m glad you asked it, because I said at the beginning, I talked about pay transparency, and it kind of being a dead end and static what I was referring to. And I do believe that, but only to a point. Here’s the point I want to make about that, how they’re delivering pay transparency, the mechanisms I understand people were concerned about pay transparency, so the simplest and most obvious thing that they could do was require states to post the pay I’m saying that can be a real negative. But here’s the positive about the pay transparency laws, where it’s a good thing when you’re putting out these pay transparency when you’re putting out these ranges, it’s forcing companies to look inwards at their own practices, and they are more and more for a number of years now there are companies, and they are doing exactly that. They are looking through their pay equity issues, not market equity issues, but internal equity issues. So I’m giving some kudos here to companies, because one of the things that I do as a consultant is I help companies look at, okay, we’ve got this female population. Are they underpaid for this role? They’ve been here this many years? How do they compare to a person making more money? So these type of equity analysis that I’m talking about, they were being done, but now they are being accelerated because of these pay transparency. So while I may think not much of the mechanics of the pay transparency in terms of motivating right, meaning that on the flip side, the good news is that it is forcing a stronger internal commitment, and I’m seeing it in companies. Here’s the good news, just saying. Why is this? Why is this so part of my job as a side more of an administrative exercises. For example, I will get a list of employees, and the first thing I will do is I will look at, okay, because job titles can be misleading, right? Are they in the same job, regardless of what they’re calling them? And I have ways to find this out. You know, documentation, okay, what is the performance level been? What are the years of experience? What is the pay disparity? Are there any specific reasons? Are they part of a protected class, and if there is not something that can be grabbed? Gone to this is what is pointed out. So whether they’re doing it internally, which a lot of companies are doing, or if I’m helping, the bottom line is, this is the good aspect of the laws being posted down. Not all states have them, but it’s generally moving in that direction. In the past year, a couple more states like Minnesota and a few others, and I think that will continue the trend. I don’t know how many states it’s up to. There’s some variation in the states in terms of how they do it, but it’s not just, you know, California is often a leader in this regard, but it’s happening in a lot of different states and different geographic regions of the country. But that’s my view on the good part of pay transparency.
Maria Ross 20:40
I love that you said that, you said that, and that’s why I wanted to get curious as to the different dimensions of that. Because I think that going through that, you know, for whatever catalyst creates a company, you know, forces or urges or motivates a company to go through that exercise, it’s so important because I think a lot of it could be happening at these lower levels. But it’s not until you get all the data, and you look at everything all together and say, Oh, wow, we didn’t realize there was a pattern here. We didn’t realize that this was going on. And I had to laugh a little bit about your comment about titles being different, because I’ve worked in Silicon Valley for a long time, you know. And you’ve got, you know, people who are just out of college who want a vice president title, right? Yeah, and they get it just because, you know, it’s a startup, they’re like, we can give anybody any title we want, but it’s kind of meaningless sometimes within certain organizations, of, what are you actually directing? What are you actually the vice president of? Oh, you don’t actually have a team, but you’re the vice president of whatever. So I had to laugh at that.
Scott Trumpolt 21:43
Yeah, yeah. This is another pet peeve I have, is and I go on and on about this, I train companies about job titles and their value, and I say, look, you’re setting yourself for a fall. I understand that job titles are free and you feel nice in giving them, but if you have a director and they’re making $60,000 a year, you’ve got a problem, and it could come back to bite you. And so I try and explain that again, going back to the idea of compensation, it’s market based, and I can tell you right now, in the market, real directors do not make $60,000 unless they’re working for a very small nonprofit somewhere, that type of thing. But if we’re talking about jobs, and in defense of the director title, there are certain things that a director must do in the market in order to qualify for that pay. So they’re paying the job, perhaps, right? The real job throwing a title on it, and it can be very disruptive, right? And also could land them in some trouble. So, and the other thing that you said that’s very important is that human resources, oftentimes, managers, will make individual decisions that make sense at the time from a pay perspective, but they’re not seeing the big picture, and that’s where we in human resources can help them to step back and see, yes, I know you did this at the time, and it made business sense. It wasn’t anything that was hateful or trying to be deceptive. It just made sense at the time. But we’re here to say, look, in the collective here is where the issues lie.
Maria Ross 23:16
Yeah, I mean, it’s just so important. And also, you know what I see, especially from you know, the vantage point of being around a lot of tech companies is when you throw around those titles, you actually don’t create the career path for people to be able to prove themselves and advance and have somewhere to go, right? You bring someone in right, out of college at a VP level, where are they going to go? Right? So, and then, what are those milestones? And so a lot of leaders that I know that have come into organizations where that stuff was done willy nilly are spending a lot of time sort of revamping and creating equity among the pay and among the market and among the titles, yes, and it, you know, it can lead to a lot of resentment, because now these people have an unrealistic expectation of what their title should do and what they should be paying. But it’s about it’s a lot of them call it a leveling exercise of just like coming in and going, what has happened here? What it was Frankensteined the way it was done, to bring in the right people, like you said, in one off specific situations, but now you’ve got a team of five VPS that don’t actually have any direct reports, right? That makes no sense. Yeah. The
Scott Trumpolt 24:29
good news is it can be cleaned up, but it does become very problematic once a company grows to a certain level. It’s fine as a startup, I understand why they do it, yeah, but I shouldn’t resent it, because it provides me some work. But on the other hand, I do understand when employees get confused, and it does get a little bit beyond the pale that yeah, something that needs to be addressed.
Maria Ross 24:57
So can you give us an example of working with a client where. You created, you helped them revamp or integrate their compensation strategies, and it drove employee engagement and career development. Can you give us kind of a even if it’s anonymous, can you give us a real world example of like the before and after? Sure?
Scott Trumpolt 25:15
One of the most important ones was I was actually I mentioned nonprofit earlier, but I was working for a very large nonprofit, and they had one of the things about human resources often, well, it’s not a profit center, so you can’t really measure if you’re having a success in a certain area, but actually you can, and that is in the area of employee engagement. So they ran employee opinion surveys, and they asked specific questions about employee engagement, and what were some of the areas that they were concerned about, and they mentioned compensation and career development. So we ended up putting in a career architecture that was directly linked to market. And when you want to talk about pay transparency, we did not post the pay ranges of all of the employees. What we did do was provide them a vision of career architecture and showed how market based pay is directly linked to their job. And then we did some follow up, and a couple years later, they asked the same questions, and we had moved the needle specifically on compensation. So that is an example of moving the needle in a positive direction that took a lot of work over a couple of years, but it was something that was generally verifiable and believable, because the most important thing about any program, though, is to not just put together a program. It’s you’ve got to make it part of the culture, yeah. So it has to be renewed. And as we talked about earlier, there needs to be real modeling. There needs to be real models that people can see. That’s when it changes, just announcing, well, we have a pay structure, and it’s linked to career development. It’s not enough. Yeah, we put all of the materials out on a intra net where employees could see within, and they could see, well, I could move in this direction, again, it’s getting beyond their immediate job. And they could see what other departments do, and do I have skill sets that transfer into that area, right? So this is the kind of thing. You have to make it part of the culture and not just program. It won’t work, right? That took me some time to understand. I was like, early on in my career. Well, if I just do this, and I just do this, yeah, yeah, and it will be all and then it sits there, and it looks very nice on paper, totally, but in terms of practical application, yeah, I didn’t really do anything, sorry. It can make all the sense in the world on paper, yeah, but if people aren’t buying into it, and so that’s why I got into consulting, because I was spending too much of my time on program maintenance and not enough time, as I saw it, in creating something that can help move the needle, I could do my part in employee engagement, which, again, feeds in, I believe, into empathy.
Maria Ross 28:08
So real quick on that project you were talking about, did they ultimately see an uptick in employee engagement because of what they put in place?
Scott Trumpolt 28:15
Yeah, they let me know. Because sometimes you put in a project and you finish it, and then you That’s it with the client. But I have some of my clients stay with me for years, and so since they were they could actually report back to me. Hey, made a difference.
Maria Ross 28:33
That’s great. That’s great. Well, and I was going to make a point earlier, when you were talking about both transparency and career development and putting those things in place. A lot of my background, after management consulting, my background was in marketing and branding, and that is what actually led me into the empathy work. Was empathy to connect and engage with customers, but also being able to walk your talk on the inside of the organization. And I can’t, you know, we can’t ignore the fact that, when you do this internal work, what an advertising it is, what a great brand look it is for your organization to attract top talent. When you’re putting these kinds of things in place internally, it can feel like, Oh, well, what are we doing to communicate out there? But if you have this. It says so much about your employer brand and your ability to recruit and retain top talent moving forward in terms of like, this is what the company does on the inside. And given our transparent world, people know what’s going on and how you’re doing things. How transparent you are with compensation, how committed you are to career development, how clear you are with career architecture. Those things are a banner for your company to help it build its brand in the market. Well, think of it this way
Scott Trumpolt 29:53
when you’re talking about branding, absolutely you’ve heard of the top 100 companies to work for. How do they become a top 100 companies? You. Well, or one of the things is about their employee engagement results. And those employee engagement results can often link back to the idea that they have a culture in place about pay. They have a culture in place about career architecture, not just a program, right, but a culture. If I ever wrote a book, it sounds like a very simple title. I’m sure someone’s written a book about it, but it would be a culture, not a program, right? But that’s how they get to be these top 100 companies, which is branding, but there is some reality behind it, that they are doing things from the employee engagement perspective, that are resonating with I love it.
Maria Ross 30:37
I love it. I love it. Okay, so let’s leave off with some tools and strategies that you know, if anyone in HR or even the C suite is listening and they’re they suspect they may need to revamp their compensation culture and structure. What are some starting points you could advise
Scott Trumpolt 30:59
to identify their issues, certainly if it’s coming up in employee engagement surveys. If you have to be careful, though, with this next one, with exit interviews or reasons why people leave an organization, they will often say pay. Because now I’m not saying it always, but when you really go through the weeds. A usually comes out seventh on the list. You know, not first or second. It’s easy to say, because it’s not personal. It’s just more a reflection on the
Maria Ross 31:31
company well, and they can’t argue with it. It’s there’s no rebuttal like, Oh, you’re leaving because you’re making more money at the place you’re going to Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Scott Trumpolt 31:40
So there are those kind of warning signs. What I usually encounter is it’s coming from the front lines, from the recruitment team that is tasked with hiring the right individuals. And it’s not just about getting people in the door, but they might say, for example, I’m hiring. The recruiter is hiring for a manager role, speaking of directors, and they’re getting all these wonderful resumes through the man and these in the and the job pays $95,000 and the people are saying, This is crazy, this this job should pay 140 $150,000 your compensation. Is all wrong. The reality is, is job we have open as a manager, the person applying for the job for whatever reason has been a director, a real director, and now they’re trying. I don’t know if they think that that job will be easier for them, because it’s a lower level than what they were. Yeah, but that’s kind of the disconnect. So if recruitment is sending some warning signs, either difficulty hiring or difficulty hiring for certain jobs that they’re getting candidates that are over or under qualified, that could certainly be a warning sign. Okay, as I said, employee engagement surveys. But some companies are small, they may not run employee engagement surveys, right? So I think that’s a touch point. Now get with your recruiting team and see if they’re having struggles for parts of the country, for some of the reasons that I mentioned.
Maria Ross 33:06
And then does is the first step to take different for every company? Or is there one sort of clear if yes, you know, you know, Houston, we have a problem. What’s one small step? Does it? Does that differ by company.
Scott Trumpolt 33:21
It can differ differ by company, because sometimes the chief executive officer or the Human Resources leader will get anecdotal information over time, not data driven, but nevertheless, wanting to see a lot of companies don’t a lot of the companies, though, to be honest with you, it’s not that their current structure is failing them. They don’t have a structure because human resources, because, again, it’s not a profit center. When it comes to funding the right type of information system that they need, or having the right pay structure. They don’t have the infrastructure, because they don’t have the budgets for it. And again, working with an independent consultant, not just myself, but others that are out there that can provide that at a much lower cost than a large firm. There’s many, not many, but there’s big, large firms that do what I do, but they have a lot of overhead, and they don’t give you customization. So that’s the biggest warning sign that I see, is just that they get to a point where they’re so big they can’t manage things effectively, right? Excel spreadsheets. They need something more. And so that’s when they will reach out to me. It gets to a point where, yeah, they’re not meeting their goals, right? And the business is wondering why human resources is not meeting their goals. And Human Resources will move heaven and earth often to meet their goals with stone knives and bear skins, type of stuff to support them. Yeah, yeah. And I understand where the business is coming from. Um, but at some point, if you want them to meet their goal, so that that’s when there’s the fundamental disconnect, right? And that’s when they usually will call me. And so I hope that is answering you.
Maria Ross 35:09
It does. I was thinking more, what are the first steps they can take, versus the warning signs. But I think the warning signs are an important point to make. I want to ask this one final question. Have you ever worked with a client who thinks they have a compensation strategy issue, but it’s really more of a deeper issue of how they value people as an asset versus as an expense? And the answer could be no. I’m just curious if you have ever come across where it wasn’t just about the compensation. It was about how they view people as a fundamental investment.
Scott Trumpolt 35:45
Oh, sure, but the difference is, is that I experienced that in my corporate career. What? How I avoid that now, and why I say no, that’s not an issue for me. Is I’m only looking at it from my consultant perspective, because while my clients are checking out me, I’m checking out them, and one of the things that I do is I ask very probing questions about the leader of the organization. How do they feel? How do they view the role of human resources? Do they view it as personnel and transactional, or do they view them as a strategic partner? And there are different ways to answer that question, and if I don’t get the answer that I want, I feel like, even if they approve the budgeting of this project just to shut up their human resources folks, it won’t become a culture, right? And that’s what I drive it. So I try and stay away from those. But are there people that think in those terms? But if, depending on their view of human resources, which I’m a part of, right, there’s a reason why compensation is not in finance. Yes, I use a lot of numbers I generate, but we do it in a completely different way, right? And we are impacting the individual directly.
Maria Ross 36:51
I think that’s a really important point about why compensation should live in human resources and not make
Scott Trumpolt 36:58
a difference. Sometimes I’m working on a sales plan design with a financial analyst that has to provide a certain perspective. And we’re talking two different languages, yeah, even though we’re looking at the same numbers, I’m looking from the human motivational perspective, right, and looking at it from the business. Neither one is wrong. They’re both correct in their own context, but we have to meet in the middle. So my answer to that question is very much the viewpoint of human the role that human resources plays in the organization, and as to how much they value people. Because I’ll tell you this, some CEOs that are fantastic. They really do get the connection. Yeah, those are the ones that I want, I want to find, and those are the ones that I want to work I don’t want to sound snobbish, but I’m a, I’m a one person organization, and so the projects that I pick, I have to feel that that’s part of it. Yeah, absolutely, because we’re all getting older, and you’ve got to work on things that engage your interest level to your full potential. It’s not just about the employees. It’s about me too. I’ve got to be engaged well.
Maria Ross 38:09
And also your projects are going to be like you said. They’re going to be more successful in an organization that truly values its people and and values people like I said, as an investment and not as an expense that can just be cut right? So such a great conversation. Scott. I could talk to you so much more about this, but I really appreciate the very practical perspective of where empathy fits into something, as you know, operational as compensation strategies and compensation structures, because this is exactly the whole crux of my work is trying to show that empathy lives in all these nooks and crannies. Oh, there’s an organization. Yeah,
Scott Trumpolt 38:46
there’s a connection on right? Yeah, no question about it, but it is very detached compensation. It’s like I say, it’s very much in the shadows, very much in the black box. I’ve been living that for 30 years, but we are moving in that general direction, and I think linking it to empathy in a constructive way, yeah, that can be very positive, is like one of the next challenges
Maria Ross 39:09
for sure. Well, thank you so much for your insights today and your time. We’ll have all your links in the show notes for those who are on the go, where’s the one best place they can go to find out more about your work.
Scott Trumpolt 39:22
Best place is my website, HR compensation consulting.com
Maria Ross 39:26
Perfect, perfect. HR compensation consulting.com wonderful.
Scott Trumpolt 39:31
Newly revised, ready to go.
Maria Ross 39:35 Great, great. All right. Well, thank you so much, Scott and we appreciate having you on Thank you, and thank you everyone for listening to another episode of the empathy edge podcast. If you like what you heard, you know what to do. Please rate review and share it with a friend or a colleague, and until next time, please remember that cash flow, creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. Take care and be kind. You. For more on how to achieve radical success through empathy, visit the empathy edge calm. There. You can listen to past episodes, access show notes and free resources. Book me for a Keynote or workshop and sign up for our email list to get new episodes, insights, news and events. Please follow me on Instagram at Red slice Maria, never forget, empathy is your superpower. Use it to make your work and the world a better place.
