Payscale

Managers and TA teams do not need compensation to hand them the answer. They need the tools to make the right call. As Rajashree Campbell and Ilissa May, SPHR shared at Compference, real empowerment comes from giving stakeholders three essential inputs: 💰 Budget 📊 Salary range ✨ Internal average With these data points in hand, teams stop waiting on comp and start making confident, fair decisions on their own. That is how dependence turns into empowerment. Watch more insights from their session in the Compference recordings: https://bit.ly/3UiwGqd

Every comp pro knows the moment: the CFO asks why. 😅 Why this budget? Why this structure? Why this trade-off? If your only answer is “that’s the market rate,” you’ve already lost the room. To defend your decisions, you need to: ✅ Show the trade-offs behind every recommendation ✅ Connect total rewards back to business outcomes ✅ Prove compensation is more than a line item. It’s strategy On this episode of Comp and Coffee, Lexi Clarke (CHRO) and Philip Watson (CFO) share how HR + Finance can stop speaking past each other and start building pay strategies that stand up to scrutiny. Listen here: https://bit.ly/45bLWvl

Retention risks don’t show up all at once. They surface quietly, then suddenly your best people are gone. 😞 Employees are making faster career decisions, expectations around pay and growth are shifting, and transparency has raised the stakes. Organizations that rely on disconnected data and reactive strategies are often too late to respond. Get all your questions answered live on February 26, 9–10 am PT, featuring Lexi Clarke, Chief People Officer at Payscale, and Farrell Redwine, Executive Consultant at livingHR, Inc. and former CHRO at Nordstrom. In this session, we’ll explore: • How employee expectations around pay, growth, flexibility, and purpose are changing • Where traditional retention strategies break down in a more transparent labor market • Practical ways to engage and retain critical talent • How to equip managers to have stronger, more effective retention conversations If retaining your best people feels harder than it used to, this session will help you see the risks sooner and act with confidence. Register now: https://bit.ly/3NTt8L8

If you can’t explain how AI is influencing your people data, someone else will. Executives already assume AI is part of HR decisions. Many teams are still figuring out where, how, or with what level of confidence it’s being used. In this episode of Comp and Coffee, Stacey Harris and Payscale experts Amy Stewart and Ruth Thomas review recent pay research and explain why understanding the facts behind your HR and compensation decisions matters more than ever in 2026. Grab a cup of ☕️ and tune in: https://bit.ly/46huVzO

Pay transparency is quickly becoming a competitive advantage as much as a compliance requirement. In this session, Ruth Thomas and Lulu Seikaly from Payscale unpack what the latest U.S., Canadian, and EU regulations mean for job postings, offers, internal equity reviews, and pay communication in 2026. Join us on February 24 at 1 PM ET. 🔗https://ow.ly/AN5X50Yh2UY

In case this saves you one awkward leadership meeting ⤵️

What’s trending in the world of compensation right now? From pay transparency to smarter planning, here are a few reads worth adding to your list. 📚 Preview 2026 salary increases: https://bit.ly/4r7dhql 📚 ICYMI, California passed a new pay equity law: https://bit.ly/4q1SXpE 📚 How to deal with job hugging: https://bit.ly/4pVQf4I 📚 Will pay transparency make every employee’s salary the same?: https://bit.ly/4jXuOiD

If your comp strategy falls apart the moment someone asks, “Cool… and what data is that based on?” you've got a problem on your hands... I just read Payscale’s Compensation Data Landscape whitepaper and it’s a practical gut-check on whether you actually have the right mix of data to hit your comp goals and sheds light on where “free salary data” can quietly lead you astray. A few things worth stealing for your next comp convo: ✅ They highlight the results from a survey of 3500+ HR practitioners and gave an honest assessment + score across the major salary data types (aka: not all data is created equal). It's always good to know what your peers are saying! Stay tuned for their 2026 Compensation Best Practices Report later this month. ✅ There are drawbacks to free salary sources (you know the ones), and they can mislead decision-making. ✅ There are HUGE benefits of real-time data, especially when work feels like it's moving faster than the speed of light. The big theme: if you want confidence (and fewer Slack messages that start with “ummmm what should we do”), you need the right data inputs, not just MORE inputs. 📣 If you’re in comp planning mode or trying to clean up your market pricing approach for 2026, this is a worthwhile download. Not me forwarding it to my CFO 😈 Read more from the link in the comments ⬇️

Refusing to comply with pay transparency laws could cost you 𝗺𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀. 💰 But that’s not the 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭 𝘳𝘪𝘴𝘬. For some companies, a class action settlement is just a check. The cost of doing business. The real damage shows up here: 👉 Your Glassdoor reviews 👉 Your candidate pipeline 👉 Your employee engagement scores 👉 Your reputation with regulators 👉 Your brand in the headlines Because once a pay transparency lawsuit goes public, it’s no longer about compliance. It’s about 𝘁𝗿𝘂𝘀𝘁. ⚖️ And suddenly the cost of that lawsuit isn’t just legal fees...it’s: • Increased attrition • Lower quality applicants • Longer time-to-hire • Pay compression pressure • A PR nightmare you didn’t budget for 🚨 You won’t lose millions because of the lawsuit. 𝘠𝘰𝘶’𝘭𝘭 𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘢𝘸𝘴𝘶𝘪𝘵 𝘴𝘢𝘺𝘴 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶. The question isn’t whether you can afford to comply. It’s whether you can afford the story that gets told if you don’t. 🔎

🚩 “We don’t need market data for this role.” 🚩 “Let’s just use last year’s numbers.” 🚩 “Can we make an exception?” 🚩 “Only one person knows how this spreadsheet works.” 🚩 “Can you pull this together by eod?” If your comp process has more red flags than a bad Hinge date… it might be time to move on. 💔➡️💘