I was pulled into a meeting with my director and told we’re not allowed to do this. I told her it absolutely was allowed under the law and she looked me in the eye and doubled down, stated that it has been like this at every company she’s ever worked at.
My complaint to HR resulted in the HR person telling me that while it wasn’t allowed, it was discouraged; which is also against the law.
My ethics report on both of them was “investigated and concluded”.
My call to the NLRB resulted in an overworked federal employee telling me I could make a complaint but it was unlikely to amount to anything against a company that size.
The rule with discussing salaries is that you can do it (and you should do it), but you shouldn’t let your managers know you’re doing it. The law is on your side, but nobody with actual authority wants to support you doing it.
So, if you’re on your way out in a contested wrongful termination case, there’s definitely leverage in pointing to your employer firing you for discussing salaries with your coworkers. But in every other case, you gotta play those cards close to the chest. Nod and smile and agree with every manager who says you shouldn’t discuss salaries. Then do as thou wilt.
Imagine living in a place where managers are coerced and/or encouraged to trample employers rights.
That kind of bullshit only engourages the employees to look for a new job. If somebody does a good job in the long run its cheaper to pay them well and keep them in house instead of hiring continually new people and having everytime a coin toss if they even know what they are doing and spending time to train them.
I was leading a team of engineers (in contrast to managing). There was another team that hired a cohort of engineers straight out of a boot camp. One of them was a shit-hot Jedi of a woman, so I totally poached her for my team. It helped that my team was working on cool stuff and most people wanted in.
After she joined my team, I asked what her salary was (leads don’t typically have access to pay info like a manager would). She was making $70k while most engineers of her tenure and skill were making $110k to $145k. I went to talk to motherfucking HR about this problematic disparity.
The HR jerkwad had the nerve to say, “Discussing your salaries is a terminable offense.”
“I will give you five seconds to amend your statement.”
He stammered a bit and made some non-committal statements. I went to the division VP, to whom I directly reported. He fixed that shit the next day and got her back pay to her previous review.
So yeah, absolutely discuss your salaries with your peers. And FFS don’t be cowed by these douchebags.
Same job mentioned before. One of the women on our team had been there a little over 10 years, she was just starting at the same place when I left for another job. When I came back to that company she had been through 4 promotions and was making at least 10k less than I was hired for, same role amd same team.
I was pulled into a meeting with my director and told we’re not allowed to do this. I told her it absolutely was allowed under the law and she looked me in the eye and doubled down, stated that it has been like this at every company she’s ever worked at.
My complaint to HR resulted in the HR person telling me that while it wasn’t allowed, it was discouraged; which is also against the law.
My ethics report on both of them was “investigated and concluded”.
My call to the NLRB resulted in an overworked federal employee telling me I could make a complaint but it was unlikely to amount to anything against a company that size.
The rule with discussing salaries is that you can do it (and you should do it), but you shouldn’t let your managers know you’re doing it. The law is on your side, but nobody with actual authority wants to support you doing it.
So, if you’re on your way out in a contested wrongful termination case, there’s definitely leverage in pointing to your employer firing you for discussing salaries with your coworkers. But in every other case, you gotta play those cards close to the chest. Nod and smile and agree with every manager who says you shouldn’t discuss salaries. Then do as thou wilt.
That’s not a rule.
That is shitty workplace culture that needs to change.
Imagine living in a place where managers are coerced and/or encouraged to trample employers rights.
That kind of bullshit only engourages the employees to look for a new job. If somebody does a good job in the long run its cheaper to pay them well and keep them in house instead of hiring continually new people and having everytime a coin toss if they even know what they are doing and spending time to train them.
I was leading a team of engineers (in contrast to managing). There was another team that hired a cohort of engineers straight out of a boot camp. One of them was a shit-hot Jedi of a woman, so I totally poached her for my team. It helped that my team was working on cool stuff and most people wanted in.
After she joined my team, I asked what her salary was (leads don’t typically have access to pay info like a manager would). She was making $70k while most engineers of her tenure and skill were making $110k to $145k. I went to talk to motherfucking HR about this problematic disparity.
The HR jerkwad had the nerve to say, “Discussing your salaries is a terminable offense.”
“I will give you five seconds to amend your statement.”
He stammered a bit and made some non-committal statements. I went to the division VP, to whom I directly reported. He fixed that shit the next day and got her back pay to her previous review.
So yeah, absolutely discuss your salaries with your peers. And FFS don’t be cowed by these douchebags.
Same job mentioned before. One of the women on our team had been there a little over 10 years, she was just starting at the same place when I left for another job. When I came back to that company she had been through 4 promotions and was making at least 10k less than I was hired for, same role amd same team.
An employer telling employees that they can’t discuss salary is such a massive red flag
Yep. That was when I realized I wasn’t planning on moving up or staying long.