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Wage Scale
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Wage Scale
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I need to develop an hourly wage scale for our monitoring station. They work all shifts and we have employees who have been there for 30 years. Does anyone have any suggestions for resourc
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Forums » Topic Forums » Benefits & Compensation » Wage Scale
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Wage Scale
posted at 1/30/2013 11:05 AM EST
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 22
First: 11/15/2011 Last: 4/12/2013 |
I need to develop an hourly wage scale for our monitoring station. They work all shifts and we have employees who have been there for 30 years. Does anyone have any suggestions for resources I could use to help develop this? |
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Re: Wage Scale
posted at 1/31/2013 9:52 AM EST
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 180
First: 9/21/2011 Last: 5/14/2013 |
It's hard to give you specific resources, but I used to have a book called "COMPENSATION" by Milkovich that was the textbook under the CEBS program for developing wage scales. Do you already know your minimum/maximum/average where you want/need to be ? Do you have any resources/wage studies to know what your industry is paying this position? You might check with the larger HR consulting firms to see if they do a study for your industry. The first year you may have to pay more but if you participate, it should be cheaper the next round as a participant. Are you having to compete with other industries for the same good workers? Do you have high COL issues? Do these employees also receive other benefits (health insurance, etc) that should be considered in their overall cost to the company? I would consider a formula that takes into account the following: (1) internal service/experience (2) External service/experience -- depending on your views this can be more or less valuable than internal (3) education and certifications -- do they need this or does it help them become a more valuable employee? (4) The ability to increase wages based on performance, not just on service. Once you have your formula, you can place current employees into it and see what the calculated rate would be....see how many outliers (both under and over you have). This will tell you how well your current pay matches what you wish to compensate for. Then you can tweak your formula or you can grandfather those making too much and possibly do so raises for those making too little. But going forward, you have an easy way to explain and calculate for new hires and ongoing pay issues. |
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Re: Wage Scale
posted at 1/31/2013 11:22 AM EST
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 22
First: 11/15/2011 Last: 4/12/2013 |
I think I have that book, I will check it out. I'm not finding a lot of survey information for our industry or our specific jobs. I think we would consider having a custom survey done, but not sure who to use for this. |
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Re: Wage Scale
posted at 2/1/2013 12:47 PM EST
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 180
First: 9/21/2011 Last: 5/14/2013 |
Custom surveys can usually be done by HR consulting firms. Of course the larger ones (mercer, hewitt, buck, wyatt) are more expensive per hour but usually have a wider range of data mining contacts. But depending on the level and number of ees you have, it may not be feasible. What's good about a consulting firm is that it give you the arm's length needed to avoid issues under the Sherman Act (wage setting laws). I work for a company that has employees who do multiple types of jobs and it is always fun trying to analyze what they should be making compared to the marketplace. What I try to do is percentage/ratio their duties and then use those same percentage/ratios on the pay that I find and add them together. But then again, I love solving puzzles and working with data (to the point that some would probably call me whacked) .... if I didn't have a full time job, I would offer to help you out! Because projects like this really interest me. I loved the class on compensation and actually got the CEBS 3 course certification years ago, but haven't used it much. |
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Re: Wage Scale
posted at 2/4/2013 10:15 AM EST
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 22
First: 11/15/2011 Last: 4/12/2013 |
I wish you didn't have a full time job because this is not my favorite thing to do! The jobs I am looking at are fairly low paying shift work. I don't think there is a lot of competition from other companies in our area, but getting good people to work at that rate is challenging. Finding out what other companies in the industry (not necessarily in our area) are paying would be helpful. Thanks for your advice. |
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Re: Wage Scale
posted at 2/4/2013 1:45 PM EST
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 221
First: 9/29/2011 Last: 5/2/2013 |
First, define what your pay strategy is going to be. You're having problems finding people to work at the rate you're paying. If your strategy is to pay as low as possible, this will forever and always be a challenge for you. On the other hand, if you established a rate of pay/benefits/working conditions that would be attractive, then that will go a long ways towards reducing the challenge. If it's a low pay job, it's most likely a low skill job. Is retail a potential source of candidates? Fast food? Similar industries? If you can draw from that population and, with a minimal amount of training, get them up to speed you might be able to solve some of your staffing issue as well. |
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Re: Wage Scale
posted at 3/21/2013 5:15 PM EDT
on Workforce Management
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Posts: 1
First: 3/21/2013 Last: 3/21/2013 |
I do not like the compensation data analysis components in HR, but as we all know, they are a very necessary factor for being competitive, understanding your position in the market, determining any internal pay inequities as well as communicating with the C-Suite. I am assisting a client to complete a compensation analysis and then implement salary grades and ranges. The client has multiple industries within its organization, some of which have very specialized jobs in rural areas. So instead of going the route of purchasing multiple surveys, and/or collecting data from the DOL's Bureau of Labor Statistics, we are considering contracting with PayScale Inc. which will not only assist with determining where we are in the market, but will also assist with the internal analysis and the grades and ranges as well as forecasting for merit increases and bonuses. You can provide an Executive Summary in a moment's notice, and we all know how quickly we need to respond to a CFO sayiing "I need thelabor stats for xyz...." You can utilize the data all year; it stays relevant because PayScale, Inc uploads their system I believe 2x a day, but I know at least daily. Real-time data. This is very attractive because it is swift, with relevant data and the program is capable of creating reports; you can manipulate scenarios with ease compared to the traditional manual approach to the compensation process. Which is time consuming, often the surveys you purchase are out-dated so you need to age the wages and 'aim and hope' for reaching the current market wage. Too much room for errors and inaccuracy increases without having experience in this area and it really takes up a great deal of time which isn't beneficial to a 1 person HR department. Completing compensation data manually is ideal for organizations that have a dedicated comp staff and/or someone that LOVES this type of work and has experience to complete efficiently. It is a rough task if it's not your niche. In Response to Re: Wage Scale: Custom surveys can usually be done by HR consulting firms. Of course the larger ones (mercer, hewitt, buck, wyatt) are more expensive per hour but usually have a wider range of data mining contacts. But depending on the level and number of ees you have, it may not be feasible. What's good about a consulting firm is that it give you the arm's length needed to avoid issues under the Sherman Act (wage setting laws). I work for a company that has employees who do multiple types of jobs and it is always fun trying to analyze what they should be making compared to the marketplace. What I try to do is percentage/ratio their duties and then use those same percentage/ratios on the pay that I find and add them together. But then again, I love solving puzzles and working with data (to the point that some would probably call me whacked) .... if I didn't have a full time job, I would offer to help you out! Because projects like this really interest me. I loved the class on compensation and actually got the CEBS 3 course certification years ago, but haven't used it much. Posted by rrupert |
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