Iwish the media pushed half as hard to get people to donate eyes for thevisually impaired, as they do to get eyeballs for the sake of circulation andviewership.
Atelevision channel claimed to have lured viewers to their election coverage of‘real stories of political intrigue’ and away from the ‘boring numbers, graphs,trends and analyses’ presented by rival channels. In a bid to boost sales, anadvertisement for a newspaper read, ‘why go to sleep when you’ve just woken up?’, in a clear dig at rival newspapers that were less sensationalist and moreeducating. There seems to be a free-for-all to ‘dumb-down’ the consumer. Consumershave a free choice and can choose what they want, you might say. I agree. But Ithink that customers have a free choice and should also consider choosing whatthey need. Appropriate communication would certainly help.
Considerthis. A few days back, a headline in several publications screamed that Cognizanthad paid its employees a whopping 200% as annual bonus. In many instances, therelated articles did not adequately clarify that it was upto 200% of the targetbonus paid to the best performers at some or more career levels. That, if an employeewas to receive, say, 25% of fixed pay as bonus, the actual payout to thatemployee was doubled. You might think that common sense would lead thereaders to the right picture anyway. I thought so too. Till I read numerousreader comments posted on social media sites like, “awesome man, my companysucks since it has given me only 15%”, and “it’s a lie, no one can give 200%bonus”. Huh ? Were these people seriously mistaking that Cognizant had paid itsemployees 200% of fixed pay as bonus ? If this is how many people who belong tothe elite 7% of our population employed in the organised sector received thisnews report, what about the scores of others outside of this group ?
It’snot that I don’t respect what Cognizant did. They’ve a history of doing goodwith employee compensation and promotions, and I’ve always respected that. WhatI have respected even more is what lies behind that act. That’s what, I feel,the people at Cognizant as well as the people elsewhere need to know. Thecompany’s SG&A (sales, general and administrative) expenses as a percentageof their revenues, has consistently declined over the last five years. And thattheir revenue per employee has consistently increased over the same period.Which means, that the company’s employees and leaders have been consistentlydoing many things right. Which also means that the company has consistently hadthe capacity to pay.
Itwould be in their interest, for the employees of Cognizant to know, that their futurecompensation and benefits are dependent on a maintenance or increase of thatcapacity. And that, they would have to play their part in it. Or else the sweetrun might soon end. Companies that have phenomenal growth have to recruit in verylarge numbers. Which means that they are at risk of their own employeesgrieving about ‘lots of people from outside’ coming in with better pays and biggerjobs. That’s also probably why high-growth companies stretch a bit more and showwillingness to provide higher than the required raises and higher than the necessarypromotions. At least for some employees, faster progress may take them to their‘stagnation or landing points’ faster.
Itis also necessary for the employees of other companies to know, that to get thekind of rewards that Cognizant provides, their own companies must also havecomparable or better capacities. And comparable or better growth. That only employeedesires can’t be benchmarked. So should the organisations’ capacities andwillingness to pay.
Thatbrings me to a suggestion.
Whynot include these factors (of capacity and willingness) to adjust the resultsof compensation benchmarking exercises and make them more real ? Let’s say,that the usual study throws up that company A has an average salary of Rs. 80, yourcompany has Rs. 100, and company B has Rs. 120. If company B has bettercapacity (revenue per employee, overheads as % of revenue, or any otherrelevant metric) and better willingness (growth, or any other relevant metric),than your company does, then the relative advantages of company B need to be adjusteddownward to allow for real comparison. Similarly, if company A is worse offthan your own in capacity and willingness, then your relative advantages needdownward adjustment.
Inthe above example, what that means is that the salary gap between company A andyour company needs to be reduced. And so does the salary gap between yourcompany and company B. The adjusted scenario could, say, look like this - company A at Rs. 95, your company at Rs. 100, and company B at Rs. 110. Or whatever else, it does not matter. Since it would be realistic and fair. To all parties.
I amgetting more of a good feeling about this than I thought I would. Perhaps, suchan adjustment might just reduce the gap between what the employees want as pay versuswhat they need. Perhaps, such an adjustment might just reduce the gap betweenwhat companies want to give as pay versus what they need to.
