Talking about your salary is still a major workplace taboo. There is almost an unwritten rule in most offices that wages should never be openly discussed with anyone apart from HR.
But a new study could be about to change all that. According to research conducted by UCLA’s Ricardo Perez-Truglia and Harvard’s Zoë Cullen telling your employees how much you earn could actually boost productivity.
For their research, they surveyed 2,060 workers at a bank in Asia. They found that in general, employees tend to underestimate their bosses’ compensation.
However, when staff members discovered that their managers’ salaries were higher than they thought they actually spent more time at work, sent more emails and increased their sales.
In an interesting twist, the larger the salary misperception was, the more productive the employee was likely to become.
On the other hand, when employees discover that their peers make more than they do, they tend to slack off.
The increase in measurable productivity is relatively modest—according to the study, employees who find that their boss’s salary is 10% more than they had imagined will spend about five more minutes in the office a day.
The reason, according to Ricardo Perez-Truglia, is that the higher salary is aspirational. It gives workers an extra incentive to work hard so they can be promoted and perhaps one day make their bosses’ pay
Would you be brave enough to let your employees know how much you earn? Let us know below.
