For years, “competitive salary” was the norm on job adverts. It gave employers flexibility, and candidates accepted it.
Today, the conversation feels very different.
Candidates increasingly expect to know what a role pays before they apply. In fact, recent research suggests that 80% of candidates won’t apply for a role if no salary is listed, and 89% are more likely to apply when a salary range is included.
But whilst much of the discussion centres around whether employers should publish salaries, we think there’s a much bigger question to ask.
Could you confidently explain how your salaries are decided?
Because pay transparency doesn’t create problems. It exposes the ones that already exist.
We’ve all seen businesses where salaries have evolved over time rather than through strategy. A role filled urgently commands a higher salary than expected. A valued employee receives a counter-offer to stay. New starters enter on market rates while long-serving colleagues gradually fall behind.
Individually, those decisions often make perfect sense.
Collectively, they can create inconsistencies that become much harder to justify when transparency increases.
A salary band on a job advert is just the visible part of the iceberg.
Beneath the surface sits everything that supports it:
- market benchmarking
- internal pay consistency
- career progression
- workforce planning
- reward strategy
When those foundations are clear, salary transparency becomes far less daunting.
Although the UK hasn’t yet introduced the same pay transparency legislation as the EU, the direction of travel is clear. Many organisations, particularly those operating internationally, are already reviewing how salaries are benchmarked and communicated. Even without legal requirements, candidate expectations are evolving much faster than legislation.
And that’s where we believe the real opportunity lies.
Transparency isn’t just about attracting more applicants. It’s about building trust.
Candidates want to understand where they stand. Employees want confidence that pay decisions are fair. Managers want clear frameworks to support recruitment and progression.
The businesses that navigate this shift successfully won’t necessarily be the first to publish salary bands on every advert.
They’ll be the ones who have already asked the difficult questions behind the scenes.
- Are our salaries benchmarked against today’s market?
- Could our managers explain why someone is paid what they are?
- Are we rewarding loyalty as well as attracting new talent?
- Do our progression pathways match our pay structure?
These aren’t just recruitment questions. They’re business questions.
At JFR, we’re finding that more conversations are moving beyond simply filling vacancies. Employers want to understand how they’re positioned in the market, what candidates expect, and whether their hiring strategy will still work in a year’s time.
Pay transparency is only one part of that conversation, but it’s an important one.
Because in the end, it’s not the salary band on the advert that builds confidence.
It’s the strategy behind it.
Is your current pay structure helping you attract and retain the right people, or could it be quietly holding you back? Lets talk.