Pay Review Meeting – Checklist for You as a Manager

Springtime means wage revision time for many companies. As a manager, grading the employees’ work and conducting pay review meetings can be challenging – but don’t worry! With the proper preparations, you will do great. We’ll give you a list of everything you need to check off before and during your important chat.

Wage revision means reviewing and adjusting the employees’ wages and should generally be performed once a year. The wage revision process is outlined in the collective agreements. Usually, the salary increase levels (the salary pots) are described here, which co-workers are covered, and when and how the pay review meetings should be conducted. When you have assessed the employee’s work efforts, you need to communicate this in a pay review meeting.

The meeting should be a natural continuation of the staff appraisal and aims to follow up on performance and results, motivate proposed salary and let the employee give their viewpoints.

Read more: A Smoother Salary Review – Four tips to managers and HR

Clear Salary Criteria Will Pay Off

How well do you know the company’s salary criteria? And how well do the employees know them? The salary criteria are valuable for you as a salary-setting manager. They clarify what affects your employees' pay and facilitate consistent evaluation and salary setting. The salary criteria define which of your employees’ performances, competencies, and behaviors are essential in your organization and that you wish to reward.

But for the salary criteria to fill their function, they have to be communicated to the employees. Perhaps, an assessment of terms and definitions is necessary to ensure that everyone interprets them the same way. When it’s time for the pay review meeting, you can use the salary criteria as your support for motivating a particular salary setting. Of course, there are no guarantees that all your employees will be satisfied. On the other hand, the chances of them understanding why their salary is set to a specific level and how they can influence it will increase considerably if they know and understand the salary criteria.

Pay Review Meeting Checklist

There are a few things to consider when planning a pay review meeting: you will have to coordinate the process with your colleagues, and you will also need supporting information. A good piece of advice is to start preparing early on to maintain a good feeling about it throughout the entire process.

1. Discuss with Your Colleagues
   Walk through the wage revision process with the other salary-setting managers. Assess the size of the salary pot and coordinate your suggestions of how it should be divided. Also, make sure it’s clear what mandates and authority you as a manager have in the salary setting process – this way, you avoid uncertainty in the dialogue with your employees.
   
   
2. Schedule the Pay Review Meeting
   The employees also need time to prepare for the meeting, so invite them in good time. Schedule enough time, so you don’t have to rush; an hour is usually appropriate.
   
   
3. Prepare Supporting Information
   Above, we talked about the importance of clear salary criteria. Make sure both you and your employee have access to them. Read up on collective and possible local agreements, and consult with the company’s HR department if necessary. Also, compile essential background information about the employee, such as position, responsibility, work tasks, and competence development up until now.
   
   
4. Conclude Your Evaluation
   The salary setting should be based on an overall assessment of the employee’s work efforts during the year. How has the employee performed compared to the set goals? How have they developed? Pro tip: The staff appraisal can be good support for your evaluation. Think through what you want the outcome of the meeting to be, what you want to communicate, and which questions you want to ask. Consider how the employee may react to the proposed salary and how to motivate your decision.
   
   
5. Use a Template for Consistency
   Using a template for your pay review meetings will facilitate consistency throughout the process and ensure that nothing is overlooked. The template should be outlined according to your business area and updated continuously.
   
   

Proceed from yourself when talking: “My assessment is that…”, “I experience that…”

During the Pay Review Meeting: What to Consider

Alright, the groundwork is done. You've made your assessment, discussed it with colleagues, and prepared all the necessary materials. Well done! Now it's time for the pay review meeting. Here's how you can structure that important conversation.

This is one way to outline your meeting:

1. Map Out the Meeting
   Start with introducing the employee to the meeting's purpose, agenda, and time frames.
2. Communicate Your Conclusion and the Reasoning Behind It
   Explain what factors the assessment is based on and your impression of the employee’s work efforts. Try using specific examples. Present and motivate the new salary. Lastly, advise the employee on how they can influence their salary moving forward.
   
   
3. Be Responsive to the Employee
   The meeting should be a dialogue where the employee is given a chance to share his/her point of view. Ask questions and listen actively. Ensure that the employee has gotten the opportunity to say everything they wanted before finishing the conversation.
   
   
4. Mind Your Words It’s a good idea to proceed from yourself when talking: “My assessment is that…”, “I experience that…” When you give negative feedback, you should always follow up with straightforward suggestions for development/improvement.
   
   
5. Document Your Meeting Write down what you agreed upon as soon as possible after the meeting. Save the notes for next year’s pay review meeting.

Looking for a more seamless way to handle wage revisions and meetings?

How does your company work with the wage revision process? Do you have a lot of manual double work for managers and the HR department? Save time and resources by digitalizing your wage revision. The wage revision module in Flex HRM Employee gives you system support throughout the entire process, from preparation with creating salary pots and the managers’ work with salary setting, to review and approval of salaries and finally execution and export to the payroll system.

With Flex HRM, working with wages becomes effortless! Feel free to reach out to us if you want to know more!