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Discover what your job should pay—and how to earn it. Hosted by a PhD in HR and compensation analytics expert, What It Pays goes beyond generic advice with real salary data, behavioral insights, and a research-backed system built to help professionals thrive. Whether you're negotiating your first offer or aiming for your next raise, we break down what works, what’s fair, and what’s next. With actionable advice, inspiring stories, and expert-backed tools, this podcast helps early and mid-career professionals unlock their full earning potential.
The content of this podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial, legal, tax, career, or professional advice. Listeners should consult qualified professionals before making any decisions based on anything discussed. Opinions expressed by guests are their own and do not reflect the views of the host or CompRatio LLC.
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You shouldn't need a PhD to understand what a job pays, so I earned one so that way you don't have to. Welcome to What It Pays, a podcast about helping you understand salaries and negotiation and just live your salary with confidence. Let's start with a question. When was the last time you really knew if your salary was fair?
For most people, that answer is never. And that's the problem we're trying to solve. I've worked in HR, I've done compensation strategy, analytics, I've been in tech, I've been in the nonprofit world, I've been in small business world, government, you name it. And I've built salary systems for organizations that actually want to get it right. But here's what I've learned.
The people that need these insights the most are often the ones getting left out. So what it pays is here to fix that with data, context and honesty. I've been in those shoes. I've been in that spot. And now I've been on the other side and earned a PhD along the way. So that way I can help everyone. And so this podcast is here to do exactly that. And that is to bring the best out in people and the best out in career. So that way you can live the life that you've always wanted to live.
This isn't just a podcast. I'm building a platform. It's also called What It Pays. That makes the salary transparency movements and things like that actually usable.
So besides for having this podcast, you can go to what it pays dot com and join the mailing list because I've got a tool that's going to be coming out very soon where you can look up salary ranges, not just by vague national averages, compare job offers side by side. You're not dealing with job postings that may have a salary range attached to them, but it often is very wide. No, this is real grounded data. You can also track your salary and history.
so that way you can see your career and then there's a goal setting section so that way you can also career plan your future based on actual data. You can even submit your job and pay information anonymously so that way you can help others as well. we're all in this together and the more that we're able to bring this out into the forefront with real clear data the better everybody is. It's the tide that'll rise all ships.
And that can help you with negotiations or career planning looking things up by state and comparing it with National etc. So it's gonna be a really nice tool So when you upgrade when it launches you'll actually be able to unlock all those premium features with the dashboards deeper analytics the things I wish that I would have had so guess what I did I earned a PhD I worked out there in the field and now I've built it for not just myself but for everybody And then you're gonna be able to give feedback
as we move forward. So as we look at some other aspects, those comparison tools that let you see what others of similar backgrounds are actually earning. And for businesses, yes, I've built this for you too. There's a business to business side as well. Employers can run internal reports, benchmark their titles, explore pay equity gaps in departments or based on tenure or protected classes, but more importantly, have actual information
to then generate good offers that are paying what they should pay. Because I've heard from many small businesses when I ask them the question, what are you going to pay this role? And they said, well, this is what I can afford. And that number might be too high or too low, thus creating a situation that's untenable or not going to be able to retain that talent because it's not actually paying what the skill set demands.
And so this is the tool that I wish existed when I started out. I'm building it with clarity, privacy at its core because this is really important to me and I think it's important to you. And that's why we want to do this together.
So what are we doing here on this podcast?
We're breaking down salaries, real salaries, and talking about the systems behind where those numbers came from. Also, the information behind a salary that's an additional compensation that we also might not be considering. You'll also hear how compensation works, what the HR team doesn't necessarily tell you in that process, and how to protect your earning power to make sure that your purchasing power, A, is being maximized, as well as
staying
staying well with inflation and other things. To do so, I'll be answering the real listener questions that are posted online or sent into the podcast. And so you can email podcast at what it pays dot com. Feel free to send in anything. on the tool in the future, there's actually going to be an upload feature for you to upload audio or text content, whether that's you sharing a success story, which absolutely send those in. We want others to be able to learn from your success. Or it is really, hey, here's I have an offer or I've
a about my pay or my situation. Maybe I've gotten a title change, but no comp change. Why is that? What's going on here? We can break all of that down. So we'll break down those job descriptions, those pay bands, negotiation strategies, and also the fine print that people often miss.
So here's why this matters. More states are passing salary transparency laws. Remote work has changed everything. We're also seeing returned office mandates. are finally asking, wait, is this actually a good offer? But when you start looking for answers, you get nothing but chaos.
job postings may have a posted salary range because of salary transparency laws of this job will pay between 60,000 and 140,000 dollars.
Well, that's not really helpful because does that mean they're just going to come in at 60? I might be thinking my skill set demands 140, but what am I basing that on in any place? also what are they going to base it on? So crowdsource data is all over the place. Most platforms are if you go out and you want to Google your salary or look up a salary for a thing, a lot of that data is simply user generated content. There's no large data sets that are informing that. And the ones that have that
are really, really expensive. And so this is a platform to bring that more to you. So let's, because it doesn't need to be like that. This data is available. The question is, how can we access it? And that's exactly what this is for. So we're doing not just that. We're here, what it pays is here to be a precise human and local tool. Salary data that you can actually use in a podcast and other content to help all of us
understand it.
And this is where you come in. You can submit a story, your biggest salary question, or a job offer if you're unsure about, and I'll feature them on the show. We'll talk it through, we'll break down the analytics behind it, and you can stay anonymous, that's completely fine, and you can send it as an audio file so you can record a voice memo on your phone, and send if I email podcasts at whatitpays.com. This is your space. We're all here together.
So what do you do from here? First step, subscribe to the podcast. Whatever podcast platform you're listening to this on or watching it on YouTube, how do YouTube is you can click subscribe, like and follow or share with friends. So then you can also join the newsletter. That tool is coming. I am so excited. It's got a really cool system behind it that I spent a lot of time building. And I think you're going to really enjoy it. And of course, there's going to be freemium access and things for those who are the first
people
it into what you want it to be. This is a way to carve out the tool that you also have wanted. So that's going to be really great. So here's what to do next. Again, one first subscribe to the podcast wherever you are listening. First of all, thank you. This is free. And the truth is you subscribing or liking the episode will have this discoverable to more people. And that helps more people find out about pay, which again, betters the conversation for everyone. Second, go to whatitpays.com.
and join the newsletter so you can get the latest and greatest and what's going on in the market as well as all the information about the tool going live and that you'll because you'll want to be a part of that really cool movement. And then you deserve to know what it pays. And I just thank you for being here. I thank you for subscribing and I thank you for being a champion of wanting to go out there and make the world a better place because guess what? We are all in this together. So let's make it the best it can absolutely be. And there's no reason that salary
and the conversations around that should be hard to navigate because guess what? We all navigate it. It's so common, so let's make it common. All right, I'll talk to you next week. Bye.