Salary compression explained, and the one sentence that resets it
Back in 2022, the period Lean In and McKinsey dubbed the "Great Breakup," Hartford-area firms saw roughly two women directors resign for each one advanced to a higher post. Take a moment with that. Departures did not outpace new hires at a rate of two to one. Instead, two left for each one who climbed the ladder internally.
What makes it striking is who those women were. They had not stalled. Directors are the people employers say they most want to keep. Those departures were deliberate, and the women making them had done their homework on the math. The biggest figure in that calculation is one your organization rarely shows you: the difference between what it pays you and what it pays the person it just brought in to sit beside you.
Tracing the figure to its source, and what it leaves unsaid
Each year, the Women in the Workplace study polls large companies across North America, and the 2022 edition is where this figure originates. It covers a single year and a single management level, and it does not explain why any particular woman walked out. A few moved on to work under a more capable manager, while others chased a more senior job title. Still, a quieter pressure runs beneath many of these exits, and it is called salary compression. It appears when annual increases are applied as a share of a pay figure fixed years back, even as incoming hires are offered whatever the current market will bear. The longer you remain and the more you achieve, the further your pay drifts behind, and nobody has to make a deliberate choice to make it happen.
How it feels from your desk
Imagine you signed on six years ago, with a solid offer for a senior manager role. You earned two promotions. Each time, your raise was a percentage of what you already earned, and every percentage looked reasonable. Today you run an entire division, and last month the company hired a director from the outside. HR sent over the offer, and you read the number. That newcomer earns $18,000 more than you do.
Nobody misled you. Your manager did not scheme against you. Most organizations run two pay systems, one designed to retain current people and one designed to attract new ones, and only the second one responds to the market. From the very first day, your pay has been set by the older formula, not the one currently in use.
How this plays out for your career
The salary you currently earn belongs to the person who walked in six years ago. The work you do today belongs to an executive with a much higher market value. Your employer has had little reason to notice the change, because the version of you on the payroll keeps showing up and performing the job the newcomer is paid to do.
Your negotiating skills were not the cause of this. It is the default result of staying put and doing well, and it only stops when you ask for a re-price instead of a standard raise. Those requests are different. A standard raise nudges the existing figure upward by some percent. A re-price sets a new number.
Steps you can take this week
Gather three posted salary ranges for your current title in the Greater Hartford market and note the midpoint of each. Then, in a scheduled one-on-one, deliver this sentence and pause: "I'd like my pay set against the market for the job I'm doing now, not adjusted upward from the job I was hired for."
If your manager says the budget cycle has closed, ask for the date it reopens and the figure you are aiming for, then send a brief two-line email confirming both. Should your manager claim there is no gap whatsoever, request the pay range attached to your position in Hartford or elsewhere. In either case, the conversation moves away from asking for a little more and toward asking what the role is truly worth, and that is the only framing that actually narrows the gap.
When was the last time you looked at the figure you are being paid against?