Pay transparency is exposing a bigger problem: Most companies can’t explain why they pay what they pay

Salary transparency was supposed to be the major fix for the pay gap. But at Fortune‘s Workplace Innovation Summit in Atlanta on Tuesday, a pay transparency CEO and a viral content creator who have spent years working on the issue both said that the problem isn’t companies not sharing pay, it’s that they can’t explain it. “If companies were merely consistent with the things they say they care about in their pay philosophy, and what they actually pay in the execution of offers, merit, promotions, transfers, the pay gap would basically be eradicated,” Maria Colacurcio, CEO of pay equity software company Syndio, told the audience. The disconnect, she said, isn’t intentional, but it still has consequences. HR and compensation teams spend months building thoughtful strategies. But then “that strategy hits the wild wild west,” when recruiters are trying to land candidates and managers are making last-minute retention plays. Merit increases also often go to whoever is loudest, not necessarily whoever performed best. “All of that thoughtful strategy goes out the window, because all these daily decisions are just completely ungoverned, and so the output of that is where we end up [being] inconsistent,” Colacurcio said. Those inconsistencies show up as pay decisions that drift from stated values, and employees that can’t get a straight answer about why they earn what they earn. Hannah Williams, the founder of Salary Transparent Street, has built a viral media platform asking strangers on the street what their salaries are, whether they think they earn enough, and why they make what they make. But with all of her experience talking to everyday people, most people can’t answer that last question. “Are people able to articulate why they make the salaries that they make? Absolutely not,” she said at the Fortune Workplace Innovation Summit. “When I ask them, do you know why you make what you make, they’r