Lately, I encountered an interesting, yet complicated situation.
At the meeting, which - lets say - had some of the characteristic of employee evaluation and budget planning meeting, management met with an employee who hasn't been given a raise for a long time.
She felt that she was not appreciated and her value wasn't recognized.
Management shared the view and agreed to be partially accounted for omissions or failures. As I am aware, the emotions were properly addressed and apologies stated.
But, the problem is, in order to fit in a budget and have a salary plan that is fair and square management can not give her a raise...
It looks like a lose-lose situation. Of course, I have a bunch of ideas inspired by it, but I would like to hear your suggestions.
What's your suggested approach? Can it be turned into a win-win situation?
Edit:
Is looks like the subject needs some clarifications in order to improve helpfulness of the answers:
- As I am concerned, a salary level related to a position we are talking about, is externally just and attractive.
- A gender of a person is out of equation because of two reasons. First, both genders are paid equally. Second, I choose to refer to such person as "she" because an impersonal construction is (in English) rather uncommon and I don't feel convenient using it.
- As I am concerned, this person is not paid unfairly nor the entire group is. We can probably argue how much of a salary should be related to skills and responsibilities and how much to years of work. Nevertheless, there is no significant change in her responsibilities or skills that would justify a rise. She was paid more than others for a time being and it's a sum of many events that led to a current situation. Events that both management and employee partaken and agreed to.
Commenters seem to focus on a presumed management-employee conflict while it's not the main part of the question. Both parties understand the situation and understand importance of the conditions which are in place. I believe both will appreciate any solution which could make employee feel more appreciated and her value more recognized without making whole salary plan unfair.
I look at it as an opportunity to learn and introduce any valuable insights to both parties involved.