In this episode, Michelle interviews Piccia Neri all about recruiting! If you hire or intend to hire in order to build a diverse team, this is an episode you cannot miss.
Episode Transcript:
Michelle:
Usually I start the podcast by going, “Hi, Allie,” but Allie’s not here today. Allie’s a little under the weather, and so, I’m going to start the podcast by saying, hi, Piccia. How are you?
Piccia Neri:
Hello. Hello. I’m very well, thank you very much. How are you, Michelle?
Michelle:
I am-
Piccia Neri:
I’m sorry to hear Allie isn’t well today.
Michelle:
Me too. I’m sure she’ll be better soon, it’s just we have to give each other grace when we’re not feeling well, and when sometimes I’ve been overwhelmed and I was like, “I don’t have time to do the podcast this week,” and she pulls in a guest. And so, she messaged me this morning, and I thought, “I will ask Piccia to come on,” and we can talk about recruiting, and talk about job postings, and some of the things that you have a real passion for that affect underrepresented people greatly.
So, let me introduce my guest. If you don’t know her, I’m here today with Piccia Neri, and I think of Piccia kind of as a Jill of all trades. So, you have a lot of things that you’re involved with, and a lot of things that you do with training, and working with companies, and doing a lot of your own stuff. And so, I’m going to let you introduce yourself a little bit more, because you can speak about yourself more clearly than I can, I’m sure. So, tell us just a little bit about who you are.
Piccia Neri:
Thank you, Michelle. So, I have recently proudly embraced the fact that I am indeed, a so called unicorn. I’m actually working on my website right now, and the thing is that I’m Italian, so I’m used to being surrounded by artworks that were created by people, well, men in the past, obviously, that were architects, scouters, mathematicians, painters, everything under the sun, and nobody questioned it. They were like, “Yeah, that’s cool. Okay. You’re an architect, or you want to paint? Yeah, do it. How let’s see, how is that? Good.”
So actually, what I do, which is design in general, graphic design, but then I transitioned into UX design, but it doesn’t mean that I stopped being able to do UI design, that’s what I’m saying, and then also along the way, because I’ve always tried to make myself better, because I used to be very much a creative designer. Obviously, I developed my photography skills and my skills as an artist. All of these things stay. They don’t leave because, sorry, I don’t want to sound… What’s the word? Sort of confrontational. I don’t know why it’s coming out this way, but it’s just that, especially in design environments, it’s very much this thing that you can’t do UX, if you’re a UI designer, and I agree that there is definitely a distinction for sure, absolutely, but the reality of smaller clients is that you’ve got to be a hybrid, and in fact, it only makes you a better designer.
And since doing UX stuff, I actually have been doing pure UX for bigger clients, such as Cloudways, such as this Italian music, and actually, no, I want to do both, because otherwise UX on its own is a bit boring. But anyway, sorry, I totally digressed, and my focus at the moment is accessible creativity, because I am really focusing on accessibility, because we want to be inclusive. That’s what this podcast is about. So, there was a thread that led me to this, and I’m on a mission to prove that you can be creative and accessible, because there’s this big myth that accessibility curbs creativity, and I completely disagree. So, here I am.
Michelle:
Well, I’m glad [inaudible 00:03:55].
Piccia Neri:
Very, very long story. Sorry.
Michelle:
No, don’t never apologize. I love it, I love it. Well, one of the things that Allie and I talk about quite frequently on the podcast and just in public in general, is the employment of underrepresented people, and inclusion in projects, and podcasts, and all of the different things, events and things like that, that go into our whole community, the tech community at large, but specifically, we are part of the WordPress community. And one of the things that you are passionate about is making sure that the job descriptions that get put on job postings are inclusive of all the important information, specifically salary, but I think there’s more to it than salary as well. There’s so much-
Piccia Neri:
Yeah, there is loads more to it than salary, yes, and I do believe it’s very, very much an inclusion issue, and certain practices that seem to be prevalent, definitely exclude underrepresented people, and if they carry on, then we’ll carry on being non-diverse and underrepresented, underrepresented rather, as an industry. So, it’s really interesting. So, the reason why I got into it recently is that I had, let’s say a source of income that I recently decided to leave that company, and therefore, I mean, I do lots of things, as you were saying, but it’s really nice to not have to hustle, and have at least one source. Even if it’s not full-time, actually, I would not want full-time, because I do have lots of projects, but I was looking for something that’s part-time and that allows me to do my other things, and that complements what I do well, which is what my previous role actually did quite well.
So, I was looking for that, and so, I started looking at job adverts in the WordPress community, because that’s where I am. However, I can also, I’ve got the luxury of being able to be outside of it as well, because as a designer, the world can be a little bit bigger, and I was flabbergasted because I think in WordPress, you can easily say 90 to 95% of a job adverts do not list salary. They also do all sorts of other heinous, terrible things as well, and in tech in general, it’s an issue, but not everywhere. So, I opened a conversation in the Post Status Slack a while ago, and it gave rise to a lot of people chiming in. Mostly though in that forum, it was people who were saying, “That’s wrong. You should always list a salary, and you should never do other things,” such as that we can get into in a while, such as don’t ask for geographical location, that’s another bug bear of mine that I find a terrible relic of colonialism and exclusion.
So, but none of those who do practice, who do not list salaries and so, on salary ranges, I should say, none of those chimed in. So, I continued the conversation with Dan, the editor of the Post Status blog, and he suggested that I write about it, which was a while ago, and it’s taken me actually a long time, because I want to make sure that I listen to as many people as possible. So, I took the Post Status job page as it was on, I think it was the 27th of July. There were 11 jobs listed at that point, only one mentioned any form of salary range, and it was the Codeable advert. Now, Codeable doesn’t pay people directly. They say just that your typical range for your freelance fees will start from $70 an hour, which is great, because then people go in and know what they’re doing.
So, I wrote to every single advertiser, one was Gravity Forms, and they had two jobs, so it was nine people I wrote to. One, Codeable… Or eight or nine. Anyway. And to their credit, quite a few of these people responded. It was only, I think two companies that didn’t respond, and I was very grateful. In fact, let me publicly say that I haven’t answered them yet, which is shameful, because it’s been a couple of weeks, but I was out ill, and then away, and that’s why. Anyway, apologies. The summer heat, I’ll blame the summer heat. But anyway, it was very nice of them, because often, I think that they know a bit that it’s not quite right and therefore, they gets a little bit defensive, so I think it was really nice of them to actually explain. None of them convinced me at all, but it was quite commendable that they did take the time. Some of them, it’s a very long involved email where they explained their reasons not to list a salary.
I think that I can give them much more compelling reasons to list the salary, and when I write the piece, it will happen. But the thing that I was trying to explain to them, actually, I haven’t engaged a conversation with them yet. I mean, it would take too long, it’s not the right forum. The article is what will do that. But my point was in business, especially as a WordPress agency, I took the famous WP Elevation course, which it doesn’t exist anymore, with Troy Dean, anybody who’s anybody in there has taken it. I’m joking, and you don’t need to have taken it obviously, but I’m saying it out of jest, but really, it was a great course because it introduced everybody to one another. That’s how I met so many of my close friends now in the WordPress community.
And pretty much the first thing that they teach you, for those who don’t know, it was a business course for agency owners. You did need to be a WordPress, agency actually. So, one of the first things that it teaches you is to ask for a budget, and if a client refuses to give you a budget, run them out to work with them, just because you are unable to provide the right solution, and gage whether the project is for you. So, they teach you a number of ways that you can screen potential clients to work out whether they… And the budget thing is the very first one. So, what I’m asking these agencies and companies that choose not to list a salary range is, would you work with a client that refuses to disclose a salary range? I don’t think they would. I mean, I’m going to put that question in the article, but I just don’t think they would.
Michelle:
Right. What do you think the reason is that they don’t?
Piccia Neri:
So, I’ve been given a number of reasons. Some of the answers were actually clearly not saying what was in their mind. Some others were saying what they felt was the reason, and it was never a good reason. So, reasons ranged from, “I don’t want people to have to negotiate for themselves. Therefore, I’ll ask them to give me their number,” to which I have so many objections, because as you teach me Michelle, that it’s a typical underrepresented in tech reaction to totally undervalue yourself, and guess what? And I don’t want to stereotype anyone here, but it’s most likely to be one, woman, two of color, three, also other people of color, or from developing countries and so on.
So, you’re already discriminating. I would hate that, and also for the same reason why when a client tells me, “Oh, I don’t have a budget. Tell me how much you think it should be,” I can’t give it to them, because I’m going to give them the best case scenario, and then I go, “Oh, that’s too much,” and then you’re like, “Oh, you do have a budget then.” Because every single time, even in recent times that I have not respected the rule, “Give me a budget or I’m out of the room,” it’s come to bite me in the ass, because I’m told… I can say ass? So, I’ve said it.
Michelle:
Yes you can.
Piccia Neri:
So, every single time, even recently with nice clients that I could laugh at them and say, “Okay, well you see, you proved me right,” but every single time. So, that’s not a good reason, and often, another reason that they’ve been giving is that salaries, and that’s the one that, I mean, really makes my blood boil a little bit, someone said, and I don’t have their email at hand here, but they did say that they don’t need anonymity, because they completely stand behind their choices, and they’re also completely open to their mind being changed. So, fair play to them, but I can’t remember who they are [inaudible 00:14:14] anyway. So, actually, it was Robert from White WP Security, something like that. So, he said that the needs of someone who is 40 and single, and lives in Porto, are different from someone who’s 40 and has a family, and lives in New York, which I’m really sorry, Robert, when you listen to this, I find it so wrong.
Michelle:
I agree.
Piccia Neri:
Because first of all, you do not know the needs of someone who’s 40 in living in Porto and single, because they may have a whole family that counts on them, even though it’s not their immediate family that they created, it could be their grandparents, their parents, and also fundamentally, what’s the difference? Are you paying for skills? Because if you’re paying for skills and you get the same from New York and Porto, that’s what you’re paying for, which brings us to the localization thing.
I’ve seen so many ads that ask you to state where you are, which is so wrong because, okay, what if I’m a digital nomad? And so, this week, I’m in New York, next week, I’m in Bali. Are you going to curtail my pay? Are you going to dock my pay when I’m in Bali? And also, but if I live in Bali, it may be for a number of reasons that don’t mean that you should pay me less, because maybe I am Balinese. Oh, it’s so wrong. I get really quite riled up because it’s a fundamental, deep unfairness that you are exercising that, but I know that you feel very [inaudible 00:16:04] about it as well, Michelle, don’t you?
Michelle:
I do. I think one of the things that I think companies don’t put that out there for is because they have people working in similar positions, or even the same position within the company, and they don’t want to pay everybody the same rate. And so, like you said, maybe I’m living in New York, and somebody else is living in Kansas, and maybe the cost of living is cheaper in Kansas than it is in New York. Why does that matter? But also, some companies, and this is in the United States anyway, I should say in most states in the United States, it’s illegal to tell your employees that they can’t discuss salary with one another.
So, if I want to talk to somebody else at Liquid Web about how much I make versus how much they make, we are legally allowed to do that. There’s no reason that I shouldn’t be able to have that discussion with somebody else. But then they’re risking the fact that what if I’m making $10,000 less a year than somebody who has a less senior position than I do, or the same level position? They’ve put themselves in that situation by not just deciding that this is how much this position is worth, as opposed to how much a person is worth.
And so, because people will talk, right? We’ve been raised up, at least in the United States, we’ve been raised up not to discuss salary. It’s like you don’t ask a woman her weight or her age, and you don’t ask anybody their salary. Well, all of that is bullshit. If you want to ask me my weight, I don’t have to tell you, but you could ask me, I’m still going to think you’re an ass, but whatever. I don’t care about my age. A lot of people don’t like to talk about their age, and that’s fine, whatever. And if somebody doesn’t want to tell you their salary, that’s fine too, but we’ve been raised kind of those are the things you don’t ask about, or political affiliation. I mean, there’s a whole list, right?
But people are becoming, especially the younger generations now are more and more open about that, because they want to see equity and fairness. And so, if they’re offering me a position and they’re offering me X number of dollars, and I know somebody else in that company, and I ask them how much they’re making and I see that this is way less or way more, now they’ve created a position and that company has created a situation where people are not going to be happy with one another, and they’re going to be asking why? Instead of just saying, “This is how much this position pays, give or take 5,000 or 10,000,” whatever it is, based on experience and the skills that you bring, not your socioeconomic level, your physical location in the world, et cetera, you have a much more equitable situation, and people are happier to work there, feeling valued for the work, not devalued because of their personal socioeconomic status or location.
Piccia Neri:
Yes, and not wasting any precious time and energy actually seething about an unfair situation, and the thing about not wanting current employees to know is very true, and this is something that was told to me in utter confidence by someone I know who’s an agency director, but that’s exactly what they said. So, I believe that it’s very often a reason, and some people have said also that they don’t mention a salary range because when they do, then people immediately go for the top, which I find very hard to believe, and anyway, in that case, you can always have a conversation about it.
It happened to me when I was in London. I went for a job, and I was offered the job, and I knew that I was at the top level. I mean, I understand that maybe not everybody is like that, but they said, “Look, we think you should be here in this scale,” which was somewhere in the middle. I said, “Yeah, that feels fair enough,” because I also thought, if I’m at the top, they will demand more, and I don’t want that responsibility. So, and actually, having said that, out of curiosity, because I was thinking, is this something that has happened to me before? And actually, no, I didn’t remember it.
Admittedly, it’s been a long time since I last looked for a job, but I went on The Guardian Newspaper website and looked at design jobs, every single one of them, bar maybe on, had a salary range, and I mean, quite a few of them were governmental, and if it’s a government body, or an institution such a museum and so on, THEY have to, it’s a legal obligation. But there were really just two or three that didn’t have it, and I was just thinking maybe is it more because design is tech, but some of these jobs were not necessarily tech jobs.
Anyway, what I found also very interesting is the reasons all the people that do do all the right things, and I have come across two specifically, one is XWP that make a real point out of quoting a salary range, and they make differences based on experience, not on location, which is the right way to go about it. I’m sorry, the fact that I live in Spain doesn’t mean I have fewer financial commitments, and what’s it to you anyway? It’s got nothing to do with you. And also, as far as I know, I can’t think of any other WordPress agency that has a recruiter as a permanent right member of staff. So, they clearly care about it.
And another amazing agency, which they’re called Knucklepuck, and I actually interviewed their founder, they’re Canadian, and they’re amazing, Michelle. They’re amazing. I just want and found their careers page, I’ve got it here, Knucklepuck Media. So, what they say is, I mean, obviously they [inaudible 00:22:07] salary range, but what they say is… I love how their careers pages has so much about their ethics, and their values, and how they work, and because there are so many that say, “We’re committed to diversity,” and then they say, “Yeah, where do you live?” And I’m like, “Okay. Well, no, you’re not then, are you? Because otherwise, you wouldn’t be asking me that,” but they do not accept résumés or cover letters because they say, “We know how time consuming these are to put together, and how they are to review as well. We also recognize that higher education institutions train their students how to write résumés, to present a favorable impression of a person’s skills.”
So, basically their point is if you’re a young mother, or not young, or whatever, if you don’t have the time or the education, which doesn’t mean you don’t have the skills, you are in an unfair position. And that is such a great point, and that was exactly my point, because all of this was triggered by me seeing an advert that I thought was amazing, perfect, a dream job. It was a full-time job. I would’ve gone full time for that job, because it had everything I like to do. All the things that I do separately, it just condensed them. But it had no salary range, which could mean that maybe it wasn’t senior. It looks senior, but it isn’t senior. So, how can I gauge? And also, you’re asking me to give up my freedom, so I need to know what you’re offering.
So, I contacted them and said, “Can you tell me the salary range?”And they said, “We’d love you to apply,” and I was very flattered, and I said, “Brilliant. Okay, great. So what’s the salary range?” They said, “Yeah, that’s discussed at the first interview,” and I said, “Yeah, but you’re asking me…” I haven’t had a résumé, which we call a CV, For a very long time, because I was lucky enough in the past few years to never be asked one. People knew me, they’ve seen me speak, they’ve taken a course, and they offered me a project. So, to redo a CV now would take me weeks, months of suffering, and the same thing for a portfolio. So, XWP asks you ask you to bring three pieces. You don’t have to present a CV or a portfolio with XWP either, and that’s amazing.
So, I told them, “You’re asking me a lot. It’s a lot. It’s very involved to get to the first conversation, because your application form demands all these things,” and I said it very nicely and very politely, and they never ever replied to me, and I tried again, I contacted them again, and they still never got back to me. So, that’s why I went into the Post Data Slack and asked, I said, “Was it wrong to ask? Because I don’t think he was.” So, that’s why the conversation started, and that’s why I was a little… So yeah, if you are truly committed to diversity as Knucklepuck is, then you understand that it’s a discrimination issue. Asking all these things means that you are a priori excluding a whole range of people that will not be able to comply with all your requests and demands, and so on. So, you are screening out potential great talent, because you are putting barriers already, and that is wrong.
And don’t even get me started on the jobs that demand a task, an unpaid task, I hasten to add, because XWP asked for a task where it’s paid. Maybe it’s not paid for, but I don’t know, because I didn’t get to that level, but it’s-
Michelle:
It’s compensated at some… Yeah.
Piccia Neri:
… the least you could do. It’s compensated, because I used to be on the board of the Chartered Society of Designers in the UK, and it was one of my missions, and which ultimately failed, to fight it, because the other board members didn’t feel the same fundamentally. But basically, it’s like on unpaid pitches of any kind are actually completely counterproductive, and they kill the industry, and they kill small people. And the same goes for a task that’s unpaid, because also, you will not get a good result. I mean, I’ve had to fire people that were hired with a task, because ultimately, it doesn’t show anything, and I posit, my point is that if you’re a good recruiter, you will be able to understand whether someone is the right fit or not in a conversation. That’s what you need.
Michelle:
Absolutely. I agree, 100%. I think that putting a salary range out there doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for negotiation, there is.
Piccia Neri:
Exactly.
Michelle:
That’s why it’s a range, and if somebody says, “I want the top one,” you advertise that that’s a conversation, that’s a negotiation. That’s why it’s a range that’s there. I don’t think that that’s unfair at all to do that. I also think that I’ve seen applications that ask for a photo, I’ve seen applications that ask for a date of birth.
Piccia Neri:
Wow.
Michelle:
Those are both forms of discrimination, or could lead to forms of discrimination. In the United States, I think it’s Title IX, where there’s scholarships and things like that, colleges and universities had to find a way to decrease discrimination based on those kinds of things. And so, universities used to ask for a photo with your application, and now they don’t do that anymore because you could say, “Well, I didn’t get the scholarship because I’m a person of color, or because I’m a woman, or because I’m old,” or whatever, older. And so, we’ve taken that out of other places, we need to make sure that we’ve taken it out of hiring within the tech community as well, because you don’t know. You don’t know who might be the absolute perfect fit, and if you’ve already allowed them to bow out because you haven’t given them the right information to even think about applying for your job, then you’ve missed out on a potentially amazing employee, so.
Piccia Neri:
Absolutely. And do you know that there are plenty of studies and tests done, definitely in the UK, where they send mostly more African sounding names, or foreign sounding names, exactly the same CV, and the ones that don’t sound Western get completely… And they’re exactly the same résumé. It is shocking, utterly shocking, and yet, and not that surprising, sadly. So, there’s still a lot of ground to cover, and the simplest thing to do, the easiest thing to do, is to disclose a salary range. If it inconveniences you as a company owner, then I think that you should ask yourself why?
Because to be honest, even though again, like I said, I really appreciate all the people that answered and gave me their reasons, but every single reason actually highlighted an issue that you have. Because if you find that people go for the highest range, then it means that you are the one who’s not able to negotiate, and as an employer, you do have to know how to do that, if you’re a hiring person, me, as a designer, I don’t need to, I shouldn’t be skilled in negotiation. That’s not… I mean, have done that. I have listened to Chris Voss’ book, Never Split the Difference, which is a book I highly recommend a million times, because it’s super useful as a life skill, but it’s not a skill that I should have if I am a job applicant.
And any other reason, such as the geographical location, that’s completely wrong, as we’ve highlighted in various ways, or the other reason, the covert one that very few people will admit to, that you don’t want other employees to know what other people are making, that is so wrong, I’m not even going to comment on it, and asking people to name their own salary. I don’t know if you saw recently, I think that’s the worst one. That’s the one that really, really makes me very uncomfortable to say that some people do it on purpose, and because I don’t know if you saw, a few months ago, there was this big viral thing, which was this woman, a recruiter that was bragging about a candidate that she offered a job to. So, she had this candidate who was a successful candidate and she asked them, “What do you want? How much do you want to make a year?” And this woman said something like 80,000 a year, when the salary range for that job was 120 to 150.
So, this recruiter kept saying, “Are you sure? Are you sure?” And this woman who was, by the way, a Black woman, coincidentally, said, “Yeah, I think that that’s what it’s worth.” And so, the recruiter was bragging that the candidate got the job for 50,000, 40,000 less that she could’ve done, and she got crucified, absolutely roasted on social media, to the point where it was actually a bit too much, but it was completely understandable. I was like, seriously? Is that what you brag about? Because there are so many reasons, and also, I was given the advice of asking when there isn’t a salary range, asking, “This is my range. Is that okay with you?”
But that’s not right either, because I don’t want to name the range, because if a job is for a company that works with very big names, then it’s going to be different than with a smaller company, but I may choose a smaller company, because it’s less hassle, different culture. So, I want to be paid more for the same job in a bigger company. It makes complete sense. So, no, I cannot find a point of view under which it would be a good idea for me to name my own salary. It’s just not possible.
Michelle:
Yep, I agree 100%. So, if you’re listening, don’t make that mistake, be the change. Be the change, put your salary range out there, and allow people to be valued, but also not apply for jobs that take them a ton of time, that they won’t be able to take because of the salary range. If somebody came in and said, “Oh, Michelle this job, it pays $50,000,” well, I’m not going to apply for that job, because I make a little more than that now. So, more than a little more than that, but anyway, yes, I would not be willing to apply for a job where I wouldn’t be able to provide for my future, and for the people in my life that I help provide for. So, that’s just the way it is.
So, putting a salary range down there makes a huge bit of difference, especially if somebody’s looking to leave a job for another job, looking to climb up in their position, they are taking time away from making money, they’re using vacation time or whatever else, and outside of work time to build that résumé, apply for your job, and then find out that it’s less than they’re making now, it doesn’t make any sense for them to do that, unless there’s a salary listed and room for negotiations. So, I think that if you are looking to hire people and you want the best people for the job, putting a salary range on there is going to help you accomplish that, not the opposite, so.
Piccia Neri:
So well put, Michelle. Thank you so much for putting it so eloquently. Thank you.
Michelle:
Oh, thank you. So, thank you so much, Piccia, for being here with us this week. I know that I pulled you out of whatever you’re doing on a day with very short notice, and I do appreciate you filling in for Allie this week, and I think Allie and I next week, our topic is going to be… Let me see how I worded it in my text. It’s words and phrases that we need to take out of not only our personal language, but business language, based on the racist roots of those phrases, things like “grandfathered in,” and “whitelisting.” So, if you have any interest in making your company vocabulary a more inclusive and better vocabulary, tune in next week, as we talk about some of those things. Thank you, and we’ll see you all next week.