When Salary Stops Working: What Candidates Really Want

Talent Acquisition once operated under a simple assumption: pay people more and they'll join, stay and perform.

But what happens when salary stops being a deciding factor?

In this episode of Edan Haddock - Total Talent, Edan explores one of the biggest shifts happening in the world of work. Drawing on research, personal experience and observations from years spent in Talent Acquisition, he examines what really drives candidates once compensation becomes "good enough".

From freedom and flexibility to growth, purpose, leadership and lifestyle design, this episode challenges the idea that money is the ultimate motivator and asks a confronting question:

If every organisation paid the same, why would someone choose yours?

This is a thought-provoking conversation about human motivation, modern careers and the factors that increasingly influence whether people join, stay or leave.

Salary matters.

But eventually something else matters more.

Join the Edan Haddock - Total Talent community (formerly Rubberband)

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hello and welcome to another episode of Eden Haddock Total Talent. I'm your host, Eden Haddock, Head of Talent and People Experience at Movember. As always, no guests, no sponsors, no vendor agenda. Just one practitioner still on the tools, talking about talent, talent acquisition, workforce strategy, leadership, and the future of work. And today I want to talk about something that sits at the center of almost every hiring conversation: money, salary, compensation, remuneration. The thing we all pretend isn't the most important thing. And the thing we we secretly know matters, right? But I want to ask a different question today. A harder question? A more uncomfortable question. What happens when money stops being enough? Not because it doesn't matter. Not because we've somehow transcended the need for income. And not because we've all become enlightened. But because eventually most people reach a point where another pay rise doesn't fundamentally change their life. And that's where things get interesting. Because I think talent acquisition has spent 20 years obsessing about compensation while largely ignoring motivation. We've become brilliant at benchmarking salaries, fantastic at producing market insights, and excellent at understanding REM. But I'm not convinced we've become equally good at understanding human beings. And maybe that's the problem. Because humans are complicated. Humans are emotional, humans are irrational. Humans don't always make decisions based on spreadsheets. And if we're honest, neither do we. So let me start with a confession. I've never really been driven by money. And before you start typing an angry LinkedIn comment and calling BS, let me explain. I mean, money matters. I've got a mortgage, I've got responsibilities, I've got bills, I've got all the realities that everybody else has. This isn't some privileged argument that compensation doesn't matter. It absolutely does. But when I look back over my career, the moments that changed my life weren't driven by money. The organizations I joined, the opportunities I accepted, the risks I took, the challenges I pursued. These rarely came down to who offered me the biggest paycheck. In fact, some of the most important career decisions I'd ever made weren't the most financially attractive. They were the most exciting, the most meaningful, the most uncertain, and often the most uncomfortable. And that's a strange thing when you think about it. Because if salary was truly the thing that drove me, I should have made different decisions. But I didn't. And I suspect I'm not alone. I think many people listening today would say the same thing. When you think about the best role you've ever had, the role that shaped your career, was it the highest paying role? Or was it something else? The best job you ever had. I want you to think about that for a moment. The best job you've ever had. Not the highest paying, the best. The role where you felt energized. The role where you felt valued. The role where you learned. The role where you grew. The role where you looked forward to a Monday morning. Why was it the best? Was it the salary? Or was it the people? The leader? The mission? The culture? The trust? The opportunity? The challenge? Because I suspect most people don't tell stories about compensation. They tell stories about experiences. And I think that's incredibly revealing. One of the biggest traps our profession falls into is confusing attraction with motivation. Salary attracts attention. But attention and commitment are not the same thing. A salary might get someone to answer your call. A salary might get somebody into an interview. A salary might get somebody to consider an opportunity. But does salary create engagement? Does salary create loyalty? Does salary create purpose? Does salary create trust? Does salary create belonging? I'm not sure it does. And that's where things for me become quite fascinating. Because many organizations continue to spend enormous amounts of money trying to solve retention problems through compensation. And yet people continue leaving. They continue disengaging. They continue burning out. They continue quietly quitting. Which suggests the problem might not actually be compensation. Maybe compensation is just simply the easiest thing to change, but not the most important thing to change. The thought that's been rattling around my head for the past few weeks is really maybe people aren't looking for more money. Maybe they're actually looking for less misery. Think about that. Less misery, less bureaucracy, less politics, less micromanagement, less pointless meetings, less pretending, less performance, less theater, less corporate nonsense, and more trust, more honesty, more autonomy, more humanity. Maybe that's the real battle happening in the talent market right now. And maybe we've completely misunderstood it. Now you've all heard about the Sunday night test, and it's my favorite test. Forget compensation, forget benchmarking, forget EVP, forget employer branding. Ask yourself one question. How do you feel on a Sunday night? Because that answer tells you almost everything. Do you feel energized? Excited? Interested? Curious? Or do you feel dread, anxiety, frustration, resignation? Because if somebody is lying awake on a Sunday night feeling miserable, an extra ten thousand dollars probably isn't solving the real problem. And that's an uncomfortable truth. I think salary has become what psychologists could describe as a hygiene factor. When it isn't there, it's a problem. When it isn't competitive, it's a problem. When it isn't fair, it's a problem. But once it reaches an acceptable level, something interesting happens. Its power starts to diminish. And other things begin to matter more. Freedom, growth, purpose, leadership, belonging, identity, meaning. That's where the battle is won or lost. So I want to explore what those things are. Not through the lens of theory, not through the lens of consultants, and certainly not through the lens of corporate buzzwords. It's not my vibe. But through the lens of what candidates actually tell us, what employees actually experience, what leaders often misunderstand. And of course, what I've observed after working in talent across different organizations, industries, and countries, because I truly feel we're at a fascinating moment. A moment where salary still matters, but salary alone is no longer enough. And the organizations that understand what comes next will win. And the organizations that don't simply won't. And that brings us to what I believe has quietly become the most valuable thing in modern work. And that's freedom. Not flexibility, freedom. And there's a massive difference between the two. Freedom is the new currency. We'll talk more about freedom, not flexibility, as I said, freedom. Because I think we've spent years talking about flexibility when what people are actually looking for is something much bigger. Control, agency, trust, ownership. The ability to have some influence over how work fits into life. And I think that's become one of the most powerful forces in the modern talent market. Maybe even more powerful than salary itself. Now, before anyone jumps in and thinks people have always wanted flexibility, sure. Right, I agree. But I don't think that's what's happening. I really think something more fundamental has changed. For decades, work was structured around control. You arrived at a certain time, you sat in a certain place, you worked in a certain way. And along the journey, we convinced ourselves that visibility was productivity, that presence equaled performance, that attendance equaled contribution. But something happened. We all know what happened. And of course, at that point, people proved they could deliver outcomes without being watched. And once people experience that freedom, it's very difficult to take it away. Because freedom changes how people think about work. The conversation shifts. It stops becoming can I work from home? And starts becoming, do you trust me? That is a completely different conversation. Because trust is emotional. Trust is personal. Trust is human. And candidates feel it immediately. One of the things I've spoken about before on this podcast is work-life integration. Because I I am a true advocate for work-life integration. Not work-life balance, integration. Because balance suggests everything sits neat neatly in these separate buckets. Work over here, life over there. Never touching and never overlapping. And to be honest, for most professionals, that's not reality anymore. Certainly not in global roles, certainly not in talent. Certainly not when you're supporting teams across multiple countries and multiple time zones, as I highlighted in a previous episode. And I've lived that reality. I'm living it now. Many of you that listened reached out and they are living that reality as well. You take a call early in the morning, you jump on another call late at night, you answer messages after dinner, you review something on a Sunday. And that's been recruiter life for quite some time, if we're honest. And it's not because somebody forced you to. It's because that's the nature of the work. The challenge isn't preventing overlap. The challenge is creating sustainability. And sustainability comes from control, not restriction. I remember seeing the comments from our members in the talent, total talent community on Facebook discussing their global portfolios. And there were stories of 12-hour days, 14-hour days, 18-hour days between the first call and the last call. And what really struck me there wasn't the workload. It was the loss of control. Because high performers can handle hard work. But what destroys people is feeling trapped. Feeling like every one of those hours belongs to somebody else. And feeling like they have no autonomy, no say, no ownership. That's what burns people out. Not necessarily the effort, but the absence of agency. And this is where I think many organizations are getting attraction completely wrong. They're advertising flexibility, but candidates are looking for freedom. They're offering hybrid policies and putting that front and center. But candidates are actually looking for trust. You know, we're advertising about days in the office. But candidates are actually asking themselves, will I be treated like an adult? It's a big difference. It's a huge difference. And increasingly, I think candidates can feel that difference. The strongest organizations I've seen don't obsess about where people work. They obsess about what people achieve. They focus on outcomes, not optics. Contribution, not attendance, trust and not surveillance. And the reason this matters is because freedom has become part of identity. People don't want jobs that fit around work anymore. They want work that fits around life. That's a profound shift. And organizations that don't understand it will increasingly struggle to compete. If somebody can deliver from home, why must they sit in traffic? If somebody consistently performs, why are we still measuring attendance? Maybe the future of leadership isn't more control, maybe it's less. Because the future belongs to organizations brave enough to trust their people. Because freedom isn't a perk. Freedom is becoming part of the employment contract. Now, once people experience freedom, something else starts happening. They begin thinking about growth. Because when survival isn't the issue, and freedom isn't the issue, the next question becomes Am I still becoming somebody? Gets really interesting. Growth purpose and leadership. I think growth is the most underrated attraction strategy in the world. Not compensation, not culture, not employer branding, growth. And here's why. Most people don't leave because they're unhappy. They leave because they've stopped moving. They've stopped learning. Stopped stretching, stopped evolving. And human beings aren't designed to stand still for long. We're wired for progress. We're wired for development. We're wired for momentum. The problem is many organizations mistake retention for engagement. Just because somebody stays doesn't mean they're thriving. Just because somebody hasn't resigned doesn't mean they're growing. And I think that's one of the biggest blind spots in talent today. And I'm not talking about career pathways and advancing up the ladder. Certainly not. Think about the people you know who seem most energized in their careers. What's usually happening? They're learning, building, creating, expanding. They're moving towards something. And now think about the people who seem disengaged. The people who appear flat. The people who seem frustrated. Often they've stopped growing. The role hasn't changed. The challenge hasn't changed. Nothing is stretching them anymore. And eventually boredom becomes louder than loyalty. That's when people leave. Not always for money, for movement. I sometimes wonder whether we've accidentally created workplaces that are too comfortable. And I know that sounds strange. Because comfort sounds positive. But comfort does have a shadow side. Comfort can become stagnation. Comfort can become complacency. Comfort can become drift. And before you know it, someone has spent three years doing the same thing and wondering why they feel stuck. Growth is uncomfortable. Growth creates uncertainty. Growth creates challenge. Growth forces us to become something different. And deep down, I think we all know that. And this is why opportunities win over compensation. Because opportunity represents possibility. I want to talk about purpose too, but this is where I want to be careful. Because purpose has become one of the most overused words in businesses. Everything is purpose. Every organization has purpose, right? Every presentation has purpose. Every EVP now has purpose. And yet many people still feel very disconnected from their work. And why? Well, it's because purpose isn't a statement. Purpose is an experience. People don't feel purpose because it appears on a slide or a poster on the wall. People feel purpose when they understand why their work matters. That's different. One of the reasons I've really loved working with Movember is that connection to me is obvious. You know, and it's obvious to all of us. You can see it, you can feel it. The impact is tangible. But purpose isn't exclusive to charities. You can find purpose in technology, healthcare, manufacturing, retail, logistics, recruitment, anywhere. Because purpose isn't about industry. Purpose is about contribution. It's understanding how your work improves something for somebody. That's what people are looking for. Not slogans, but meaning. And now let's arrive at leadership. The most underrated EVP in existence. I genuinely believe this. The strongest EVP in the world can't survive a bad manager. Think about that. The strongest EVP in the world cannot survive a bad manager. You can have amazing benefits, amazing branding, amazing working spaces, amazing technology. But if somebody reports to a leader who destroys their confidence, trust, and energy, none of it matters. Eventually they will leave. Think about your own career. I guarantee there are leaders you still remember years later. Some inspired you, some changed. Some changed your trajectory. And unfortunately, some probably damaged your confidence. Leadership leaves fingerprints long after somebody leaves an organization. Which is why candidates are increasingly evaluating leaders and not companies. People want to know who will I work for? Will they support me? Will they challenge me? Will they invest in me? Will they trust me? Those questions often matter more than salary. Because great leaders create growth. And growth creates loyalty. Which then brings us to perhaps the biggest shift of all. The move from careers designed around jobs to careers designed around life. I think we've entered the age of the lifestyle career. And I don't mean that people are less ambitious. I think the opposite. People are becoming more intentional. They're asking different questions, not what job do I want, but what life do I want? And it's a big shift. Because once somebody designs their life first, work just becomes one piece of that puzzle, but not the entire puzzle. For decades, career success was relatively simple. Aggression is in higher title, more money, bigger team, larger office, corner office if you were lucky. Remember that? That was the formula. But today, not so much. Somebody might choose flexibility over promotion, remote work over prestige, purpose over pay, balance over title, experience over status. And that's not a lack of ambition. It's a different definition of success. I think our younger generations understand this instinctively. But increasingly so do us older generations. You know, people are asking, is this sustainable? Does this align with my values? Am I becoming the person I want to become? Can I still have a life? These aren't career questions. They're human questions. And talent leaders need to understand that, because candidates certainly do. So we'll go back to where we started today. I've talked a lot. Money, salary, compensation. The thing we spend so much time talking about. So to summarize my view, salary matters. It absolutely matters. But salary is rarely the whole story. Salary gets attention. Meaning gets commitment. Salary starts conversations, leadership sustains them. Salary attracts people, but growth retains them. So salary matters. But eventually something else matters more. So here's the challenge I want to leave you with today. Imagine if salary disappeared tomorrow. Imagine every organization paid exactly the same. What would you compete on? What would candidates choose? Would they choose your mission, your culture, your leaders, your flexibility, your growth opportunities, your trust, your purpose? Or would your EVP collapse entirely? Because the only thing differentiating your organization is compensation. If that is the only thing, that's not a talent strategy. That's an auction. And somebody can always outbid you. The organizations that win the next decade will not necessarily be the ones paying the most. They'll be the ones creating environments that people genuinely want to be part of. Places where people can grow, contribute, belong, learn, lead, and importantly, build meaningful lives. That's the future. Not more money, but better work. And maybe that's the real question, not what do candidates cost, but what do candidates value? Because once salary stops being enough, that's the only question that really matters. Thank you for joining me for another episode of Eden Haddock Total Talent. If you've enjoyed today's discussion, please follow, subscribe, and share the podcast with others in the talent community. Until next time, I'm Eden Haddock, and this has been Eden Haddock Total Talent.