While 70% of companies understand that pay equity is a critical component to their people strategies and their business, only 5% of companies are addressing pay equity well, according to a new study from the Josh Bersin Company, a human capital advisory firm.

Industry analyst Josh Bersin told HR Brew that one underlying issue with tackling pay equity is that it may be conflated with the pay gap.

Pay equity refers to the idea that all individuals should receive equal pay for work of equal value. The pay gap, on the other hand, refers to the difference in earnings between different groups of people, such as different genders or racial groups. The pay gap can be caused by a variety of factors, such as discrimination or differences in education, experience, or opportunity.

“The only way you can figure out what equity is, you have to first take all the people in your company and put them into equivalent job categories or job classes,” Bersin said of pay equity analyses. “Then, you do a statistical analysis of all of the factors…that correlate with increase in pay.”

Every hire, promotion, or raise impacts pay equity, so addressing it can’t be a one-time project. This has to be an ongoing process with guidelines to help HR and managers keep compensation in line with equity goals, Bersin said.

“You have to institutionalize this idea, and then you need a tool or a toolset or a platform that prevents you from…getting back into the old situation again,” Bersin said.

And it’s important to address pay equity, because when companies pay employees differently for the same work, it can negatively impact engagement, teamwork, and trust in leadership, he said.

In fact, the 5% of companies in the study with a more “mature” approach to pay equity boasted stronger people and business outcomes, as well as more innovation.

Keep reading.—AD

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Firms attempting to crunch the numbers on their accounting shortages might have a tighter deadline than expected as accountants reassess their roles and their work-life balance.

That’s according to The Great Recalibration: The Role of Technology in Retaining and Recruiting Accountants, the latest survey from FloQast, an accounting workflow software company, conducted in partnership with the University of Georgia’s Consumer Analytics program.

The survey is not good news for companies looking to attract and retain accounting talent. More than 53% of the survey’s respondents said they’re unsure if they will remain with their company until the end of the year and, of those, 65% said they were unsure if they would remain in accounting at all.

Work-life balance—or the lack of it—remains a crucial factor in the uncertainty of many respondents. More than 60% said that they “struggle with an imbalance between work and life,” with many expressing doubts about being able to complete assigned work, while also aspiring to take on more strategic roles in their organizations.

Technology is having a significant impact on the day-to-day work of accountants. “More than 60% of accountants reported that technology is more important in their job satisfaction today than it was two to three years ago,” with 43% being “extremely likely” to ask about technology in a job interview, according to the survey.

Keep reading on CFO Brew.—LR

For many companies, instituting RTO policies has been a bit like herding cats. Some companies have used carrots to incentivize RTO, while others have used the stick.

We polled HR Brew readers to find out if they’ve ever considered penalizing workers who fail to comply with RTO policies. Among respondents, 30% said they already do that, 36% said they’d never do it, and the rest said they were thinking about it.

Experts have warned that rigid RTO requirements would not work. Some remote employees, meanwhile, are taking (somewhat hilarious) measures to at least seem productive in a remote environment.

Today’s quick question:

Have you considered giving the entire company a mental health day after a stressful period for the organization?

Yes, we have offered company-wide mental health days
We’re thinking about it
We’d never offer a day off specifically for mental health

Today’s top HR reads.

Stat: 82% of US workers want to work for an organization with values that align with their own. (LinkedIn)

Quote: “A performance conversation can turn into a mental-health conversation at the drop of a hat...Leaders can say, ‘That makes me uncomfortable.’ Tough. It’s going to happen, and you have to get used to it.”—Dane Jensen, CEO of leadership-development firm Third Factor, talking about how bosses should get used to personal conversations at work (the Wall Street Journal)

Read: Inside the growing advocacy campaign to simplify the visa-granting process for digital nomads. (WorkLife)