How a Gen Z TikToker became an outspoken advocate for pay transparency

Latte makeup and the Thai dance challenge are fun TikTok trends, but they likely won’t change your career.

Hannah Williams, a Northern Virginia-based content creator, uses the platform to advocate for pay transparency and give advice to help women negotiate a better salary through the viral account and business Salary Transparency Street that she founded with her now husband.

She recently sat down with HR Brew to chat about how she became interested in pay transparency, what she’s heard from HR professionals about the trend, and the cultural shift she’s anticipating.

Finding her worth. Williams didn’t set out to be a pay transparency advocate when she graduated from Georgetown University in 2019. While working as a data analyst for a government consultancy, a colleague left the team, and she found herself doing the work of two people and making far less than the market rate for her role.

“I was so happy with that [initial salary of $90,000], I didn’t negotiate. I didn’t do market research,” she explained. “First time doing market research, and I found out really quickly that people doing what I was doing were making like $130,000 a year.”

But even with data to back her up, she struggled to negotiate a better salary. Frustrated and learning more every day, she took to social media. “I started making videos on my personal TikTok account, about how much I made and how I negotiated.”

What started as a place for her to vent and share her personal journey turned into a platform for asking strangers on the street about their jobs and salaries.

The page took off, and in 2022, Williams quit her data analyst job and went all-in on Salary Transparent Street, the company she started with her now husband. She’s since amassed more than 1.4 million TikTok followers, over 35 million TikTok likes, and 864,000 Instagram followers. She’s also expanded beyond her street-side interviews, offering educational forums and networking mixers, and partnering with brands like Capital One.

Transparency and the pay gap. In 2022 in the US, women earned 82 cents for every dollar men earned, according to Pew Research, and globally, it’ll take more than 169 years to close the gender pay gap, according to the World Economic Forum. Many experts believe pay transparency plays a major part in closing the gap.

Some countries are trying to legislate their way out of the pay gap, and 28 countries including Australia, the European Union, and Ireland have some type of reporting of pay, HR Brew previously reported. In the US, at least eight states and several municipalities have adopted pay transparency laws, including New York, Illinois, and Colorado, and a number of others, like Washington, DC, have passed legislation that will begin this year or the next1.

“Information is power, obviously, so if pay transparency laws require salary disclosures, it gives women information on what the marketplace says about what a position is worth,” Lynne Marie Finn, president and CEO of Broadleaf Results, a workforce solutions company, told SHRM.

Embracing change. As job seekers continue to seek out companies that offer pay transparency, Williams has found that HR wants it, too.

“The general consensus that I’m getting from them, [is] HR believes in transparency,” she said. “They want the change to happen. They want to make a habit.”

But simply complying with the law is not enough, Williams said. Companies including Netflix and Tesla have been criticized for posting “baffling” salary ranges, which is a red flag for applicants. “That makes it sound like you don’'t know who you’re hiring,” she said. “If you are obviously trying to skirt the parameters of a pay transparency law, that’s almost worse than not providing transparency in the first place.”

Williams argues that, ultimately, pay transparency is in the best interest of organizations. “You have more people that will apply for the job. It’s less expensive to hire. You spend less time on hiring people because you’ve got the right people in the door already,” she said. “It’s less expensive to hire somebody and pay them well then to replace them when they quit, and they find out that they’re not well compensated.”

Culture shift. Talking about money has historically been taboo, but Williams said that mindset is changing, and companies can help accelerate the change. “It would really be a culture shift for corporate America to start taking those steps. But that would be the most impactful,” she said. “It would have the most actual results…if they decided to make this change, it will no longer be an issue.”

Between new legislation and growing pressure from workers, Williams expects more companies to be transparent with employees and applicants moving forward. “The Great Resignation showed me that social media and workers can work together to create movements and pressure corporate America to make these changes.”