Value Goes Up and Prices Go Down

Does anyone else remember a retail clothier from a few decades back named Robert Hall? Their advertising jingle was something like the value goes up, up, up yet the prices go down, down, down.... With all the strife around the U.S. debt crisis and the very stagnant job market, I started thinking about how much value an employer could gain by hiring a well seasoned, high quality professional at a much lower salary today than 3 years ago.

Please understand, I am absolutely not condoning the underpayment of top shelf talent but am being reluctantly realistic about where we are right now. Way too many people have been out of work for 18 months or longer and simply wish to do something useful and earn whatever they can. If I were a hiring manager with a pile of work that needed immediate attention, I would go after the most qualified individual, make the best offer my budget permitted, and try to bring that person onto my staff. Of course, if things do pick up in a few years, I would then have to evaluate pay rates versus workload but, in all honesty, we should all cross that bridge when we eventually recover.

Too many employers are fearful of hiring those they perceive as overqualified for fear that they will not stay long and/or will not be able to take directions very well. Right about now, I know an enormous number of terrific folks who really just want to wake up in the morning and head out the door to a source of income. Rebuilding our economic infrastructure will take millions of baby steps and I wish this would happen sooner than later. In the meantime, companies have a golden opportunity to cash in on some great, value-priced talent!