When we brought the Innecto Advisory Board together in January, we asked a simple question: how is the shape of work changing, and what does that mean for organisations in practice?
What emerged was not radical reinvention, but growing tension between simplicity and rigour, transparency and defensibility, automation and judgement. Transparency has quietly shifted the centre of gravity in Reward, from design to justification. Across sectors, HR and Reward leaders are navigating pressures that are subtle but increasingly structural.
Progression in a transparent world
Pay progression remains one of the most sensitive topics in Reward. Many organisations are revisiting frameworks that have become increasingly granular and complex over time. Originally designed to enable pay progression without role change, and to create fairness and consistency, they can also create expectations that are difficult to sustain and harder to explain.
Granularity isn’t inherently wrong. But in a more transparent environment, every distinction between roles invites scrutiny. The more finely levels are differentiated, the clearer the rationale must be. In this context, complexity becomes a liability unless it can be confidently explained.
At the same time, employees are comparing internal and external pay data more openly, often without context. This is not just exposing pay gaps; it is exposing understanding gaps. The difference between perception and reality is widening. How are market rates determined? What distinguishes role value from individual performance? What sits within organisational control? And where do job titles differ from actual responsibilities.
Designing robust frameworks is no longer enough. The bar has moved from having a structure to being able to defend it in real time. Organisations must be able to explain and defend them to managers, employees and regulators alike. Compliance around pay transparency and equality is a journey, not a quick fix. Market data alone is unlikely to be sufficient; consistent methodology and clear rationale matter more than ever.
One live question emerging from the discussion was whether pay grades and benchmarking can sometimes be simplified, reducing unnecessary complexity without weakening defensibility.
Flatter structures or shifting shape?
There is much rhetoric about flatter organisations. In practice, the experience around the table suggested something more nuanced.
Many organisations are reducing formal pay grades, but hierarchy has not disappeared. Instead, differentiation is often moving within grades rather than between them. The metaphor of shifting from a traditional “triangle” organisation to something more “diamond-shaped” organisation resonated, acknowledging a greater emphasis on specialist roles in the middle of organisations as automation reshapes entry-level activity and increases the need for added value.
This has implications for early-career routes. Frustration around stability and progression is surfacing earlier in working lives, while “squiggly careers”, more varied and less linear, are becoming normal. Yet reward models are still largely built around steady vertical advancement.
The tension between encouraging broader career experiences and reverting to traditional layering when making pay decisions remains unresolved.
Skills, value and technology
Skills-based approaches are not new, but the pace of change feels different. As automation becomes more embedded, organisations are re-examining how they define and signal value. Traditional markers of seniority feel less stable. The conversation is moving from “what level is this role?” to “what is the nature of the contribution?” Where does human contribution sit alongside automated capability?
Established job architecture and evaluation methodologies remain robust. The question is not whether frameworks are needed, but whether they are sufficiently adaptive to evolving definitions of contribution.
The discussion also turned to the balance between digital tools and consultancy-led journeys. There was broad agreement that technology should do the heavy lifting, organising data and surfacing insight, while human judgement remains central. A useful framing was a notional 60/40 balance: technology-enabled output supported by human validation.
AI can increase efficiency and prime thinking. It should not replace decision-making. In a world of regulatory scrutiny and data visibility, guardrails and transparency are essential.
What this means
If there was one consistent thread, it was this: reward is increasingly experienced through interaction.
Frameworks and data matter, but trust is built or lost in how progression is explained, how pay decisions are communicated and how value is understood in practice. In that sense, the future of reward may be less about building new systems and more about strengthening confidence in the ones we already have.
The second Innecto Advisory Board session took place on 29 January 2026 at The Law Society.
