Offer Letter with Package Details or we can send a job offer letter without package details?

Dear HR Friends,

Hope all are safe and doing well. I need some suggestions on providing an offer confirmation letter along with package details for the selected candidate. Is it mandatory, or can we send a job offer letter without package details? Nowadays, job-hopping is a common problem that HR faces in every company. Can someone provide some suggestions?

Thank you.

Job hopping is not contingent on the mention of a salary package, though disclosure of the package could be used by the candidate to bargain for a better package elsewhere. Even otherwise, once the candidate is not satisfied with the job offer, he/she will always be on the lookout for greener pastures. While disclosure or non-disclosure need not be a uniform solution for all, you can use it as per your judgment.

Dear Shashipriya,

Yes, you need not write the salary break-up or even a consolidated salary amount in the offer letter. The practice of withholding this amount has been going on for a long time for the reasons mentioned in your post.

However, please be cautious. There should not be confusion regarding the salary break-up or take-home salary for the prospective employee. Occasionally, I have found that misunderstandings occurred regarding the salary break-up, and the employee was frustrated after joining. Please find ways to avoid such situations.

Thanks,

Dinesh Divekar

Dear Colleague,

It is sound HR practice to issue an offer letter with all essential conditions such as salary package, designation, probation period, and joining date. Your written commitment will lend great credibility to your intentions to the candidate.

To address the issue of the candidate backing out after accepting the offer letter, you may include a clause stating, "This offer is made subject to your accepting the same by returning the duplicate copy of this letter duly signed as a token of your firm commitment to join the company on the committed date. If you fail to join after acceptance of the offer, the company shall proceed legally against you."

This clause is suggested to safeguard your legal rights and also to instill some fear in the mind. However, this is not a panacea to the problem but will facilitate nipping the problem in the bud.

Yet there will always be one or two who may intentionally or out of some compulsion ditch you at the last minute. This clause will give you a handle to invoke it in fitting cases.

Regards, Vinayak Nagarkar HR and Employee Relations Consultant

Dear Shashipriya,

There is a suggestion by a learned member to include a paragraph in the offer letter which says that if the candidate fails to join, then the company is free to take legal action against the candidate.

However, we have to think from the opposite side too. If such a deterministic warning is given in the offer letter itself, the candidate may perceive it as a threat and may think that the company has a coercive work culture. Such threats will keep a talented candidate or a confident candidate at bay. What if the candidate declines the offer? When a talented candidate declines the offer, what will be the loss to the company? The company will suffer because of the opportunity cost. Such costs are incalculable.

Now I am coming to file a suit. Suppose the company files a lawsuit against the candidate for failing to honor the condition of the offer letter. Nevertheless, the case will drag on at least for a decade, and what will be the cost even if the court gives a ruling in favor of the company? Secondly, it will be a distraction from the primary goal of business expansion or customer satisfaction.

By the way, how many suits can a company file? A few suits will make your company gasp because of the burden of the lawsuits.

Gone are the days when there used to be an employer's market. For the last 20 years, it has been the employees' market, and they have a sway in the job market more than the employers! Therefore, while taking a decision, one has to be mindful of the results, usefulness, advantages, and disadvantages of one's action or procedure.

Nevertheless, the problem of "no show" or backing out by the candidate has to be addressed. One of the suggestions from my side is to show a small video, say of 5 minutes on the positive side of the company. Do not send this video by WA or email. In the video, you can show how the company helps the employees to grow, examples of how employees have grown, the autonomy that the company gives to the employees, how your company is different from the competitors and so on. This will make your company attractive. However, avoid painting a false picture in the video. Otherwise, the newly joined employee should not feel that he/she has been cheated.

Thanks,

Dinesh Divekar

Dear Colleague,

The learned colleague has expressed contrary views by disagreeing with mine, and I respect them for whatever worth they are.

To read (or misread?) the clause suggested by me to be seen by the candidate as an indication of coercive culture, and as a result, he may decline the offer as being the only possible outcome is far-fetched, imaginary, and devoid of any supporting research data. Similarly, his observations about the job market being an employee's market lack any scientific data or basis, which makes them very sweeping observations. If he is relying on any research data on these points, he should provide it.

Although we agree to disagree, the purpose is to keep discussions churning with fresh thinking.

Regards,

Vinayak Nagarkar
HR and Employee Relations Consultant

Coercive clause in the offer letter incorporating penalty/damages for non-joining, to my understanding, is unlikely to be upheld in the legal proceeding, if at all instituted.