What if your compensation system is rewarding job titles instead of actual value creation?

That question sits at the center of Mason Duchatschek’s conversation with Jacob Chase, founder of The Infin, on The Mason Duchatschek Show. For CEOs, business owners, executives, HR leaders, and managers, this episode raises an uncomfortable but valuable question:

Are the people creating the greatest value inside your business being recognized, rewarded, and retained?

Jacob’s perspective comes from direct leadership experience. While running a 150-person real estate services company, he noticed something traditional compensation systems did not capture. One employee, an accounts payable team member, had a market-based salary that reflected the position, but not the person’s full contribution.

This employee was more than a task performer. He was dependable, trusted, helpful across departments, and relied on by others for issues beyond his job description. In other words, his official role did not reflect his actual value to the organization.

That realization led Jacob to rethink how leaders measure employee contribution, performance, and compensation.

Listen to the full podcast audio:
https://open.acast.com/public/streams/5cd334e4e3b953af742edd5d/episodes/6a2996f77fe177e75b4811fa.mp3

Watch the full conversation on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/7F13xL8PC-I

The Problem with Traditional Performance Reviews

Traditional performance reviews often rely on centralized judgment. A manager, executive, or HR process determines which criteria matter, how employees are evaluated, and how performance is scored.

The problem is that one manager’s perspective rarely captures the full picture.

Employees create value through more than assigned duties. They help coworkers solve problems. They prevent mistakes. They retain knowledge. They support customers. They strengthen culture. They train others informally. They become the person everyone depends on when something needs to get done.

Those contributions may not show up in a job description, salary band, or annual review form.

That creates a serious risk for business leaders. A company may appear stable on the surface while high-impact employees are underpaid, underrecognized, or at risk of leaving.

Job Titles Do Not Always Reveal Value

A job title tells you what someone was hired to do. It does not always tell you what others depend on them to do.

Jacob explains that dependency can be a powerful indicator of value. Who do people turn to for answers? Who helps remove friction? Who keeps work moving? Who creates confidence across the team?

Those questions matter because real value is often revealed through the way work actually gets done, not just through the organization chart.

For business owners and CEOs, this distinction is critical. An employee with a modest title may be creating significant value. Another employee with a senior title may be consuming more value than they create.

Without better visibility, leaders may reward the wrong people, overlook hidden contributors, and unintentionally drive away the employees the business can least afford to lose.

The Hidden Cost of Centralized Talent Assessment

Centralized performance systems can also encourage political behavior.

When employees know only one person or a small group controls their evaluation, they may focus on managing appearances instead of serving the team. Mason described this as the “spotlight performer,” someone who looks impressive when leadership is watching but contributes far less when peers are the ones depending on them.

Peer-driven feedback can expose this gap.

The people working alongside an employee often see the behaviors that leaders miss. They know who follows through, who takes credit, who avoids responsibility, who creates drama, and who quietly carries more than their share of the work.

That does not mean peer feedback should become a popularity contest. It means leaders need better systems for gathering trusted, decentralized insight into how value is actually being created.

Why Metrics Alone Can Be Misleading

Some roles are easy to measure on the surface. Sales, for example, may be evaluated by new account acquisition, close rate, revenue, retention, or cross-selling performance.

Yet even sales metrics can miss the full story.

A salesperson may produce strong numbers while creating problems for customer service, operations, or account management. Someone may close deals by overpromising, leaving other teams to clean up the damage later.

That is why performance data needs context.

Metrics matter, but they should not be the only source of truth. Leaders need to understand both the measurable results and the human impact behind those results.

Toxic Employees Can Hide Behind Institutional Knowledge

One of the most important parts of the conversation focused on toxic employees who appear valuable because of their institutional knowledge.

Many leaders have seen this situation. One employee knows the systems, the history, the customers, or the processes better than anyone else. Because of that knowledge, the employee is protected, tolerated, or even praised.

Meanwhile, the rest of the team experiences the damage.

Morale declines. Engagement drops. Good employees leave. Others stay but stop giving full effort. The toxic employee may appear indispensable to leadership while becoming a major source of hidden labor cost, turnover risk, and culture damage.

A better feedback system can help leaders see what is happening through the eyes of the people affected by it.

Real-Time Feedback Can Reveal Problems Earlier

Annual reviews are often too slow to help leaders address people problems before they become expensive.

Jacob argues for a more real-time approach to performance feedback. When feedback is gathered continuously and from multiple perspectives, leaders can identify patterns earlier.

That may include:

  • High performers who are being undervalued
  • Managers whose teams are losing trust
  • Employees who are flight risks
  • Toxic contributors who are hurting morale
  • Teams where performance issues are hidden beneath surface-level results
  • Compensation gaps that do not reflect actual contribution

For CEOs and business owners, earlier visibility creates better decisions. It can help improve retention, strengthen engagement, and align compensation with the value employees actually create.

Trust and Anonymity Matter

A real-time feedback system only works if employees trust it.

Jacob emphasizes that people need confidence that their feedback will remain confidential and anonymous. Without that trust, employees may avoid sharing what they really see.

This is especially important when feedback involves managers, toxic coworkers, compensation concerns, or leadership blind spots.

Trustworthy systems protect the person giving feedback while still giving the organization useful insight. That balance allows leaders to surface the truth without creating fear, retaliation, or unnecessary conflict.

What CEOs Should Do First

For founders, CEOs, and business owners, the first step is not to overhaul compensation overnight.

The first step is to start measuring contribution more accurately.

That means looking beyond job titles, salary bands, and annual review forms. It means asking who is truly creating value, who others depend on, and where the current compensation structure may be out of alignment.

Once leaders understand where value is being created, they can make better decisions about pay, recognition, development, retention, and leadership accountability.

Listen to the Full Conversation

This episode is especially relevant for CEOs, business owners, executives, HR leaders, sales managers, and team leaders who want to improve employee engagement, retention, performance management, and compensation strategy.

Listen to the full podcast audio:
https://open.acast.com/public/streams/5cd334e4e3b953af742edd5d/episodes/6a2996f77fe177e75b4811fa.mp3

Watch the full conversation on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/7F13xL8PC-I

Connect with Jacob Chase

Website: https://www.theinfin.com/

Connect with Mason Duchatschek

Website: https://masonduchatschek.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/masonduchatschek/

Connect with Workforce Alchemy

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