Company Accidentally Posts Internal Salary Spreadsheet to Public Job Listing

You know that nightmare where you show up to work naked? A mid-size SaaS company in Austin just lived the recruiting equivalent: they accidentally attached their entire internal salary spreadsheet to a public job posting on Indeed.

For four glorious hours.

How This Masterpiece of Incompetence Happened

According to reports on Blind, a recruiter was copying and pasting job description content and somehow managed to attach the company's comprehensive compensation spreadsheet as a "benefits overview" document.

The spreadsheet included:

• Every employee's name, title, and salary
• Bonus percentages and equity grants
• Raise history for the past 3 years
• Notes on performance reviews (including some spicy comments)
• Projected compensation for open roles

The job posting went live on a Friday afternoon (naturally). By the time someone noticed on Monday morning, over 2,400 people had viewed the listing—and approximately 847 had downloaded the salary spreadsheet.

Screenshots started circulating on Reddit's r/cscareerquestions within hours. Then Twitter. Then LinkedIn. Then the company Slack, where current employees discovered they were massively underpaid compared to newer hires.

Oops.

The Fallout Was Spectacular

Internal chaos erupted immediately. According to leaked Slack messages shared on Twitter, at least 17 employees confronted their managers about compensation discrepancies within the first 24 hours.

One senior engineer discovered he was making $95,000 while three engineers hired in the past year with similar experience were making $135,000-$145,000. His response? He accepted a job offer from a competitor by Wednesday.

A marketing manager found out her male counterpart—hired six months after her with less experience—was making $22,000 more. She's now retained an employment attorney, according to posts on Glassdoor.

The company's Head of HR reportedly sent an all-hands email titled "Regarding Recent Salary Information Disclosure" that basically said "we value transparency" (translation: please don't quit or sue us). Multiple employees responded with "cool, let's discuss my transparent underpayment."

The Recruiting Ramifications

The accidentally-public salary data created fascinating recruiting dynamics. External candidates now had perfect information about what the company actually pays versus what they claim in negotiations.

One candidate told Business Insider that he was initially offered $110,000 for a role. After downloading the salary spreadsheet, he discovered the same role was budgeted at $145,000. He countered at $150,000 and got $142,000.

Another candidate withdrew entirely after seeing notes in the spreadsheet describing the open role as "desperate hire, will pay whatever" alongside a max budget of $180,000—$40,000 above what the initial offer would've been.

The company's Glassdoor reviews spiked dramatically. Current ratings show dozens of new reviews mentioning "pay inequity," "compensation discrimination," and "salary transparency issues." Their rating dropped from 4.2 stars to 3.1 stars in a week.

The Tech Industry's Worst-Kept Secret

Here's the thing: everyone already knew this was happening. Levels.fyi and similar sites have been exposing salary discrepancies for years. But there's a difference between crowdsourced data and seeing your company's actual spreadsheet with real names and numbers.

This incident just confirmed what recruiters and employees already suspected: companies pay new hires more than loyal employees, negotiate in bad faith, and maintain "confidential" compensation systems specifically to avoid accountability.

One particularly spicy detail from the leaked spreadsheet: a column labeled "flight risk" that rated employees on their likelihood to leave. Multiple people rated "low flight risk" were making 15-30% below market rate. The company was literally banking on their loyalty to underpay them.

Several employees who were marked "low flight risk"? They've since updated their LinkedIn profiles to "Open to Work." Turns out loyalty has a price ceiling.

The Lesson Nobody Will Learn

This story would be funnier if it wasn't so predictable. Companies will continue to treat salary transparency like classified information while preaching "openness" and "authenticity." Recruiters will keep low-balling candidates. HR will keep making "accidents" that expose the whole charade.

And employees? They'll keep talking. On Blind. On Reddit. On salary-sharing platforms. In Slack DMs. The cat's out of the bag—companies just haven't accepted it yet.

The Austin company at the center of this disaster has since removed all job postings from Indeed and other job boards while they "review internal processes." Translation: they're figuring out how to spin this before their next round of hiring.

Good luck with that. The internet never forgets, and screenshots are forever.

Update: The Plot Thickens

As of this writing, the company has announced they're "conducting a comprehensive compensation review" to "ensure market competitiveness and internal equity." Industry insiders are translating this as "we're going to give some small raises to the people most likely to quit while hoping everyone else doesn't notice."

At least three department heads have already left the company, according to sources on LinkedIn. Two cited "personal reasons." One just posted "lol" as his departure announcement.

The lesson for recruiters: triple-check your job posting attachments. The lesson for companies: maybe just pay people fairly from the start and you won't have to do damage control when your secrets inevitably leak.

But honestly, where's the fun in that?