A survey reported by The Hindu has found a widespread mismatch between job designations and actual salaries, with employees holding senior-sounding titles earning pay that falls well short of what their grand headings imply.

The finding matters directly for HR teams because title inflation distorts internal equity, complicates benchmarking against market salary data, and creates exposure when employees discover that counterparts at other firms hold the same designation at materially higher pay. For employers in the Indian market the survey adds to a recurring problem: promotions in title are sometimes used as a low-cost substitute for raises, and the data suggest employees and candidates are catching on.

The survey, covered by The Hindu, examined how designations compare with compensation across the Indian workforce. Its central conclusion is that many job titles now promise more seniority and responsibility than the attached salary reflects. Roles dressed up with impressive headings — the "grand titles" of the survey's framing — frequently come with "modest pay," a pattern the survey characterizes as systemic rather than incidental.

For people-process decisions, the mismatch touches several concrete areas.

Compensation benchmarking. Salary surveys typically match roles by title. If a company's "Vice President" is functionally a mid-level analyst, benchmarking data built on designation will misprice the role in both directions — overpaying some inflated titles and underpaying understated ones. HR teams running annual compensation reviews may need to shift toward job-value or scope-based matching rather than title matching.

Internal equity and retention. Employees holding elevated titles at below-market pay represent a retention risk that is harder to see on standard dashboards. Because their titles suggest seniority, exit-interview data and engagement surveys may under-flag their dissatisfaction until they receive an external offer that prices their designation properly.

Recruitment and offer negotiations. Candidates arriving with impressive titles from previous employers can distort leveling during hiring. Recruiters who take titles at face value risk placing candidates into roles above or below their actual capability, a problem leveling frameworks are supposed to prevent.

Compliance and documentation. In disputes over termination, gratuity, or promotion claims, designation records carry weight. A gap between title and function can complicate an employer's position if a worker argues their designation established their seniority and entitlements.

The survey's headline observation — that grand titles and modest pay frequently travel together — points to a practice some employers have used deliberately: awarding designation changes in lieu of, or ahead of, compensation increases. The Hindu's coverage frames this as a measurable pattern rather than anecdote, and the survey format gives HR leaders a data point for raising the issue with finance and leadership teams.

What the survey does not resolve is direction of causality at the level of individual firms: whether employers inflate titles to retain staff without budget for raises, or whether labor-market conditions have simply produced titles that drifted ahead of pay bands. Either way, the practical implication for people leaders is the same — audit the gap.

A designation-versus-compensation audit is a contained exercise: pull the org chart, map each role's title against its pay band and functional scope, and compare against at least one external market data source. Where the survey's pattern appears internally, the choice is to correct the title, correct the pay, or accept and manage the retention risk. Deferring that choice is itself a decision, and the survey suggests a growing share of employees will eventually test the market to find out what their title is worth elsewhere.