I worked at a non-profit org that relied on outside consultants for every tough decision because none of the "leadership" wanted to be accountable for telling people things they didn't want to hear (like the truth).

They did annual surveys, and always asked "what can we do BESIDES INCREASE PAY to improve job satisfaction?" and the #1 reply was always a write-in variation of "increase pay" (e.g. "less focus on expanding new to sites and more focus on retaining quality staff")

Finally, after several years of this routine (and lame-ass department pizza parties/potlucks) they decided they needed to act to silence the complainers. They announced they were going to hire an outside salary consultant to advise on the pay structure and they promised they'd adhere to the results, so it was heavily implied they would be raising wages after the results came in.

Well nearly a year goes by and finally it is reported that the the consultants determined our pay was considered "competitive" for our industry and region, so there would be no blanket raises this year.

It as plainly obvious that they paid these consultants thousands of dollars just to be deliverers of bad news. It seemed like all they did was look at salary data and compare to public data about wages from the Dept of Labor. Something that anyone in HR could have done (and I did myself, just out of curiousity). This is the same thing that every other similar clinic already does—and why every single position at every other clinic in the county pays the exact same slight-over-min. wage median rate. There is insane divergence to the mean because everyone uses the same "competitive" metric, it is effectively de facto collusion to depress wages.

But the other real reason for the big ruse is that it gives cover to the exec. director who was now like, "Sorry guys, I wish I could give raises to everyone but the mean old bean counters on the board of directors said we have to stay competitive!"