I am the whole HR department and pay has just landed on my desk. Where first?

For 140 people, the minimum is five or six levels across the whole company, each with one pay range per job family where the market clearly differs, for example engineering and production. Make the ranges wide, around 40 per cent from bottom to top, so that most people fit inside on day one. Buy one local salary survey rather than several.

Leave alone for now: bonus design, a formal job evaluation scheme and any pay progression rules. Fix the largest unexplained gaps over two review cycles rather than one, and agree that timetable with the managing director before anyone asks.

On the 9,000 euro gap: find out whether there is a reason you could say out loud, such as experience or shift pattern. If not, that is the one to raise first. With pay transparency rules arriving across the EU, the managing director will want to hear it from you first.

The Pay Equity & Transparency space covers the practical side.

Thank you. The single sheet is done and it was sobering: eleven gaps of more than 15 per cent within the same job. I have a meeting with the managing director on Thursday to propose six levels and a two-cycle plan.