Victor Ueda· Job Architecture Lead, Independent
Asked in New Member Welcome ·
I am the only HR person at a medical device manufacturer in Galway with 140 employees. Until now the managing director and the finance controller set pay between them. The managing director has decided it should sit with HR from January.
There are no grades, no ranges and no written policy. Pay has been set offer by offer for twelve years. I already know of two people in the same job with a gap of about 9,000 euro between them.
I have a small budget and perhaps a day a week to give this. What is the minimum sensible structure for a company our size, and what should I leave alone for now?
9 helpful · 6 insightful · 1 agree · 4 replies · 175 views · 6 following
Accepted answer· by Victor Pereira
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.
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Compensation Consultant, Tidewater Utilities
Welcome, and you are far from the only solo HR person here who has been handed pay. Before building anything, get every salary into one sheet with job title, start date, manager and location. Sort by job. The pattern will tell you what the real problems are, and it takes a day.
Victor PereiraCBS, GRS
Sales Compensation Manager, Qasr Holdings
Accepted answer
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.
Benefits Analyst, Silverline Media
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.
Victor UedaCEP
Job Architecture Lead, Independent
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.
