Thursday, May 15, 2008

Salaries and Raises

One of the hardest items to manage is that of compensation. We all want more money, we all value our employees and feel they should make more money, but we all have a fiscal responsibility to the firm. In short I believe we all want to be fair when it comes to compensation, but it is very easy to let emotion take over. I have standardized our process in that each job description has a salary range. The salary range is derived from the responsibilities of the job (not title) and compared to available industry benchmarks. Individuals are hired within the ranges and each year we check to confirm that all individuals are paid appropriatly for the position.

When annual reviews are preformed employees are elgible for up to a 7% raise. The reviews are done on a 5 point scale. If an employee scores at 3 or below they are not raise elgible. Score of 3-5 recieve a corralating increase in compensation starting at 2.5% for 3.1 up to 7% for a 5 (by the way - I have never given a 5 review). If the manager wants to give additional monies, they have to look for a promotion.

I believe this is as fair as can possibly be, but if someone has a better idea......

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