Research industry salary benchmarks

Almost everyone underestimates or overestimates their market rate, and both errors are expensive. Industry salary benchmarks fix that, but only if you gather several and adjust them properly. An hour of careful comparison gives you a number you can defend, which is worth considerably more than an hour of guessing.

Why research industry salary benchmarks is worth an hour

Single-source salary data is close to useless. Self-reported sites skew toward people pleased with their pay, recruiter ranges skew toward what is easy to fill, and government data lags by a year or more. Triangulating across three sources with different biases produces a range that is genuinely defensible in a negotiation.

How to research industry salary benchmarks step by step

1. 1

   Fix your comparison variables

   Role, level, city, company size, industry. A senior title at a startup and at a bank are different jobs with different pay.

2. 2

   Pull from three source types

   A self-reported site, a published industry survey, and any legally mandated pay range on live job postings in your region.

3. 3

   Use medians and quartiles, never averages

   A handful of enormous packages drags the mean upward. The median and the interquartile range describe your actual situation.

4. 4

   Adjust for total compensation

   Separate base, bonus, equity and pension. A headline number that bundles unvested equity is not comparable to a salary.

5. 5

   Write down your range and date it

   Record the figure, the sources, and the date. Salary data goes stale within a year and you will want to know when to redo it.

Tips to get more out of it

• Pay transparency laws now require posted ranges in many regions. Live postings are the freshest data available and cost nothing to read.
• Ask a recruiter what a role like yours is placing at. They will usually tell you, and their number reflects the current market.
• Note the whole range, not one figure. Where you sit within it depends on scope and evidence, not just job title.

Ways to mix it up

If you are considering a move abroad or to a different city, run the exercise twice and adjust for cost of living and taxes, since headline salary comparisons across regions are frequently misleading. If your role is unusual, benchmark the two adjacent roles instead and position yourself between them.

Research industry salary benchmarks: frequently asked questions