20 Best Compensation Management Software of 2025
10 Best Compensation Management Software List
Here's my pick of the 10 best software from the 20 tools reviewed.
Get free help from our HR software advisors to find your match.
Managing employee compensation is complex. If you're manually tracking salaries and bonuses across spreadsheets, struggling with pay equity issues, or finding it difficult to align compensation with company goals, you're not alone. Many HR professionals face these challenges, making it tough to manage compensation effectively and even harder to choose the right software to help.
That’s where compensation management software comes in. The right tool can help you automate salary adjustments, ensure pay equity, manage bonuses and benefits, and stay compliant with regulations—all while saving time and reducing errors.
With years of experience evaluating HR software, I’ve researched dozens of compensation management tools to find the best options available. In this post, I’ll break down my top picks to help you find the right software for your needs.
What is Compensation Management Software?
Compensation management software is a practical tool designed for businesses to manage and organize employee pay effectively. It automates the process of calculating salaries, bonuses, and other forms of compensation, ensuring accuracy and consistency.
The purpose is to help companies align pay with performance, adhere to budgets, and maintain competitive salary structures. Its use simplifies administrative tasks, supports strategic financial planning, and contributes to fair and transparent compensation practices, enhancing employee satisfaction and retention.
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Best Compensation Management Software: Pricing Comparison Chart
This comparison chart summarizes pricing details for my top compensation management software selections to help you find the best software for your budget and business needs.
| Tool | Best For | Trial Info | Price | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Best for real-time benchmarking in 110+ countries | Free trial + demo available | From $29/month | Website | |
| 2 | Best for fair merit increase plans | Not available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 3 | Best for company-wide compensation reviews | Not available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 4 | Best for complex organizations | Free plan available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 5 | Best for competitive salary benchmarking | Free demo available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 6 | Best for pay equity analysis tools | Free demo available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 7 | Best for benchmarking against accurate market data | Free trial available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 8 | Best for managing compensation budgets | Free demo available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 9 | Best for complex compensation programs and TRS | Not available | Pricing upon request | Website | |
| 10 | Best for real-time compensation data | Not available | Pricing upon request | Website |
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Rippling
Visit WebsiteThis is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.4.8 -
Paycor
Visit WebsiteThis is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.4.1 -
ClearCompany
Visit WebsiteThis is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.4.6
Best Compensation Management Software Reviews
Here’s a brief description of each top 10 compensation management software that made my shortlist. Keep reading to find additional bonus picks at the bottom of the list.
Deel is a comprehensive payroll service with a robust self-service function for HR professionals. It’s designed for global teams, letting you manage and keep track of employees and contractors around the world.
Why I picked Deel: Their service is easy to use and offers a wide range of features. The platform gives you a comprehensive overview of benefits, perks, and salary expenses. You can make use of their internal research tools to benchmark salary ranges in over 110 countries in real-time, taking into account mandatory contributions like pension and healthcare.
Deel Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include international market salary insights, employer of record (EOR) or global payroll services, payroll & tax management, a dedicated customer service manager, access to international legal and tax experts, compliant employee contract templates, compliance monitoring tools, expense management, time tracking, analytics & reporting, and 24/7 in-app support. Deel is also SOC2-compliant and ISO 27001-certified, which means it meets international standards for data security.
Integrations are available with a handful of popular accounting and HR management systems that allow you to import and export HR data easily. Key integrations include Ashby, BambooHR, Bob, Greenhouse, NetSuite, QuickBooks, and Xero. They also have an Open API solution that allows developers to build their own interfaces on top of the Deel platform too.
Deel offers flat rate pricing per worker, as well as a free demo.
Compease is a compensation management software designed to help organizations maintain accurate, market-driven salary structures. It offers tools for salary administration, merit planning, and employee engagement.
Why I picked Compease: It offers a comprehensive merit planning feature. The Merit Matrix allows you to develop merit increase plans tailored to your company's compensation policies and budget. This ensures equitable and consistent merit increases, aligning employee performance with compensation.
Another notable aspect is Compease's job evaluation system. It helps establish job value within your organization by assessing factors like knowledge, skill level, problem-solving abilities, and accountability. This systematic evaluation supports the development of fair salary ranges, ensuring that compensation reflects the true value of each role.
Compease Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include expert compensation consulting to guide your salary administration strategy, access to current market salary data for accurate benchmarking, and annual updates to keep your compensation plans aligned with industry trends. These elements ensure that your organization's compensation practices remain competitive and effective.
Integrations aren't currently listed.
Barley is a compensation management platform that brings together pay band management, compensation reviews, merit cycle planning, global benchmarking, and total rewards into one platform.
Why I picked Barley: It stands out for its ability to simplify the entire compensation review process with automated approval chains, configurable merit guidelines, multi-currency management, budget allocation by team, visualized compensation analytics, automated comp letters, and secure access controls.
With Barley, HR teams can control budgets by setting budgets for specific teams and projecting spend based on pay guidelines. It’s also user-friendly for managers because it embeds pay guidelines and team budgets, and flags outliers to make informed and fair pay decisions during comp reviews.
Barley Standout Features & Integrations:
Standout features include visualized compensation analytics where you can spot potential issues and outliers by analyzing budget spend, pay equity, and pay distribution. In addition, Barley features automated increase and promotion letters to simplify communication compensation with employees.
Beyond compensation letters, Barley offers a dynamic Total Rewards portal that enables pay transparency and better communicates the value of all aspects of an employee’s pay (including perks and benefits and equity compensation, like stock options).
Other features include compensation review automation, salary band management, pay equity analysis, candidate benchmarking data, and Global Benchmarking Data (powered by Mercer).
Integrations include HRIS and HCM platforms like ADP Workforce Now, BambooHR, Dayforce, HiBob, UKG Pro, Namely, Paylocity, Paycor, and Workday, and ATS platforms like BambooHR, Greenhouse, and Lever.
Aeqium is a cloud-based compensation management software that gives HR teams the flexibility to collaborate on their compensation planning process, including planning compensation across multiple geographies, currencies, pay bands, and job types.
It's suitable for complex organizations of all sizes and is a comprehensive solution for managing employee salaries, variable pay, equity grants, and compliance reporting.
Why I picked Aeqium: It uses advanced integrations to help HR teams configure and prepare their compensation cycles by automating the gathering and validation of compensation-related data. This data, combined with their guided workflows for managers, helps organizations make more data-driven decisions.
You can also use Aeqium to create customized plans for employees, determine pay equity, and simulate different compensation scenarios to assess their impact on the bottom line.
Aeqium offers agile, self-service functionality so HR teams can make changes to their compensation program themselves at any time rather than relying on tech support for changes. In addition, HR teams have complete control over which compensation details are shown to managers, including data on salary, equity, and others.
Aeqium Standout Features & Integrations
Features include collaboration tools, custom logic and permissions, multi-currencies, proofing & approvals, user-based access, budgeting, interactive offer letters, market data integration, and a total rewards portal for pay transparency.
The platform also offers compensation analysis tools to help teams understand when employees are approaching events like a drop in equity vesting.
Integrations include other HRIS, applicant tracking systems, payroll systems, and cap tables and stock systems like Carta.
TriNet's HR software system is designed to help small to medium-sized organizations manage their core HR needs, including onboarding, payroll, benefits enrollment, applicant tracking, document management, and workforce analytics.
Why I picked TriNet: Their Compensation Benchmark feature, part of its workforce analytics module, automatically pulls industry salary benchmarking data directly from Salary.com. This is helpful as you can run custom analytics using this data to ensure your salary ranges stay competitive against changing market rates.
TriNet Standout Features & Integrations:
Trinet also excels in their workforce analytics capabilities. You can use their software to track all the key metrics that matter, including your headcount, turnover rates, employee tenure, new hires, and terminations. You can also customize their dashboard to track other analytics and key performance indicators that are unique to your business too.
Integrations are available with Assembly, Bob, ChartHop, Compt, Greenhouse, Hyperproof, Lattice, Sage Intacct, QuickBooks, and many others.
Pricing details are available upon request.
Decusoft Compose is a comprehensive compensation, incentive, and total rewards management software. Their cloud-based software is easy-to-use and purposefully designed to mimic a spreadsheet-based experience many users are familiar with, yet with more advanced functionality.
Why I picked Decusoft Compose: Their solution not only simplifies the management of complex variable pay programs including merit-based bonuses, equity, long/short term incentives, carried interest, and deferrals but also provides enhanced analytics of your data.
Diversity, equity & inclusion (DEI), pay equity, and people analytics are all simple to measure, report, compare, and visualize. Compose is easy to use, tailored to your unique needs, and SOC-2 compliant.
Decusoft Compose Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include compensation planning, budgeting & forecasting tools, data dashboards, salary benchmarks, DEI & pay equity analysis tools, and employee performance & merit calibration tools.
The software also supports a wide range of compensation planning models (bonus + equity, bonus only, bonus with deferral, equity award, exceptional impact, financial demo incentive, sales bonus, merit + bonus + equity, merit only, etc.).
Integrations are available with a handful of human resource information systems (HRIS) or other HR management systems including ADP, Oracle HCM, SAP, UKG, and Workday.
OpenComp is a compensation management platform designed to help organizations make informed pay decisions. It offers regularly updated and reliable compensation data and actionable insights to ensure competitive and fair employee compensation.
Why I picked OpenComp: It's ideal for benchmarking employees and conducting market analyses. OpenComp's software automatically maps employees to Job Roles and Job Levels, saving you time and allowing you to market analysis based on their data or yours.
OpenComp also has a powerful feature that allows you to quickly create compensation ranges based on reliable market data that covers thousands of job roles. The platform's Range Manager makes adjusting and tuning the ranges very easy and straightforward. I also like that you can import third-party data and use it along with their data visualization features. This gives compensation leaders the ability to reference multiple data sources when evaluating employees' pay relative to the market.
OpenComp Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include merit and bonus cycles, which enable data-driven workflows for determining compensation adjustments. This ensures that performance rewards are both fair and motivating for your team. Additionally, the pay equity feature provides insights to help resolve pay disparities related to gender or ethnicity, fostering a culture of trust within your organization.
Integrations include ADP Workforce Now, Gusto, BambooHR, Carta, and many more.
Paylocity is a cloud-based HR and payroll platform designed to help businesses manage various aspects of their workforce. It offers tools that enhance payroll, human resources, and talent management processes.
Why I picked Paylocity: You can track performance and compensation side-by-side, allowing you to align pay with employee achievements easily. Its budgeting tools also let you set salary bands, forecast compensation expenses, and allocate funds efficiently. If you're concerned about pay equity, Paylocity includes features to help you review and ensure fair compensation across your workforce.
Paylocity Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include a payroll system that takes care of things like automatic tax filing and employee payments, so your team doesn't have to worry about manual calculations. Paylocity’s benefits administration lets you manage health insurance and retirement plans, making open enrollment simpler.
Additionally, employee self-service tools empower your team to update their personal information, view their paystubs, and access other important documents.
Integrations include ClearStar, Microsoft Dynamics 365, 7shifts, AirMason, APA Benefits, Azure, Atlassian, Asana, Box, ClearCompany, Dropbox, Freshdesk, Google Workspace, Greenhouse, HubSpot, Slack, Salesforce, Trakstar, and Zoho People.
CompUp is a compensation management software designed to assist businesses in managing their compensation processes.
Why I picked ComUp: I chose CompUp for its advanced ability to handle complex compensation programs, such as those involving multiple pay structures, international teams, and performance-based incentives. It also supports Total Rewards Statements (TRS) generation, which helps you clearly communicate the full value of compensation packages to your workforce, promoting transparency and retention.
In addition to its TRS capabilities, CompUp provides robust tools for compensation benchmarking and budget forecasting. These tools empower you to create competitive, data-driven compensation strategies while staying within budget. The collaborative planning features are particularly useful during increment cycles, allowing multiple stakeholders to review and align on compensation decisions.
CompUp Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include performance reviews, equity management, incentive management, pay structure modeling, salary surveys, bonus and commission tracking, automated workflows, compliance management, data visualization, reporting tools, and multi-currency support.
Integrations include various HR and payroll systems.
Pave is a comprehensive platform designed to revolutionize the way companies manage employee compensation. It offers workflows for salary and equity benchmarking, compensation planning, and total rewards to ensure fair and competitive compensation packages.
Why I picked Pave: As an employee compensation management tool, Pave excels in providing transparent, data-driven insights that help companies make informed compensation decisions. It enables organizations to align their compensation strategies with market standards while promoting internal equity and employee satisfaction.
By integrating seamlessly with various HR and payroll systems, Pave simplifies the complex process of compensation management, making it accessible and actionable for businesses of all sizes.
Pave Standout Features & Integrations:
Features include real-time market data to ensure competitive compensation through up-to-date market insights, total rewards portals and visual offer letters for existing and future talent, offering customizable compensation models that allow companies to tailor their compensation strategies to fit their goals and meet employee expectations.
This comprehensive approach provides businesses with the tools needed to manage compensation effectively, promoting fairness and transparency in the workplace.
Integrations include HRIS platforms like Workday, BambooHR, and Gusto; payroll systems such as ADP and Paychex; performance management tools like Lattice and 15Five; financial planning software; equity management platforms; compliance and tax software; and analytics and reporting tools.
Other Compensation Tools
Here are a few other options that didn’t make the best compensation management software list. I didn’t have room for a full review for each of these but they are still worthy of consideration:
- Xoxoday Compass
For gamified sales incentive programs
- Xactly
For incentives that drive performance
- Omnipresent
For global compensation compliance
- Assemble
For transparent total compensation
- Leaptree
For sales-focused teams
- CaptivateIQ
For customer-facing teams
- Spiff
For commission-based sales teams
- Varicent ICM
For enterprise organizations
- MarketPay by Payscale
For tracking global compensation volatility
- ChartHop
For automating eligibility rules
Related HR Software Reviews
If you still haven't found what you're looking for here, check out these other related tools that we've tested and evaluated:
- HR Software
- Payroll Software
- Recruiting Software
- Employer of Record Services
- Applicant Tracking Systems
- Workforce Management Software
Selection Criteria for Compensation Management Software
Wondering how I selected the best compensation management software for this top 10 list? I'm happy to explain my detailed approach.
I evaluated and compared a wide range of compensation management platforms with positive user ratings using the standardized set of evaluation criteria below.
Here's a short summary of the criteria I used to determine the best compensation management software systems for this list:
Core Functionalities (25% of total score): To be considered for inclusion in this list, each solution had to fulfill these common use cases first:
- Automating payroll and benefits calculations
- Managing bonuses, commissions, and other performance-based pay structures
- Ensuring compliance with tax and labor laws across jurisdictions
- Providing employees with access to pay information and tax documents through self-service tools
- Generating reports and analytics for pay and performance trends
Additional Standout Features (25% of total score): To help me find the best software out of numerous available options, I also kept a keen eye out for unique features, including the following:
- Real-time compensation benchmarking against industry data
- AI-driven recommendations for salary adjustments and bonuses
- Predictive analytics for budgeting future compensation costs
- Enhanced employee portals with compensation history and personalized insights
- Global payroll capabilities with multi-currency and multilingual support
Usability (10% of total score): To evaluate the usability of each system, I considered the following:
- Clean, intuitive dashboards with clear navigation
- Drag-and-drop functionality for setting up pay plans or schedules
- Role-based access that is easy to configure for secure data handling
- Mobile-friendly interfaces for both administrators and employees
Onboarding (10% of total score): To get a sense of each software provider's customer onboarding process, I considered the following factors:
- Interactive product tours and pre-built templates for setup
- Availability of detailed training videos, chatbots, and live webinars
- Comprehensive migration tools for transferring data from existing systems
- Easy-to-access help centers or resource libraries
Customer Support (10% of total score): To evaluate the level of customer support each vendor offered, I considered the following:
- Availability of 24/7 support through multiple channels like chat, email, and phone
- Dedicated onboarding specialists for a smoother transition
- A comprehensive knowledge base or help center with troubleshooting guides
Value for Price (10% of total score): To gauge the value of each software, I considered the following factors:
- Tiered pricing that scales with company size and needs
- Transparent costs without hidden fees for upgrades or integrations
- ROI through time saved, errors reduced, and compliance maintained
Customer Reviews (10% of total score): Evaluating customer reviews is the final element of my selection process, which helps me understand how well a product performs in the hands of real users. Here are the factors I considered:
- User satisfaction with functionality and ease of use
- Reports of reliable system uptime and issue resolution
- Feedback on scalability for growing businesses
Using this assessment framework helped me identify the compensation benchmarking software that goes beyond basic requirements to offer additional value through unique features, intuitive usability, smooth onboarding, effective support, and overall value for price.
Trends in Compensation Management Software
Compensation management solutions continue to evolve with cutting-edge features designed to streamline employee pay, optimize commission structures, and simplifying bonus management. These following advancements show how technology is addressing the challenges of accuracy, compliance, transparency, and employee satisfaction while adapting to shifting priorities in the workplace.
- AI-Driven Compensation Recommendations: Tools now use AI to analyze market trends, performance metrics, and internal benchmarks, providing real-time salary and bonus recommendations. This improves accuracy and ensures competitive pay.
- Predictive Budgeting Tools: Enhanced automation predicts future compensation costs based on historical data and workforce trends, enabling more strategic planning.
- Global Salary Benchmarks: Tools now include advanced benchmarking against industry standards, helping HR teams make data-informed decisions about pay structures.
- Dynamic Bonus Calculations: Software is now tying bonuses to KPIs and performance metrics in real-time, offering greater alignment with company goals and employee achievements.
- Team-Based Incentive Tracking: Updates have introduced tools to manage incentive programs and calculate and distribute team-based bonuses, fostering collaboration and shared accountability.
- Integrated Pay Equity Tools: There's a growing trend to merge DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) monitoring systems with pay equity software so teams can review compensation bands holistically, while updating employee salaries at scale.
These trends highlight the increasing sophistication of compensation management software, reflecting the growing demand for precision, personalization, and global applicability in employee pay systems. As businesses continue to navigate evolving challenges, tools with advanced AI, robust compliance, and data-driven insights are becoming indispensable.
Features of Compensation Management Software
Managing employee compensation involves a lot of moving parts—salaries, commissions, bonuses, and pay adjustments—all of which can quickly become overwhelming without the right tools. Compensation management software can simplify these processes and help ensure that employees are paid fairly, on time, and in line with company policies.
Here's a look at the most important features to consider when choosing a solution:
- Customizable compensation plans that let you create tailored pay structures for different roles, making it easier to manage unique commission and bonus plans
- Dynamic pay policy tools that segregate types of employees across departments, teams, skill sets, geographic locations, and any other relevant variable (i.e., compensation bands)
- Salary benchmarking data sourced globally, so you can ensure your pay rates always remain competitive despite global salary volatility
- Total compensation management and presentation tools (e.g., illustrative or visual offer letters for new hires)
- Data insights that monitor pay equity across your workforce demographics (e.g., DEI metrics tracking)
- Incentivization features that link compensation decisions with performance management, productivity, or goal-based data
- Workflow approval automations that streamline the process of approving salary changes or bonuses, reducing delays and ensuring proper oversight
- Self-service functionalities that et employees access their pay information, tax documents, and compensation breakdowns, improving transparency and reducing administrative queries
- Integration with HR, payroll, and accounting systems to ensure data flows smoothly across your HR tech stack, reducing redundancy and errors
Choosing the right compensation management software is about finding a solution that simplifies processes, ensures accuracy, and helps align pay with performance. With these features, you can optimize how you manage salaries, commissions, and bonuses while focusing on what matters most—your team.
Frequently Asked Questions about Compensation Management Software
Still trying to wrap your head around compensation management software and how it works? Here are some answers to frequently asked questions that should clear things up for you further:
What is compensation management software?
Compensation management software is a type of HR software that simplifies the process of developing and maintaining compensation packages for employees. These systems generally fall into two types of sub-categories: those that are standalone compensation-focused products, and those that are integrated modules within other systems.
Most of the software providers in this list fall into the former category, as standalone HR solutions with robust tools to manage employee salaries across the entire employee lifecycle. These SaaS systems typically offer a deeper set of features than those you would find within an HR management system. They also offer many integrations to help you manage your employee data efficiently.
In contrast, many HR management systems (including HRIS, HCM or HRMS providers) do have compensation planning modules too, sometimes for an added price. These modules work alongside their other core HR modules for talent management, employee engagement, and payroll, and centralize all your pay-related data in one place.
How does compensation management software work?
Compensation management software acts as a central place where compensation planning, policies, strategies, data, and reports are stored all those authorized to access them.
Compensation management programs are built on top of databases of benchmarked salary data. This allows the programs to populate the proper salary range for any given position based on key parameters like the job title, geographic location, years of experience, credentials required, and so on.
The data behind these programs are sourced globally by trusted salary survey providers that request current salary information from employers and employees alike. The data is then aggregated and anonymized into a large pool of salary data, which forms the backbone of these compensation tools.
The software also streamlines common HR processes through automation and reduces the need for HR employees to complete repetitive, low-value tasks.
What is salary benchmarking?
Salary benchmarking is the process of comparing your company’s compensation rates with industry standards to ensure they are competitive and aligned with market trends. This involves gathering data from salary surveys, industry reports, or compensation databases to analyze how your pay scales stack up against similar roles in your region or industry.
By using salary benchmarking, organizations can attract and retain top talent, maintain internal equity, and ensure fairness in their compensation strategies. It also helps HR professionals make informed decisions about pay adjustments and identify any gaps that could impact employee satisfaction or competitiveness in the job market.
If you’re ready to dive into this process, read this article covering tips on how to nail your salary benchmarking process next.
How should you establish salary ranges?
To establish salary ranges, start by analyzing market data through salary benchmarking to understand the typical pay for similar roles in your industry and location. Next, define a pay strategy that aligns with your company’s compensation philosophy, such as whether you aim to pay at, above, or below the market median.
Once you have this data, create a range for each position with a minimum, midpoint, and maximum salary. The range should account for factors like experience, education, and performance. Regularly review and adjust these ranges to reflect changes in the market, organizational goals, or economic conditions. This ensures your salary ranges remain competitive and equitable.
What are the different types of compensation?
The best employee compensation planning software provides HR teams with a way to illustrate their total compensation packages to their employees. The term “total compensation” refers to financial benefits, perks, and incentives in addition to an employee’s base salary.
The most common types of additional compensation (aside from salary) include:
- bonuses (usually performance or merit-based),
- commissions or sales target incentives (see employee incentive systems for examples of this),
- tenure-based, long-term incentives (e.g., a years of service award or bonus)
- profit sharing programs,
- company equity,
- stock options,
- health benefits,
- retirement fund contributions, and
- non-monetary items like gifts and other physical perks.
For more details on how to craft an effective compensation program, read our article on creating an effective compensation philosophy.
How does compensation management software help employers?
The way an organization compensates its employees will directly impact employee satisfaction rates. When a company fails in basic compensation planning, it risks losing talent and scaring away potential hires. Up to 52% of candidates say that competitive compensation is the most attractive element of a job offer.
Compensation management software helps organizations structure and standardize the way they pay employees across different teams and departments. It ensures that no one is underpaid or overpaid and creates an environment of fairness where individuals feel recognized for their efforts. This, in turn, helps organizations retain their existing talent and attract new hires in a competitive talent marketplace.
Compensation management tools can also reduce the costs of managing employee compensation as HR employees are able to spend their time doing high-value tasks while the software takes care of repetitive jobs.
Tools that ensure equity and fairness reduce the risks associated with non-compliance with labor laws, while helping establish a favorable relationship with labor unions and employee representative groups. In addition, when employees feel that they are fairly compensated and the company can provide a rationale for its compensation structure, employees are likely to feel more motivated to do their best at work, increasing productivity and profits.
Related Read: What Is Time Tracking And Why Is Time Tracking Important?
What are some tips to help teams master the compensation review process?
Here are some tips to help you master the compensation review process:
- Start by setting clear goals and a timeline to ensure all stakeholders are aligned.
- Leverage compensation management software to centralize data, streamline workflows, and automate calculations, reducing the risk of errors.
- Use salary benchmarking to ensure pay decisions align with market standards and your organization’s compensation strategy.
- Engage managers in the process by providing training on how to evaluate performance and apply pay adjustments fairly.
- Communicate transparently with employees about the criteria used for reviews to build trust and ensure alignment
For additional advice, refer to our step-by-step guide managing the compensation review process.
What is a total rewards strategy?
A total rewards strategy is a holistic approach to employee compensation that goes beyond base salary to include all forms of financial and non-financial benefits. It includes both direct compensation (such as salaries, bonuses, and incentives) and indirect compensation (like benefits, retirement plans, wellness programs, and career development opportunities). The goal is to attract, retain, and motivate employees by offering a well-rounded package that aligns with business goals and employee needs.
A strong total rewards strategy considers factors like market competitiveness, internal pay equity, employee preferences, and company culture. By integrating salary structures with benefits, recognition programs, and growth opportunities, organizations can improve employee engagement, reduce turnover, and foster a more productive workforce.
How can you use software to ensure pay equity within your organization?
Compensation management software helps teams manage pay equity by providing data-driven insights into salary structures, identifying discrepancies, and standardizing pay practices. Many tools include pay benchmarking, which compares salaries against industry standards, and internal pay audits, which analyze compensation across job roles, experience levels, and demographics to detect potential biases.
Automated workflows also ensure that salary decisions follow predefined equity guidelines, reducing the risk of inconsistencies. Plus, real-time reporting and compliance tracking helps HR teams stay aligned with fair pay regulations like the Equal Pay Act (US), Pay Equity Act (Canada), or other gender pay gap reporting requirements.
By centralizing compensation data and enforcing structured pay frameworks, software enables organizations to proactively address pay disparities and promote transparency, ultimately fostering a more equitable workplace.
Additional Resources
Looking for some other ways to attract and retain high-quality talent? Here's a collection of our best resources to help you develop top-notch compensation and engagement practices within your organization:
- Best Employee Perks Programs to Automate Rewards
- Best Talent Management Systems
- 10 Novel Employee Wellness Program Ideas to Attract and Retain Top Talent
- Best Employee Engagement Software
- Mind the Pay Gap, a podcast with Robin Turnill from Pivot HR Services
- Best Performance Management Tools Every HR Pro Should Know
- 20 Types of Employee Benefits You Should Know
- Cost of Employee Benefits
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