SkillLab Life: Our Compensation Framework

Are you considering joining our team? If so, you may be wondering about our compensation framework. We are excited to share that our framework is designed to be transparent, fair, and competitive. 

We believe that compensation is an important factor in your decision to join SkillLab. We wanted to take this opportunity to explain our framework in more detail.

Our approach is founded on transparency

We believe that transparency builds trust and honesty. Hence, everyone at SkillLab knows our compensation approach, the salary ranges for all roles, and the career levels of all employees.

Salary benchmarking

We use a process called salary benchmarking to set salaries fairly. This involves comparing our salaries to those of similar companies in our industry. We use a reputable salary benchmarking tool for the Dutch high-tech sector that collects this data.

Over the years, we experienced that salary benchmarking offers the following benefits:

  • Increased trust that we compensate fairly
  • Reduced friction and conflict around salary conversations
  • Increased clarity on how compensation can evolve over time
  • Faster turnaround to make salary offers to new joiners

How salary benchmarking works at SkillLab

Once we have the salary data, we group it by role and career level. We then calculate the 50th percentile salary for each role and career level. The 50th percentile salary is the amount that 50% of companies in our industry pay for a given role and career level.

We choose to compensate at the 50th percentile because it allows us to offer a competitive salary while also being mindful of our budget. As our business matures, we aim to compensate at a higher percentile.

Individual contributors vs people managers

At many companies, you can only receive a higher salary if you become a people manager at some point. We apply the same salary benchmarking process to individual contributors and people managers. This means that you can pursue the career path that is best suited for your skills and interests, without worrying that you are left behind.

Career progression

Your salary changes as you progress in your career along five levels:

  • Junior: A starting professional with little practical work experience, performing routine or well-defined tasks under detailed guidance.
  • Intermediate: A maturing professional using existing procedures to solve routine problems.
  • Senior: A seasoned professional, working independently on problems with diverse scope. 
  • Staff: A professional in the later stages of their career, who has mastered their own discipline and holds advanced knowledge of related disciplines. 
  • Principal: A well-recognised and successful subject matter expert. This SkillLaber maintains deep knowledge spanning across disciplines and solves the toughest problems for the organization.

We have detailed expectations for each career-level. You can view them in this Google sheet

More Benefits at SkillLab

In addition to a competitive salary, we also offer a comprehensive benefits package that includes:

  • Extensive relocation support, including a budget for real-estate agency fees, hotel accommodation in the first 2-weeks, transportation, first year tax declaration filing, 30% ruling application fees (if applicable)
  • Learning and development budget that you can spend on conferences, books, courses, coaching or therapy
  • Access go Google mentor network via Google for Start-ups 
  • Budget you can spend on personalized benefits like gym, swapfiets, cinema, etc.

What’s next?

Over the years, we have improved our compensation approach through various iterations and feedback cycles. We will continue to do so - including the feedback we hope to receive from you.

Join our team

We are an impact-oriented company with a mission to empower job seekers to turn their skills into careers. We offer our employees the opportunity to work on challenging and meaningful projects, collaborate with talented colleagues, and learn and grow in their careers.

If you're looking for a company with a transparent and competitive compensation framework, we encourage you to apply today!

Check our open vacancies here: https://skilllab.io/en-us/company/jobs