In an effort to simplify their transparent salaries, they benchmarked everything against a cities cost of living. In turn, they came up with the following formula.
The new Buffer Benchmark formula replaces one that included two other elements that they dubbed the Good Life Curve, which in place of location, it included elements of loyalty and the choice of more salary or stock options. Now, Buffer’s salary is based also on the location benchmark and grouped as high, average, or low cost of living. In their announcement blog post they also stated that they “use data from Numbeo to figure out which band applies for each teammate. For high cost of living areas we pay 100 percent of the San Francisco 50th percentile, average is 85 percent, and low is 75 percent.” Not only did Buffer put each employee’s salary on display, they also updated their salary calculator that allows prospective employees to know specifically what they could make at the company. After tossing in my information as a seasoned content marketer in a city with a low cost of living, their salary mapped up pretty closely, if not a bit higher, than my expectations. A few years back we spoke with Joel regarding the challenges that come along with remote teams, and even at that time Buffer was dedicated to the distributed model. With new feedback rolling in, Joel was quick to draw a line in the sand regarding what their employee salaries mean to him and Buffer.
“Salaries are the lowest amount the company thinks it can pay you” What a sad view of the world. Do many companies truly operate this way? Definitely not how I run or ever plan to run Buffer. — Joel Gascoigne (@joelgascoigne) December 6, 2017 Read more about company culture on TechCo
