Employees, including managers, across range of 54 different positions increased their average remuneration package by almost 18 percent last year. The average total package climbed from $70,917 in 2004 to $83,424 in the year to June 2005. And the average base salary paid to survey respondents climbed 16 percent from $59,731 to $69,031.
Changes at the top end of the scale were among the most interesting, with chief executives in particular scoring healthy percentage increases. The increase in the value of the average total package paid to CEOs was around 14 percent, lift from just over $160,000 to almost $183,000. The average base salary paid to CEOs who responded to the survey was shade under $150,000, up 24 percent from $121,000 last year.
On the other hand, the average value of performance-based remuneration decreased from $20,000 last year to $13,000 this year – reduction caused, no doubt, by the wider application of performance-based packages, with performance-based remuneration available to almost 70 percent of respondents compared with just 41 percent last year.
And almost three times as many CEOs, 62 percent compared with last year’s 21 percent, had access to superannuation. In the same vein, 68 percent of CEOs received other allowances, more than twice the proportion – 31 percent – offered the same allowances last year. However, the average value of these allowances almost halved from $6090 to $3700, again reflection of more widespread inclusion of additional allowances in total remuneration packages.
However, fewer CEOs were provided with cars – 48 percent compared with 67 percent in 2004. The estimated average value of the benefit of car remained relatively constant at $23,000. In addition, around 14 percent of CEOs were given the chance to exchange their vehicle for cash equivalent, and seven percent could downgrade their vehicle and take portion of the savings or cash equivalent.
CEOs are also forecasting an average six percent increase in their salary packages next year, solid two percent more than their 2004 forecast. The survey predicts an overall salary increase of five percent next year, compared with four percent last year. That additional one percent is effectively 25 percent increase over last year, and five percent represents $500,000 increase on $10 million annual wage bill. The forecast, if it proves accurate, will concern many employers.
Chief finance executives/directors lost ground. According to the survey their average total package slipped about 0.5 percent from little over $139,000 last year to $138,500 this year. Their average base salary climbed slightly, from $103,500 to $105,750. In addition, 66 percent more of them, 68 percent compared with 41 percent last year, were offered performance-based remuneration packages and more of them had access to superannuation and other allowances.
They are, however, little more optimistic about their prospects for next year. Like their CEO counterparts they forecast an increase of six percent compared with an average forecast last year of just three percent.
This is the first year NZIM has partnered with Brookers to conduct its national salary benchmarks survey. The findings are based on responses from 640 organisations and cover 54 job positions in accounting/finance, administration/support, distribution/warehousing, executive, human resources, information systems, production, sales/marketing, engineering, and project management.
NZIM national CEO David Chapman sees NZIM’s involvement in the survey as another means of providing members with valuable additional service. “It is important for our members to know what is happening in the remuneration marketplace. It is particularly critical in marketplace that is, in some sectors, starved for talent. Employers that fall too far behind market salary levels either lose valuable staff members, have difficulty employing good people, de-motivate their employees, or perhaps suffer all three,” he says.
“And while we are not seeing the velocity of change we have seen in recent years, we believe that our involvement has brought new dimension to both the depth of the data collected and to its potential application to the different sectors represented in this year’s report.”
Some of the other interesting changes include 30 percent increase in the value of total remuneration packages paid to transport managers and 23 percent increase in their average base salary, reflecting perhaps market shortage and increasing appreciation of the importance of this mid-level management position in the distribution/warehouse side of company operations.
Training and development managers are in similar demand. Their average total package value increased 29 percent from $63,000 to little over $81,000, and their average base salary climbed 24 percent from $54,000 to more than $67,000.
Office managers too notched up 35 percent increase in their total package and an almost 21 percent increase in their base salary – from $46,000 to $62,000 and $43,000 to $52,000 respectively.
Personal assistants to the CEO are, it seems, on the skids – reflection perhaps of the rise and rise of the keyboard-capable CEO. PAs’ total packages dropped on average by seven percent from little over $49,000 to just south of $46,000 last year. Their average base salary fell rather less from shade over $45,000 to $44,793. And many more of them, 53 percent, were offered performance-based remuneration packages compared with just 29 percent last year.
To order your copy of the report, visit the NZIM website www.nzim.co.nz or contact NZIM’s national office in Wellington.
David Chapman FNZIM is CEO of NZIM’s National Office.
