Frequently Asked Questions

Global Remuneration Survey Capabilities

Q: How does ERL meet the competitive practice needs of the public and private sector organizations expanding internationally?

A: In 1994 ERL took two decisive steps to assist all organizations, especially the high technology and bio-technology sectors, expanding internationally. These include the acquisition of the salary survey technology and participants of a European Survey House (founded in 1975), and the mapping of its job evaluation methodology to all of the recognized quantitative and qualitative methodologies. This mapping allows ERL to convert any of these methodologies to our job/role classification system.

Q: How does this mapping make survey matching more accurate and efficient?

A: The most important step in benchmarking is to ensure that the appropriate survey data is used for the position being priced. Mere titles just will not do. Even if the correct job family is found, the level of the position can cause the comparison to be off as much as 60% between entry level and qualified expert. Most organizations have their own job evaluation methodology, so ERL can use its validated mapping to relate discreet positions to our survey data more accurately. It never ceases to amaze me how practitioners continue to “pen the tail on the donkey” with our competition’s “Global 50”.

Q: What is the organization profile of ERL’s participants?

A: ERL has a client relationship with over 5,000 organizations represented in over 125 countries. Survey participants have their corporate headquarters in the United States (61%), Western Europe (14%), Asia-Pacific (11%), Latin America (10), and Africa & the Middle East (4%). Remuneration data for 250,000 incumbents and over 2,000 positions for most all business/industry sectors make up our current salary survey database. ERL has a higher retention rate (48%) for participants than any other survey. Once our methodology is known matching is a “breeze”.

Q: Other surveys do not normally provide industry/business sector participant lists or allow the purchaser to obtain custom cuts of the survey data. What is ERL’s practice?

A: ERL only provides custom data cuts “bespoke” (tailored) to the client’s needs. In effect, one does not pay for what is not required. Data is provided electronically to client specification within 24-48 hours. Participant lists are available by sector or by specific sector and the purchaser can select the participant sample used. Often participants not matched as peers (like or similar) can cause distortion in the pricing and cause inaccurate comparisons.

Q: How does the cost of a position pricing compare to other survey houses?

A: ERL charges approximately $250 per position per country (location) for any five percentiles of base, sales or performance incentive, value of in-kind benefits, and total rewards. Additional drilldown reports, long-term incentives, and country benefit reports are extra. Our competition charges from $400 to $650 for the same number of data elements, and usually take 3-5 business days to produce an Ad Hoc pricing.

Q: How often does ERL survey and does participation mean lower survey cost for the initial abstract and custom reports?

A: ERL sends survey questionnaires (hardcopy or electronic) to all participants in September or October of each year. Data is published back to participants in November, as well as, available for Ad Hoc reporting. The survey participation fee is $2,500, and an additional $1,000 per country. Custom cuts of the data are $125 per position per country (or location city). All job evaluation to the ERL system is gratis to participants. You do not have to complete the annual survey to get the survey data.

For more information call (516) 449-4397, or email Gary Parker at gparker@erlimited.com.