Job evaluation & salary benchmarking

A job architecture and compensation policy built on clarity, fairness, and competitiveness

In a changing world of work, successful companies are those that know how to structure their roles and manage their compensation strategy with precision.

A clear job framework, fair pay, and market transparency are no longer just advantages - they are essential levers to attract, retain, motivate, and comply with legal requirements.

Our areas of expertise

At Sharpmania, we help you build a robust job architecture through a dual approach:

Job evaluation and job grading, to clarify roles and levels of responsibility
Salary benchmarking, to align your pay practices with the market while ensuring internal equity

Why structure your jobs and pay now?

Structuring roles and salaries is not about adding administrative layers. It is about clarifying responsibilities, reducing grey areas, and supporting growth. Discover how a strong HR architecture becomes a strategic foundation to attract talent, retain people, and make decisions with confidence.

Whether you are an SME in growth, a scale-up building structure, or an established company undergoing transformation, you may be facing one or more of these challenges:

Unclear or poorly defined roles
Unexplained pay gaps
Inequalities that are difficult to justify
Limited internal mobility
Tension around recruitment and retention
Risks of regulatory non-compliance

Our mission: to help you structure and strengthen your HR organisation with objective, recognised tools and a strategic understanding of your challenges.

Job evaluation: build a coherent job architecture

Evaluating a role is not about assessing a person. It is about understanding the real contribution of each function and organising the company with logic and transparency. Discover how job evaluation creates a clear foundation to manage responsibilities, career paths, and HR decisions.

Job evaluation involves analysing each role to determine its relative value within the organisation. It does not assess individual performance, but rather the structural contribution of each position to the company’s activity.

The objectives of a job evaluation process:

Create a consistent and structured job framework
Clarify roles, responsibilities, and expectations
Define hierarchical levels (job grades) to manage career progression
Identify possible development paths (vertical, transversal, or expert tracks)
Establish a stable HR framework for promotions, mobility, and compensation decisions

Our methodology for building job frameworks:

We use the international tool gradar, recognised for its precision and neutrality, to evaluate positions based on standardised criteria such as:

- Technical expertise and complexity
- Level of decision-making
- Organisational impact
- Hierarchical and functional relationships
- Autonomy and scope of action

We complement this evaluation with targeted interviews, document analysis (job descriptions, organisation charts, HR processes), and workshops with key stakeholders.

Job grades: structure hierarchy and career paths

Job grading is not about ranking for the sake of ranking. It is about making career paths visible, enabling mobility, and giving meaning to progression. Discover how a coherent hierarchy reinforces fairness, motivation, and clarity in your HR policy.

The job grading stage classifies positions into coherent levels, or “grades,” providing a clear view of possible career paths, connections between roles, and the overall logic of compensation.

This approach helps to:

Make HR decisions (promotions, development, recruitment) more objective
Facilitate career management and internal mobility
Feed HRIS systems with a clear structure - supporting compensation policy, recruitment, promotions, and talent management
Strengthen diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives through neutral and transparent criteria
Reinforce company values and pay transparency, key to building a strong employer brand that attracts and retains top talent

Salary benchmarking: understand your market position

Comparing salaries is not about automatically aligning with the market. It is about understanding your position, ensuring internal fairness, and attracting the right talent. Discover how precise benchmarking informs your decisions and strengthens your competitiveness.

Job evaluation gains its full value when connected to reliable market data - one of the key benefits of salary benchmarking.

A salary benchmark or pay grid helps you determine the external value of a role: what the median or competitive salary is for a similar position in companies of comparable size, sector, or location.

Our approach:

Use of gradar, a platform specialised in pay equity analysis
Cross-checking with market data (salary surveys and industry databases)
Analysis of fixed, variable, and total compensation, including bonuses and benefits
Creation of a tailored salary grid aligned with your job grading
Assessment of internal equity and identification of any unexplained pay gaps

Ensure compliance with pay transparency requirements

Preparing for transparency is not about meeting the minimum legal standard. It is about anticipating obligations, structuring practices, and strengthening trust. Discover how to turn regulatory requirements into a strategic advantage for your employer brand.

The European Pay Transparency Directive, effective from 7 June 2026, requires companies to disclose:

Salary ranges by role or job family
The criteria used to determine pay levels
Pay gaps between women and men

Reporting obligations vary depending on company size, with stricter requirements for larger organisations.

These rules apply not only to companies operating within the European Union but also to Swiss companies with activities and entities in Europe.

We help you:

Conduct a compliance audit
Implement HR reporting tools
Document your evaluation practices and pay criteria
Build a progressive pay equity strategy aligned with your economic reality

A fair approach that is useful on a daily basis

Pay equity is not a one-off exercise. It is a framework that simplifies decisions, reduces tensions, and strengthens engagement. Discover how a structured approach improves the daily experience of both managers and teams.

The benefits of this approach go far beyond compliance or pay management.

It enables you to:

Set fair and accurate starting salaries
Provide managers with the information they need to make informed pay decisions - Reduce the risk of disengagement linked to perceived inequalities
Facilitate dialogue with employee representatives and social partners (unions, works councils, employee committees)
Prepare mergers, acquisitions, or restructurings with a solid reference framework

Our step-by-step method for job and pay evaluation

- HR diagnostic: mapping of current roles, salaries, and internal pay structures
- Job evaluation: interviews, analysis, and scoring using gradar
- Job grading: definition of levels, hierarchies, and career pathways
- Salary benchmarking: data collection, market comparison, and equity analysis
- Salary bands design: ensuring internal consistency and external competitiveness
- HR action plan: concrete and prioritised recommendations
- Training and handover: enabling HR teams and managers to apply the framework effectively

Why choose Sharpmania?

Expertise in HR architecture and organisational transformation

Silver certified implementation partner for gradar
Robust, proven tools aligned with international standards (gradar, Sysarb)
A human, structured, and educational approach accessible even to non-specialists
In-depth knowledge of compliance, HR governance, and strategic management
A true partnership mindset - we work with you, not for you

Get in touch

Ready to build a fair and effective HR framework?

Lets schedule a meeting. At Sharpmania, we help you turn complexity into a lever for lasting performance.