Compensation & Benefits

Course Description:

The aim of this course is to understand effective compensation systems that achieve three key goals. They provide a firm internal consistency, market competitiveness, and a means for recognizing individual achievement. An internally consistent compensation system clearly defines the relative value of each job among all jobs within a company, providing an objective justification for their differences in pay. Market competitive pay systems allow firms to attract and retain the best employees by setting pay levels consistent with a firm’s competitive strategies. Finally, a compensation system that recognizes individual achievement can boost both employee morale and firm performance by effectively rewarding key contributors. This simulation provides students a framework for developing a compensation system which achieves these goals through three distinct, sequential sections.

It introduces students to the specification of internally consistent job structures. Through writing job descriptions, the development of job structures, and both the development and implementation of a point evaluation method to objectively quantify job differences, students build the framework for internal equity. Market survey data is utilized to compare pay rates of positions inside the firm with those in the marketplace to establish the foundations of market-competitive pay. The analysis of market data also leads students to the determination of appropriate pay-policy mixes for each of their job structures.

Course Learning Outcomes:

Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to understand:

1). Setting the Stage for Strategic Compensation
2). What is strategic compensation?

3). How do you set bases for pay
4). Traditional Bases for Pay: Seniority and Merit.
5). what is incentive pay
6). What is Person focused pay
7). How to design compensation system

8). Compensation Challenges for Strategic Employee Groups

9). Compensation issues around the world