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Salary Calculator

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What should you offer your next senior hire in 2024?

Find out using Santa Monica Talent’s calculator for salaries and share options. Designed specifically for Seed and Series A to late stage scale-ups.

Last updated Q4 2023.
For an updated salary guide please contact ell@santamonica.digital

Salaries in 2024?

Our free Salary Calculator shows you the market's low, medium and high salary ranges for senior roles in 7 different key disciplines. They are drawn from recent search projects, the latest industry reports and interviews with Founders and Chief People Officers.

Salary
Benchmark

What's the salary benchmark for senior scale-up roles?

CURRENT FUNDING STAGE
I'M HIRING FOR

Equity
Benchmark

What share options are typically given?

CURRENT FUNDING STAGE
I'M HIRING FOR

Who’s behind these calculators?

Santa Monica Talent helps high-growth companies scale. We create explosive growth for game-changing brands by building exceptional Sales, Marketing, Software, HR, Product, Ops and Leadership teams. Our services are designed for Series A, B and C scale-ups, or companies of 20 to 200 people.

If you’re looking to hire a senior leader get in touch today for a free consultation.

Get in touch

FAQ

Have salaries increased?
Yes. Staff shortages caused by Brexit and the pandemic have led to companies raising salaries in a bid to attract and retain talent. You can read more about this here.
Why do these calculators exist?
‘What is the going rate for my next senior hire?’ is one of the most common questions we get asked by Founders. To give them, and you, some answers (and probably save us some time!) we decided to create these calculators. They also act as a benchmarking tool for candidates.
How were these calculators assembled?

Santa Monica Talent helps companies across the UK to scale. Using that experience, here’s how we created these calculators:

1. We reviewed every senior job role we helped recruit for between 2015-2024. That review gave us a wide-ranging view of the salaries and share options being offered.

2. We analysed several reports on tech talent (including Balderton’s The European Talent Landscape, and Atomico’s The State of European Tech), cross-checking their figures for London-based scaleups with our own.

3. Bringing all this data together, we shared our final figures with 250+ Founders and senior leaders of London Seed, Series A, and Series B start-ups for verification.

How do you classify a start-up as Seed or Series A?
Seed = average funding between £500,000 - £2,000,000 with a typical team size of 10 to 30.
Series A = average funding between £2,000,000 - £8,000,000 with a typical team size of 20 to 100.
Do salaries and share options differ by sector?
  • Highest salaries in order are for FinTech, InsurTech, SaaS, AI
  • Medium salaries for PropTech, MarTech, and Gaming
  • Lower salaries for Health Tech, EdTech, and Social Impact

Hires are often prepared to forego a higher salary for the chance to work at a mission-driven start-up. This lower salary is often offset by greater share options. More on this in the next question.

All our figures are for London-based companies only. It’s worth noting that you can expect higher salaries if the company comes from the US and launches a European office in the UK.

Does a higher salary mean greater share options?
No. At Seed stage there are a few nuances, but if you start on a lower salary you can expect greater share options. A higher salary, at an early-stage start-up, often means fewer share options.
What about bonuses?

The figures above are the base salary and do not include bonuses. Bonuses vary between 10-40%.

For senior Sales roles (i.e. VP Sales or Chief Revenue Officer), the ‘on-target’ earnings (OTE) should be double the base salary.

Where are averages for CEO, CFO etc?
We can provide these on request. Just send us a message.