Another year has come and gone; salary reviews are getting underway again and companies want to know what they need to be paying in order to be competitive.
Members of the Maritime HR Association appreciate that access to reliable data on market pay rates is a critical part of the pay review process and they make use of the Association’s annual salary survey and market analysis reports to gain insight into current pressures and trends in the shipping industry.
An additional benefit of Association membership is the regular information exchanges, where the HR Consulting team works with members to facilitate the sharing of information on topics of interest, allowing them to identify best practice in the shipping industry and review their organisational competitiveness.
An information exchange report released to participants this week, looked at the projected budgets for 2017 salary reviews.
Continuing the trend of the last few years, the results of the survey showed that forecasted budgets for shipping employers are more conservative than in the wider employment market.
This is perhaps unsurprising given the low overall confidence levels in the shipping industry, which reached a record low in the three months to February 2016, according to Moore Stephens, and barely increased in three months that followed. Overcapacity and concerns about the global economy were cited as the main concerns for shipping employers.
In August, however, Moore Stephens reported that confidence had increased to the highest level in the past nine months. This may explain our finding that, whilst members remained conservative in their forecasts for 2017, salary budgets were expected to be slightly higher than in 2016 in almost all locations.
The highest forecasted increases continue to be in Asia Pacific, with salaries expected to increase by 3.7% on average in 2017, compared with only 2.3% on average in Europe and 2% in North America.
Amanda James, Compensation & Benefits Consultant, HR Consulting, Spinnaker Global
If your company is keen to stay up to date on shipping salary and bonus levels, you can find more information about HR Consulting’s services on our website. Alternatively, feel free to contact one of the team at [email protected] or +44 (0)1702 480142.
