The presentation outlines relevant compensation studies for the German market. It highlights 6 factors which have an impact on your salary if you work in Germany, then it goes through the main findings of two independent studies. On top: a few extra slides on salary increase and best employers in Germany (2019)

1. HOWMUCHITPROFESSIONALS
EARNINGERMANY
OverviewofSalary&CompensationStudies
1.EX-YUITEXPERTSINGERMANYMEETUP//JUNE13TH,2019@SAPBERLIN
FilipS.Perišić

2. OUTLINE
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Short intro about myself and Nemački kutak
Compensation studies in Germany
6 factors which influence your salary in Germany
Overview of StepStone Study
Overview Compensation Partner Study
Salary increase
Is salary the most important factor?
10 best employers in Germany
Summary

3. FSPin30seconds
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In Germany since September 2009
- Moved here with a dream to play volleyball
- Pivoted to learning German and studying
- B.Sc. & M.Sc. in Business Informatics mostly in Germany
- Currently works as Java Developer
That’s me! 6 years and 14 kg ago…
Previously worked as:
- SAP Finance Consultant
- Applied Research in Machine Learning (NLP)
- Frontend developer
-.NET developer and team lead
- Various tutoring jobs at university
Hobbies:
- Nemački kutak & other projects

4. Nemačkikutak
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Nemački kutak is about helping people to find their way to & in Germany
Aboutlife,workand
studiesinGermany
Emerging subgroups
- Ex-yu students in Germany
- Ex-yu doctors and dentists in Germany
- Ex-yu IT experts in Germany
- Ex-yu Au Pairs in Germany
Guides on how to
- obtain German visa, residence and work permits
- deal with German bureaucracy
- understand German business culture
- enroll in German universities
Experiences from
- diverse German universities
- expats with various backgrounds
NK Communities - Connecting ex-yu people with an academic background in Germany

5. Nemačkikutak
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This is Nikola, the
backbone of NK
Two persons behind NK: Nikola Smiljanić & Filip S. Perišić
Aboutlife,workand
studiesinGermany
Gathering of ex-yu students in Berlin, October 2018
Landed in a few newspapers, magazines and tabloids in all countries
of the former Yugoslavia
More than 30 guest authors with diverse academic and cultural
backgrounds such as Social Sciences, Photography, Business, Physics,
Medicine, Psychology, Biology, Computer Sciences, Ecology, etc.
More than 30,000 unique readers with more than 45,000 views/month

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Compensationstudies
inGermany

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Relevantstudiesoncompensation
Different studies exist which focus on pay & compensation of knowledge workers in
Germany
Publicly available
- Gehaltsreport by StepStone (Covers knowledge work)
- Gehaltsstudie by Xing (Covers knowledge work)
- Gehaltsübersicht by Robert Half (Covers knowledge work)
Non-public studies
- Vergütungsstudien by Compensation Partner (Focus on IT and Real estate,
In-depth studies)
- Studies by Kienbaum (In-depth studies on management salaries)
- Vergütungsstudie by Frankfurt University & PwC (Focus on compensation of
managing & supervisory board members)

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6factorswhichinfluence
yoursalaryinGermany

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6factorsinfluencingyoursalary
Source: https://de.statista.com/infografik/10763/jeder-fuenfte-verhandelt-nie-ueber-das-gehalt/
Different studies identify unambiguously five factors which influence compensation in
Germany:
- Geographical location
- Company size
- Industry
- Work experience
- Level of education
+ One important factor are negotiation skills
- Both before and after signing the contract
- 18-25% never negotiate!*

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Taketheaveragesalary
withcaution

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Istheaveragesalarymean?
Source: https://de.statista.com/infografik/10763/jeder-fuenfte-verhandelt-nie-ueber-das-gehalt/
Recall the difference between the median and average
- Cobol developer at a bank/insurance earns ca. 110k€ gross annually
- Junior react.js developer at a startup earns ca. 40k€ gross annually
- Average developer salary: 75,000€ gross annually
How does an “average developer” profile in Germany looks like?
- Speaks German and English
- Degree from a German university
- More than 5 years of work experience in Germany
- Employed, i.e. not a freelance
- Probably works in SMEs (Mittelstand)

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StepStoneGehaltsreport
2019

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AveragecompensationinGermany
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019
Take numbers with caution because:
- They are average, Gross compensation, Base pay + variable pay

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CompensationofITexperts
inGermany
StepStoneGehaltsreport2019

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ITcompensationinGermany
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019
Take numbers with caution
because:
- They are average,
Gross compensation,
Base pay + variable pay

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HighercompensationintheWest
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019
Salary in Hesse is more
than 60% higher than in
Saxony-Anhalt
Top 3 states by salary
- Hesse
- Bavaria
- Baden-Wuerttemberg
Berlin is the 2nd best in
East Germany
- Highest compensation
growth in Germany
- Growth more than 20%

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Bigcompaniespaymore
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019
Independent from work area, big companies pay more
Small companies pay 10% less than the average compensation
Companies with more than 1,000 employees pay more than 15%compared to the
average compensation

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Top10industriesforIT
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019
Banking industry pays ~ 75,000€ on average
Moving from medical IT to banking means could mean 10,000€ increase in salary
Note that very large enterprises exist in every mentioned industry (majority in the West)

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Experience&educationpayoff
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019
Regardless of work area
- University degree means higher salary
- Salary depends on experience

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ITmarketappreciatesexperience
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019

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Seniordeveloperisbestpayedrole
Source: StepStone Gehaltsreport 2019

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CompensationPartner
IT-Study2019

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University&PhDmakethedifference
Source: https://www.compensation-partner.de/de/news-und-presse/it-vergutungsstudie-2019-unternehmen-ringen-um-fach-und-fuhrungskrafte
Top paying people with apprenticeship earn less than average master degree employee
Note that this are not entry-level salaries, but the compensations earned on average with
the given level of education

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Bigcompaniespaymore
Source: https://www.compensation-partner.de/de/news-und-presse/it-vergutungsstudie-2019-unternehmen-ringen-um-fach-und-fuhrungskrafte
By moving from small company to a large corporation, the average salary increases by
15,000€
Least paid employees in large corporate earn similarly to top paid employees in small
enterprises

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Entry-levelsalaryisca.44,600€
Source: https://www.compensation-partner.de/de/news-und-presse/it-vergutungsstudie-2019-unternehmen-ringen-um-fach-und-fuhrungskrafte
After 3-6 years the average salary increases by 6,000€
Top paying colleagues get after 7 years of work experience an increase of more than
20.000 € compared to the entry-level

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ITsecurityearnsthemostonaverage
Source: https://www.compensation-partner.de/de/news-und-presse/it-vergutungsstudie-2019-unternehmen-ringen-um-fach-und-fuhrungskrafte
Backend developer
earns on average more
than a full-stack
developer
Admins and technical-
support are the least
paid IT jobs
Consultants earn almost
the same as IT-project
managers

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Salaryincrease

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Mainfactorsforsalaryincrease
Source: StepStone Gehaltsverhandlung in Deutschland (2019)*, Gehaltsübersicht (2018) by Robert Half**
Top 3 reasons for salary increase:
- I have proactively asked for it
- Standard Pay Increase
- Perfomance-based
The most common reasons for a salary increase:
- Change of employer
- Standard Pay Increase
- Promotion or internal job change

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"Moneyandsalaryisnotaparticularly
goodmotivatorinthelongterm."
-MattMullenweg

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Salaryorotherreasons?
Pay and compensation is just one of the important aspects
Priorities change as we go through different life stages
Examples of other job aspects
- Work itself
- Working hours
- Flextime
- Overtime pay
- Home office
- Vacation days
- Office location
- Professional growth opportunities
- Flat or hierarchical/organizational structure
- Work culture
- Expected travel
- Impact
- Autonomy
- Benefits such as take-home vehicle
- etc.

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10bestemployers
inGermany

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ThebestbyGlassdoor&Kununu
American and Austrian/German
employer rating portals recognize
SAP as the best employer in
Germany
Glassdoor identifies an
organization from a public sector
as one of the top 10 employers
- Fraunhofer
Kununu identifies 3 american
companies
- Google
- PayPal
- Cisco
Source: https://www.glassdoor.de/Award/Beste-Arbeitgeber-Deutschland-LST_KQ0,29.htm // https://news.kununu.com/focus-award-deutschlands-beste-arbeitgeber-2019/

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Summary

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Threetake-awaymessages
Location, employer’s size and industry have big impact on salary in Germany
- Salary is higher in West Germany
- Large companies pay higher salaries
- German market recognizes university degrees and work experience
StepStone study on salaries finds 62,279€ gross as the average IT salary incl. variable
pay
- Keep in mind what “average” means in Germany
Two main reasons for salary increase
- Asking for it (though only 4/10 people ask for it)
- Changing the employer

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Thankyouforyourattention!
Filip S. Perišić
Founder, Editor
filip.s.perisic@nemackikutak.com
Nemackikutak.com
Facebook.com/NemackiKutak
Twitter.com/NemackiKutak
Nikola Smiljanić
Graphics, Editor
nikola.smiljanic@nemackikutak.com
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