Pay-transparency laws rewrote the senior offer
Posted-range laws moved the first number from the offer to the job post. The expensive fallout is internal, where the range is legible to the people already doing the job.
9 min readRead
Pay & Compensation
Salary intelligence read from live GCC placements in India, not benchmark surveys. What senior roles actually pay, where the bands are moving, and which number to trust when you’re building an offer. Every figure marked pending is verified against placement data before it publishes.
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New to how we read compensation? These three set the frame. Building an offer now? Compensation benchmarking →
Video
What the 75th percentile is actually buying you
It sounds rigorous. In the senior segment it’s a way to avoid taking a position, and it loses to the 90th-percentile counter every time.
Read → Field noteThe AI/ML band split in two
Traditional ML sits where it was a year ago. The GenAI end has pulled away. Price them as one band and you lose the top while over-paying the bottom.
Read → VideoThe published band and the closed offer are two different numbers
One is written by people not running mandates. The other is what the candidate actually signs. Only one of them should set your budget.
Read →All insights on Pay & Compensation
The offer that reads generous in New York and thin in Bengaluru
Converting a US band by exchange rate, cost of living or a fixed ratio to headquarters all look rigorous. All three answer a question the candidate isn’t asking.
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Counter-offers are biting again, but which ones actually hold?
The “80% leave within six months” figure is folklore. The real number is about a third, and the ones who go are the people whose reason for leaving was never pay.
10 min readRead
The consultancies are selling you a benchmark. You need a decision.
A published band tells you where the market was six months ago. Sachith Rai on why the big firms stop exactly where the useful part begins.
4 min readRead
Compensation Index: IT & BFSI edition, Q2 2026
Band-by-band movement across senior IT and BFSI GCC roles, drawn from the placements we closed this quarter rather than survey aggregates.
7 min readRead
Base, variable, ESOP, and the one most committees under-weight
At VP level the parent ESOP can carry more of the deal than the cash. If you’re competing without one, splitting the difference loses the candidate.
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The 90-day regret window on accepted counter-offers
Acceptance masks the reasons someone was leaving. Here’s the decay curve, and the early signs a ‘retained’ senior hire is already looking again.
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Pharma GCC pay is moving for a reason IT isn’t
While IT and BFSI bands have steadied, senior pharma roles are climbing. The driver is regulatory-side, not technology-side.
7 min readRead
The skills index: what GCCs actually paid for AI talent this quarter
Band-by-band movement across IT and AI & Data roles, drawn from placements closed in Q1.
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How to read a salary benchmark without being misled
The method note. Every published benchmark carries a lag and a basket bias; here’s what to inspect before you set a band from one.
10 min readRead
Why your comp bands break at the VP line
Banded comp fails at senior levels. The off-band levers, scope, title, equity-equivalents, that close without a bidding war.
9 min readRead
The title inflation nobody wants to name
‘Head of’ means less every year, and it’s distorting how leaders are hired and paid. What we see when the label and the mandate stop matching.
5 min readRead
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Insights · Topic
Pay & compensation
Salary intelligence read from live GCC placements — what roles actually pay and where the bands are moving — not from a benchmark survey.
The published band and the closed offer are two different numbers
One is written by people not running mandates. The other is what the candidate actually signs. Only one of them should set your budget.
6 min readRead
The AI/ML band didn’t shift — it split in two
Traditional ML sits where it was a year ago. The GenAI end has pulled away. Price them as one band and you lose the top while over-paying the bottom.
7 min readRead
Compensation Index — IT & BFSI edition, Q2 2026
Band-by-band movement across senior IT and BFSI GCC roles, drawn from placements closed this quarter — not survey aggregates.
11 min readRead
What the 75th percentile is actually buying you
It sounds rigorous. In the senior segment it’s a way to avoid taking a position — and it loses to the ninetieth-percentile counter every time.
6 min readRead
Base, variable, ESOP — and the one most committees under-weight
At VP level the parent ESOP can carry more of the deal than the cash. If you’re competing without one, splitting the difference loses the candidate.
7 min readRead
Your offer-accept rate is the comp metric you’re not reading
Most tracking stops at the offer made. The number that tells you whether your pay is actually competitive sits one step later.
5 min readRead
The Science of Hiring: how counter-offers are re-pricing the senior bench
A working comp lead on why counter-offer economics have changed, and how they now set bands before the survey data catches up.
32 min listenRead
Pharma GCC pay is moving for a reason IT isn’t
While IT and BFSI bands have steadied, senior pharma roles are climbing. The driver is regulatory-side, not technology-side.
8 min readRead
The variable-pay mix is where the real negotiation happens
Two offers with the same headline can be worth very different things. The candidates who win read the structure; the ones who lose anchor to the top line.
6 min readRead
Band compression is quietly hollowing out your mid-tier
When the top of the band races ahead and the middle doesn’t, your best mid-level people can read the gap. Usually before you can.
7 min readRead
How to read a salary benchmark without being misled
The method note. Every published benchmark carries a lag and a basket bias — here’s what to inspect before you set a band from one.
10 min readRead
Five minutes: the counter-offer economics comp models miss
A quick, chart-led walkthrough of what a counter-offer really costs — and why the number rarely lands in the model that set the band.
5 min watchRead
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The question we get asked
What is the salary increase in India for 2026?
Salaries in India are projected to rise about 9.1% in 2026 (up from 8.9% in 2025), according to Aon’s Annual Salary Increase & Turnover Survey 2025–26, which covers more than 1,400 organisations across 45 industries. Mercer projects a similar ~9% in its India survey — so the two gold-standard comp houses converge on roughly 9%. Aon also reports attrition easing to 16.2%.
When Aon and Mercer land on the same number, it’s a safe planning anchor. It is also a commodity: every organisation setting a budget is working from the same ~9%, which means the average tells you almost nothing about the roles you’re actually fighting to hire.
The Recruise read. The single average hides the dispersion that decides a senior offer. A GenAI lead and a traditional-ML lead no longer sit in one band; a VP’s parent ESOP can carry more of the deal than the cash increment. The number we work from isn’t the published survey band — it’s what comparable senior mandates actually closed at this quarter, role by role and city by city. That’s the gap between a benchmark and an offer that gets signed.
Why the published band and the closed offer are two different numbers
Frequently asked
The compensation questions.
The salary numbers everyone plans from — and why the average is the least useful figure once you’re making a senior offer.
What is the average salary increase in India for 2026?
Salaries in India are projected to rise about 9.1% in 2026, up from 8.9% in 2025, according to Aon’s Annual Salary Increase & Turnover Survey 2025–26 (1,400+ organisations, 45 industries). Mercer projects a similar ~9% in its India survey, so the two leading comp houses converge on roughly 9%.
What is the attrition rate in India in 2026?
Aon’s Annual Salary Increase & Turnover Survey 2025–26 reports India attrition easing to 16.2%, down from about 17.7% the prior year. Estimates vary by sample — Deloitte India puts it nearer 17.6% — so the sensible read is a mid-to-high-teens range rather than a single point, cited to its source.
Is the ~9% average enough to set a senior GCC offer?
Not on its own. The Aon and Mercer ~9% is a reliable budget anchor, but it’s an average across all roles and levels. At the senior GCC level the dispersion around that average — between functions, between GenAI and traditional-ML roles, and across the base/variable/ESOP mix — is what actually decides whether an offer is accepted. The closing number is best set from comparable recent placements, not the headline survey band.
The Mandate Desk
One pattern worth knowing, every ten days.
Five minutes, every ten days. Our read on the senior GCC talent market — including where compensation bands are actually moving. One signal, the read behind it, one thing worth doing.
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