TTC UK TA Salary Survey

Hey folks, on behalf of the TTC crew, a huge thank you to everyone who participated in our UK TTC TA Salary Survey! Our recent UK TA/RPO salary survey received 182 responses exactly, all of which help give us a better understanding of the current state of pay, seniority, and roles across our industry. Your willingness to share this information is crucial in helping us identify key trends and areas for improvement, and it’s appreciated.

In terms of how and why we ran the survey: we have an advantage with TTC being such a broad and diverse community of practice across the Recruiting & HR Industry that we felt it was time we started to better understand our current ‘state of play’ in terms of pay. Given the challenges recent years we’ve all faced as professionals, it felt like a prudent time to get a temperature check on salaries.

As community managers we decided to begin with UK TA/RPO salaries because:

• At present, this bracket makes up the majority of our members.

• Agency recruiters typically have variable rates of pay which means a like-for-like comparison with in-house wouldn’t be fair or helpful.

  • If you want to read more about the community’s take on Agency vs In-House recruiting, check out the write ups from our AMAs on the topic!

• We’re looking into ways we can take a fair/insightful salary survey for agency recruiters later in the year.

So, here’s a snapshot of insights from what was a very short survey (6 questions!)...

Gender/Pay Disparities

One of the most significant findings from the survey is the gender pay gap, especially at senior levels. Women with 8-10 years of experience in "Head of" roles typically earn between £80k and £120k. This is comparable to the earnings of men in similar or slightly lower roles, such as "Lead/Principal." However, a considerable gap becomes evident at the "Director/VP" level, where men are more likely to earn over £150k, a salary range less frequently observed among women in equivalent positions.

This highlights disparities in pay that require further attention and action within our industry, especially in a field where women are well-represented generally: we work in an industry with a large number of women at most levels.

nb: it's unclear due to the colour options on the form, 12.1% on the pie chart represents £80-£90k salaries, not £20k-30k.

Experience and TA Salary Correlation

The data also reveals a strong (and unsurprising) correlation between years of experience and salary levels. Those with 15-20 years of experience generally earn higher salaries, often ranging from £90k to £150k. In contrast, individuals with 4-6 years of experience typically earn between £40k and £80k. This pattern holds true across both individual contributors and people managers, reflecting the industry’s emphasis on experience. However, it also raises questions about career progression and whether early-career achievements are adequately recognised and rewarded.

Role and Seniority Impact

Another observation was the difference in pay between people managers and individual contributors, even with similar experience and seniority levels. People managers with 8-10 years of experience in "Head of" roles generally earn between £80k and £120k, while individual contributors at comparable seniority levels, such as "Senior" or "Lead/Principal," tend to earn slightly less, within the £70k to £100k range. This difference highlights the additional responsibilities that come with managing teams but also underscores the potential trade-offs businesses make between leadership roles and subject matter expertise in career advancement.

To Finish Our UK TTC TA Salary Survey

As we reviewed this data, it’s evident that while our industry has made progress in some areas (the former DBR network's 2019 salary survey revealed significant gender pay gaps across all levels, which seem to have been closed in the main), some gaps remain, particularly in the most senior roles. Your input has been invaluable in highlighting these issues, and we are committed to using this information to advocate for fairer practices across our industry.

Due to the data size being (statistically, at least) on the small size we've decided not to share the raw data to respect the anonymity of the respondents however if anyone has further questions or wanted sometime to see the 'pie chart' results in full then please reach out to TTC Admin Sophie Power who is happy to help.

One important shout-out must go to Georgina Balcombe and Josh Carter who were hugely helpful in making this survey happen! Everything 'TTC' is a team effort, and often things are created thanks to a small army behind-the-scenes of members and community managers.

Once again, thank you for your participation. We look forward to sharing more detailed findings as we build on them year-on-year, working together to drive positive change in our industry!

Accessibility: if you use an e-reader or other adaptive equipment and need access to the pie charts, please contact Sophie Power who will be happy to help you - some of the responses have so many options she couldn't fit them into the alt text. TTC Slack is the best place to contact her about this.