Create Competitive Pay Programs That Align with Operating Realities and Market Dynamics
The aerospace and defense industry is under constant pressure to respond rapidly to changes in geopolitics and global security. Increasing investments in new technology, supply chain issues, and labor constraints all contribute to the challenge of balancing budgets with hiring and motivating key talent. Due to involvement with advanced technologies, strategic projects, or government contracts, many roles in aerospace and defense earn highly competitive pay rates. Compensation committees and HR leadership depend on current and reliable salary survey data to design pay programs that drive strong management performance and attract highly skilled employees. With the ERI’s Assessor Platform, you can:
- Set competitive pay for roles tied to advanced technologies, strategic projects, and government contracts
- Benchmark compensation for aircraft products and parts manufacturing, aircraft engines and parts manufacturing, general aircraft parts, auxiliary equipment manufacturing, drone technology, and more
- Access real-time compensation data, such as aircraft manufacturing salary data and aviation salary data, paired with analytical tools to set pay with greater precision
Aerospace and Defense Companies Managing Compensation with ERI
Solutions for Aerospace and Defense Employers
Get Industry-Specific Benchmarks
Compensation for aerospace and defense roles varies widely by industry, reflecting differences in technical demands, project complexity, and funding sources. with accuracy using ERI’s robust salary survey database, which allows you to pinpoint pay by industry and create unique user-defined industries tailored to your organization. Whether your company operates in defense, commercial aerospace, space exploration and satellite technology, or research and development (R&D), you can rely on ERI for accurate aerospace and defense salary survey data curated for your specific industry.
Fine-Tune Adjustments at the Employee Level
Success in the aerospace and defense industry often depends on keeping pace with emerging trends, continuously building technical skills, and seeking opportunities for growth through further education or certifications. Use the Adjustments feature in ERI’s Assessor Platform to make precise pay adjustments based on an employee’s education, skills, certifications, shift work, and direct oversight to attract, retain, and motivate top talent in your workforce. For clearance-sensitive aerospace and defense roles, ERI also provides market data for U.S. government security clearances, including Secret Clearance, Top Secret Clearance, and TS/SCI with CI Polygraph.
Use Geographic Pay Differentials
Competing for aerospace and defense talent in diverse global markets? ERI’s location-specific salary survey data helps you set precise geographic-based pay and stay both competitive and within budget. Utilize ERI’s geographic pay differentials to strategically align remote and multi-site pay structures with real market conditions in locations worldwide, helping teams maintain a defensible aerospace salary range for each market.
Build Strategic Rewards Plans
Employers in aerospace and defense must create competitive total rewards plans that effectively drive long-term results in operationally complex environments. Use ERI’s Compensation Management platform to design and manage your company’s rewards plans, connect incentive plans to aerospace pay grades, model salary increases, benefits, and discretionary incentives all in one workflow. Create meaningful performance metrics that tie value to rewards, encouraging innovation and operational excellence.
Promote Pay Equity and Transparency
Aerospace and defense employers are often under pressure to demonstrate fair and defensible pay practices. Use ERI’s Pay Equity tools to compare pay by protected group, identify compression and inequities, and build clear pay grades with aerospace salary range guidelines that support fair compensation decisions. Share Total Rewards Statements to drive transparent conversations about employee pay, helping HR teams prepare for internal reviews and audits.
Ensure Regulatory Compliance
Utilize ERI’s FLSA overtime exemption testing or the new AI FLSA Status tool to make accurate overtime exemption determinations at the state or federal level. Get current and scheduled minimum wage data for the U.S. and Canada, plus minimum salary thresholds to qualify for exemption and local and state pay transparency rules. Align internal job titles to SOC-mapped survey jobs to review compliance requirements with greater consistency and confidence.
Explore Aerospace and Defense Compensation Solutions
Aerospace and Defense FAQs
How can ERI help benchmark aerospace and defense jobs? 
ERI’s Salary Assessor helps you benchmark jobs using current market data by title, location, industry, level, years of experience, organization size, and salary planning date. Use AI job matching and HRIS integration to map internal job titles to SOC-aligned roles and keep employee data up to date. Rely on ERI’s Assessor Platform to price roles accurately, review existing pay structures, and support compensation decisions for administrative, technical, skilled, and leadership positions in the aerospace and defense industry.
Do we need to adjust salaries for geographic differences?
Yes, it is recommended to pay according to where a job is performed or the employee is located. Accurately benchmark salaries in your locations worldwide using ERI’s Assessor Platform, using either the Geographic Assessor to review actual geographic differentials between locations or the Salary Assessor to get salary results for specific jobs in multiple locations.
Can ERI help with pay grade structures?
Yes, the Pay Grade feature in Compensation Management allows you to create and define unlimited aerospace pay grades and salary structures. If you know your pay grade structure (minimum/midpoint/maximum), then you can enter them manually or use a template to easily import your structure with either values or jobs. To simplify and accelerate the process, use ERI’s AI Pay Grade Creation tool to generate complete, review-ready pay grade structures with jobs assigned to grades. Customize your pay grades for a geographic market, with localization options for each market, and access charts to view various pay grades and overlaps in the structure.
Do you have employee benefits data?
Yes, ERI provides current survey data on common employee benefits for your specific geographic region, organization size, and industry in the United States and Canada. The Assessor Platform features data for Benefits Offered (including medical, dental, vision, prescription drug, paid holidays, paid vacation, paid sick leave, retirement, and telecommuting), Health Care Coverage, and Paid Time Off (PTO) to accurately match with peers in aerospace and defense.
Can ERI help manage multiple salary surveys for aerospace and defense?
Yes, ERI’s Survey Management feature allows you to easily upload and manage external or internal compensation surveys, including aerospace and defense salary surveys. The software helps with job matching between multiple salary surveys using benchmarking or job slotting. It provides four options for aggregating data (mean, median, incumbent weighted average, and custom weighted average), which allows you to dynamically weigh various surveys as you see fit. Once configured, the calculated market rates will be imported automatically into the Compensation Management platform for streamlined compensation planning.
Can ERI help compare aerospace engineering pay rates?
Yes, ERI’s Salary Assessor helps compensation teams compare aerospace engineering pay rates for specialized engineering and technical roles in aerospace and defense. Compensation teams can benchmark roles tied to mechanical engineering, spacecraft engineering, systems design, advanced manufacturing, and mission-critical programs while reviewing aerospace engineering salary range data to align pay with technical demands, project complexity, and market conditions.