On this page, we explain how carry out the Compensation Review Cycle. For more information on the process and input review for the Compensation Review Process, please see the following handbook page.
If you have any feedback or questions about the compensation review cycle, please contact People Connect.
The most up to date timeline of the Annual Compensation Review process can be found in the Total Rewards Schedule.
Increases for Compensation Review Cycles are based on:
The increase percentage for cash and the equity refresh grant may vary for each person. If a team member was recently adjusted, the annual adjustment might yield no additional cash compensation during the annual compensation review. This review acts as a sweep for each team member’s compensation to be evaluated at least once per year. If there is an increase in Location Factor and/or Benchmark, team members affected will have the new location factors applied to their compensation, but would not receive an automatic percent increase. For example, if the location factor in a region increases by 10% the team member will not receive an automatic 10% adjustment. The team member would receive an increase aligned to their benchmark, location factor, and performance taking any budget constraints into account.
Eligible team members for Annual Compensation Review have a hire date on or before:
Team members hired after October 31st will be reviewed to ensure their salary does not fall below the bottom of their compensation band (market range) based on increases to benchmark or location factor. If this does occur, the team member will be adjusted to the bottom of the band during the Annual Compensation Review cycle.
Performance and Growth Factors are assessed as part of the Talent Assessments. The factors (developing - performing - exceeding) will be used as an input to calibrate on compensation increases, reinforcing GitLab’s pay for performance Compensation Philosophy.
Recommendations from Total Rewards for discretionary cash compensation increases based on performance factor:
Your compensation increase may vary (up or down) from these percentages. These guidelines are meant to help ensure company-wide consistency. Actual increases may vary based on:
Do not expect that the final discretionary increases will fall into these ranges, as performance is only one factor out of many that goes into compensation adjustments.
When determining an increase, managers should account for increases in the current fiscal year, due to factors such as:
After a manager determines the performance increase (in percentages), that manager should be able to clearly communicate to the team member how it was derived.
Increases are not capped at 10%. If a manager would like to suggest an increase higher than the guidelines, they will want to add a justification for each indirect manager to review and approve.
If a manager has a team member on their team who is red circled (paid over the top end of the compensation range), in order for the person to receive an increase, they will need to submit a compensation exception request with their People Business Partner to Total Rewards which will then be reviewed and approved by the Compensation Group. The Total Rewards team will notify the People Business Partners of the team members red-circled once the new ranges are set for proactive review.
Once all Performance Factors have been reviewed and approved and the Performance Factor Executive Audit has been complete, managers will be communicated to that they can share the final performance factor with their direct report. This will occur before Annual Compensation Review takes place intentionally so that way it is more focused on the growth and development of the team member rather than how this ties into compensation.
While Performance Factors are used to calibrate on cash compensation increases, reinforcing GitLab’s pay for performance Compensation Philosophy, we encourage managers to use the Growth Factor (developing - growing - exceeding) as an input to calibrate on the equity refresh. The refresh is a long term incentive which can reinforce the long term growth potential of the team member.
In calibrating the equity refresh, we recommend managers to take the following into account:
Cash and equity are two levers available to managers to determine an appropriate Total Compensation for team members.
For team members designated as key talent, we would encourage managers to review team members' total compensation (cash + equity) and recommend increases to ensure team members are incentivized through the next fiscal year in the total compensation package.
When you review your team member's card in Compaas, you will see the recommended cash increases for performance as well as details on how the market rates changed. If applicable, there will be a minimum recommended market adjustment to ensure team members end up within their compensation band. Also, managers will be able to view the total unvested holdings and value vesting in the next 12 months. All the factors should be reviewed and used to develop a holistic increase for cash compensation and recommendation on the refresh grant. We recommend the following steps and best practices:
Understanding the Total Rewards Notes for Recommendations on Increases:
For Promotions: When determining compensation increases for promotions the same general guidelines apply. We want to take a look holistically at the compensation change. It is important to not formulaicly allocate an annual compensation review increase and on top the promotion increase. Instead, we would ask managers to look a the new range (which will be seen in Compaas once the promotion is applied) and then make a recommendation based on the holistic view considering the promotion compensation increase guidance, placement in the band compared to peers who were promoted and annual compensation review increase recommendations. For more information on how to assess equity refresh grants for promotions in Compaas please view the stock tab details.
As part of the new Annual Compensation Review, managers and indirect managers will review, approve, and enter proposed salary increases to ensure that we are paying each team member to market and prioritizing increases based on performance while staying aligned to budget. Please verify the compensation review inputs (performance, level, title) are accurate in Compaas.
It is very important that GitLab team-members understand their performance and how it impacts their salary.
While some GitLab team-members may not receive an increase due to already being at the right competitive rate for their Level, Role, and Location, there are other circumstances where an increase should be avoided. If there are any reasons as to why the team member should not receive the proposed increase to be aligned with market rates in our calculator, please email total-rewards@ domain with the reasoning and cc your People Business Partner. This could be due to a current performance issue, pending termination, etc. If you would like to delay the increase, please outline a proposed plan of action and deadline. Team members who are currently struggling to perform at their current level should have that communicated clearly and the manager should consider delaying the increase until performance reaches a commendable level.
For any feedback around the manager review portion of Compensation Review or the cycle via compaas, please add it to the following issue.
Compaas is GitLab's compensation platform where managers can login, review, change, and submit their proposed increases during Annual Compensation Review.
Card Details: Clicking the background of a person's card expands it to reveal additional information you can use in determinging Total Rewards for FY23.
Raise Tab
Stock Tab
Note: The equity values for Spain and Denmark are 1/4th of the refresh range. This is due to local compliance regulations around equity vesting. All grants in Denmark & Spain will be annual refresh grants vesting quarterly over 1 year.
Saving & Submitting
Saving & Submitting
section above.Raise budget is held by the executive of each group who has the discretion to cascade their budget down their reporting line. The raise budget is inclusive of both annual raises and promotional raises. Stock budget is held at the VP level and will not be cascaded down any further.
Slate Owners
Approvers
We have now completed multiple compensation reviewed utilizing Compaas. Based on some awesome feedback from our GitLab team, we are working to have the following iterations to our process in Compaas. There are certain items that we may not be able to have implemented since any change to Compaas updates their tool for all clients. Where that is the case we will outline that it is a limitation for future reference.
The following iterations we will continue to review having implemented in Compaas:
All increases for Annual Compensation Review will be finalized by Feb 1st. FY23 compensation will be uploaded into BambooHR no later than Feb 4th for payroll to make changes in all subsequent systems. The Total Rewards team will turn off the ability to see compensation in BambooHR using Employee or Contractor Self Service from Jan 25th until Feb 11th for Employees and until Feb 4th for Contractors. Managers will have the ability to communicate any increases to their team before end of day on the 4th for Contractors and end of day on the 11th for Employees.
For FY23, each team member with a compensation change will have a Total Rewards Statment generated. Managers are able to utilize this letter when having conversations with your team members about their increase and overall Total Rewards Compensation package at GitLab. More information on these letters can be found in the handbook section below.
Communication Guidelines can be found in the here.
If your direct report has any questions on the calculation of their increase please feel free to have them reach out to the Total Rewards team.
Each team member who receives an update during the Annual Compensation Review cycle will receive a Total Rewards Statement detailing their Total Rewards package (cash, equity, benefits). This letter will be available for managers to review in BambooHR no later than Feb 4th. Managers should share the letter in BambooHR once they have reviewed this with the team member. Please reach out to Total Rewards if the letter hasn't been shared by Feb 5th (Contractors) or Feb 11th (Employees) and we'll share this with you. Instructions for downloading and reviewing the letter are as follows:
Annual Compensation Review Total Rewards Statements
folder. You can either select the linked document name to open a quick view of the Total Rewards Statement in BambooHR or select the download button that appears to the right of the letter. If you are a manager and are unable to see the Documents tab for your team member, please reach out to total-rewards@ gitlab
and we will review your access level.
The promotion and annual compensation review budget is separate and calculated based on the following conditions:
Calculating Budget Actuals