Their challenge
As an organisation with roots in the university sector, AQA’s legacy reward structures limited progression, flexibility and market responsiveness, creating inconsistent pay decisions and unclear career routes. With a long serving employee base and union negotiation required for reforms to reward structures, engagement was critical to ensure the implementation of desired change.
Our solution
Innecto worked with AQA to define reward principles, strengthen market benchmarking and introduce clearer job levelling through Evaluate. Pay framework options were modelled, equality impacts assessed, and progression approaches developed. Activity was supported with stakeholder engagement throughout, testing ideas and shaping approaches. Final outputs addressed inconsistency by creating transparent levels, evidence-based pay decisions and a practical framework the HR team could manage sustainably.
The outcome
- Successfully implemented the new reward structure in April 2023, despite executive leadership changes, TU action and wider organisational change.
- Maintained consistent job levelling and market benchmarking throughout extended negotiations, supporting evidence-based pay decisions during a period of uncertainty.
- Enabled faster, more consistent hiring decisions through Paylab, giving the HR team clear visibility of pay position against the external market.
- Created a transparent pay progression framework that improved understanding of reward for employees and gave the business a sustainable structure to manage internally.
- Strengthened AQA’s ability to compete for talent in a challenging market by addressing inconsistency, progression gaps and market responsiveness.
Watch: Revamping Pay Structures at AQA: A Cultural and Reward Transformation
Join Isabelle Perrett as she shares AQA’s journey of overhauling outdated pay systems, overcoming union challenges, and creating a fairer, more competitive reward framework.
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Client feedback
"We’ve got a clear direction of travel, have already introduced some significant scene-setting changes and are in a much better position to understand our current challenges more clearly."
