Driving Fair Pay in 2025: From Frameworks to Digital Platforms
As momentum continues to build around equal pay legislation and corporate accountability across Europe and the rest of the world, organisations are under increasing pressure to ensure that their compensation practices are fair, transparent, and evidence-based. The focus is shifting beyond compliance: companies are now looking for practical tools and data-informed insights that support sustainable, fair pay strategies.
To effectively address today’s compensation challenges, organisations increasingly rely on structured, evidence-based frameworks supported by modern digital tools. Research and best practices in compensation and benefits consistently highlight the value of moving from fragmented, reactive processes to integrated, data-driven systems. A well-designed, digitally enabled approach empowers organisations to promote internal equity, enhance transparency, and make more strategic workforce planning decisions.
However, tools and frameworks alone are not enough. A genuine organisational commitment to fair pay is essential. Without clear support from leadership and a shared belief in the value of equity, even the most sophisticated solutions risk becoming little more than symbolic gestures. When embraced with intent, though, fair pay becomes a powerful lever—not only for compliance, but for trust, motivation, and long-term performance.
From Framework to Practice: A Client Use Case
A practical illustration of this transformation can be found in a recent project at Holcim Europe—a global building materials corporation who have also made a clear commitment to gender equality and fair pay for work of equal value—aligning their compensation strategies not only with evolving legal standards but with their own values and ESG priorities. While the company had already implemented SAP SuccessFactors across 19 European entities, local payroll systems remained diverse and disconnected. This created challenges in consolidating compensation data, identifying pay disparities across countries, and aligning reward practices with internal policies and external benchmarks.
To address these issues, Holcim initiated a compensation transformation project together with 1H1—a Switzerland-based consulting company specialised in fair and competitive pay solutions—using their Fair Pay Framework supported by a flexible digital solution based on MS Power BI. The goal was to centralise and standardise compensation data and build internal capabilities to analyse pay from multiple angles:
- External Market Competitiveness (via benchmark data)
- Internal Pay Structure (through pay bands)
- Internal Equity (measured using compa-ratio analysis)
By following the framework’s structured guidance on establishing, validating, and communicating compensation structures and policies, the digital tools served as strategic enablers rather than simple data processors.
A critical factor in this success was the consistent emphasis on fair pay for work of equal value—a principle that aligned closely with the company’s broader diversity, equity, and inclusion commitments.
With enhanced transparency into how pay levels were defined and applied, Holcim was able to:
- Gain insights into retention risks linked to compensation.
- Implement fairer and more consistent approaches to pay decisions for new hires and internal transfers.
- Improve cost and budget control through more efficient tracking and forecasting.
According to Marjana Bonaca, Head of Compensation & Benefits Europe at Holcim:
"What really helped—beyond having access to the data—was the smart visualisation of key KPIs, which made our decision-making process faster and more effective. We’re now planning to build on this work by taking a more holistic view of remuneration, including total cost of ownership."
The success of this project illustrates how combining job architecture, pay diagnostics, and visual analytics with a clear change management strategy that also addresses all relevant stakeholders with a tailored communication and training concept can lead to greater acceptance and alignment within the organisation
Digital Shift: The Road to TRANSPAYRENCY.ORG
To further promote the idea of fair pay and scale this impact, 1H1 has been developing a new platform—TRANSPAYRENCY.ORG— which is set to launch in Q3 2025. The platform will equip organisations with tools to systematically monitor, analyse, and address pay equity, enabling data-driven decision-making and strategic interventions across compensation and people practices.
The platform builds on deeply rooted knowledge and first-hand experience from years of consulting work, where many organisations moved from manual, Excel-based tracking to more secure and dynamic digital environments.
A 2025 Perspective on Fair Pay
Looking ahead, the path to fair pay in 2025 and beyond will increasingly rely on a combination of structured frameworks and scalable technology. Whether through tailored consulting engagements or self-service digital platforms, organisations must ensure that pay equity is not only monitored—but actively and consistently managed.
Frameworks provide the structural foundation for consistent job architecture, pay level benchmarking, and equity diagnostics, while technology enables the agility, transparency, and scalability needed to operationalise and sustain these practices effectively. When both elements work in tandem, they enable compensation systems that support fairness, compliance, and sustainable business performance.
As regulatory requirements grow and employee expectations around pay transparency and equity continue to intensify, tools that make fair pay measurable, auditable, and actionable are becoming essential. Digital solutions and platforms serve as critical enablers—translating policy into practice by embedding fairness into everyday organizational processes through the integration of data, governance, and technology.
“At 1H1, we believe that pay equity should not be seen solely as a compliance requirement, but as a strategic leadership imperative,” says Christopher Jereb, CEO of 1H1. “For any organization committed to credibility, trust, and long-term performance, fair pay is more than just the right thing to do—it is a smart, future-focused investment in our people, our business, and society as a whole.