Compensation Technology Firms Payscale, Trusaic Announce Partnership

Payscale and Trusaic, two prominent players in the HR and compensation technology space, announced a strategic partnership on Tuesday, Sept. 30. According to a jointly delivered press release, the collaboration aims to deliver products and solutions that “tackle the growing complexity of international pay transparency and pay equity compliance.”

Payscale, founded in 2002 and headquartered in Seattle, offers compensation-related software and data services, including salary surveys and data reports, to help employers manage their pay budgets and outlays and employees understand their job-market value. Its solution suite includes brands such as Payfactors, Marketpay and Paycycle.

Trusaic, founded in 2019 (after the rebrand of First Capitol Consulting) and based in Los Angeles, provides software to address compliance toward pay equity and the European Union’s Pay Transparency Directive (EUPTD). Its product suite includes brands such as PayParity, TrueTransparency and Salary Range Finder.

Regulations Foster the Relationship

The partnership comes as global organizations prepare for a wave of pay transparency regulations under the EUPTD, which seeks to mitigate gender pay inequities by mandating compensation transparency measures across the EU’s 27 member states. The regulations apply not only to employers headquartered in the EU but also those with any employees there, with reporting required for businesses with 100 or more payrolled workers.

As these and other pay regulations emerge and evolve around the world, it has become a considerable challenge for employers to keep up — and comply — with the changes and requirements.

“Organizations can’t afford to get pay wrong,” Payscale CEO Chris Hays said, adding the strategic partnership will enable solutions that help “our enterprise customers build pay strategies that are both competitive and compliant.”

The companies stated that, through the agreement, organizations will have access to global data and scalable tools, as well as insights, consultation and support to give compensation teams a path to pursue and scale their pay equity efforts.

“Our combined expertise will help [HR and compensation leaders] anticipate regulatory changes and evolving market needs,” said Christian Liakos, Trusaic’s executive vice president of partnerships.

Commentary on the Collaboration

What’s the total rewards industry’s take on the partnership? Paul Reiman, a member of WorldatWork’s Compensation Advisory Council and the founder and managing partner of consulting firm Novo Insights, provided some commentary in a Sept. 30 LinkedIn post.

While mentioning that “time will tell if and how this partnership benefits the market,” Reiman broke down the transaction by stating, “The right recipe for managing pay transparency is data plus methods plus expertise. Two legs of the stool are not as strong as three. Payscale is bringing data to the table, with years of investment in data sourcing and data management across its solution portfolio. Trusaic can tap into that data to inform its solutions. Both organizations bring tools to calculate and understand pay equity gaps. … Trusaic has invested in a deep understanding of local transparency requirements, notably in Europe, to support [EUPTD] compliance. ... This expertise is expensive to replicate and maintain, so Payscale can leverage Trusaic’s existing capability when clients need deeper expertise.”

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