Help

Everything you need to take part, on one page. If something here does not answer your question, email us and a person will reply.

How the survey works

We ask senior people across the care economy and education what their organisations pay their executives and their boards. You enter your own figures. We review them. We report only in aggregate.

There are four steps:

• tell us about your organisation, once
• add each executive role
• add your board positions, if you have them
• send it to us when you are ready

Nothing reaches the benchmark automatically. Someone at Orchard reads every submission, and if a figure is unclear we come back and ask rather than guess.

You will never see another organisation's figures, and nobody sees yours. Results are published in aggregate only, with nothing that identifies a person or an organisation.

Taking part costs nothing.

Signing in

There are no passwords. You sign in with your work email address, and we send a six digit code to your mobile. The code lasts ten minutes.

Use the same email address each time. It is how we keep your work together.

Coming back later

You do not have to finish in one sitting, and most people do not. Everything you enter is saved as you go.

When you set up your access we email you a link back to the survey. Keep that email. It is the quickest way back in, and it works as often as you need it. It takes you to the sign-in page, where you enter your email address and we text you a code.

Your original invitation link only works once, so it will not bring you back. If you have lost the link, email us and we will send it again.

Working with other people

Adding a colleague. If someone else holds part of the information, invite them from inside the survey. They join your organisation's submission and you both keep working on it. You stay responsible for sending it to us.

Passing it on. If the survey has come to you and someone else is the right person entirely, pass it to them from your invitation, before you set up your access. This hands the whole thing over. Your own link stops working and they get their own, and you will not be asked about it again.

Once you have set up your access you cannot pass it on yourself. Email us and we will arrange it.

Those two are different. Add a colleague to work alongside you. Pass it on to hand it over.

If you do not have an invitation

Choose "I need an invitation" on the front page and tell us your name, position, organisation, ABN, work email address and a phone number. A direct line is fine. We will come back to you.

If your organisation is already taking part, we may check with the person already working on it before adding you. That is deliberate. It is their submission.

What you will need

Worth gathering before you start.

About your organisation, entered once

• your ABN
• revenue for your most recent completed financial year, and which year that is. A round figure is fine, and there is an option to tell us you would rather not say
• your sector, and the sub-sectors and states you operate in
• how the organisation is owned
• which state your head office is in

For each executive role

• the title your organisation uses, not a standard one. We match it to our list ourselves
• where the role sits relative to the chief executive
• whether it is full time, and the fraction if not
• base salary, superannuation, short-term incentive target and maximum, long-term incentive, and any other allowances

For each board position

• the position, and what your organisation calls it
• whether it is paid, expenses only, or unpaid
• the annual fee, and whether superannuation sits on top of it
• how many directors are on your board, and the split by gender

How we define the figures

Five things people read differently. These are the ones worth checking.

• Total package includes superannuation. Base, super, incentives and allowances together
• Leave not-for-profit salary packaging out. We know it is a real part of what people receive. We exclude it from every figure so organisations that offer it and organisations that cannot are compared on the same basis. There is a place to tell us about it separately
• Short-term incentive is the target and the maximum, not what was paid last year
• Other means allowances, such as a motor vehicle allowance
• Part-time roles: enter what the person is actually paid, and the fraction of full time separately. We work out the full-time equivalent ourselves. Please do not do the arithmetic for us

If you are not sure about something

Give us your best answer and tell us in the notes. An honest figure with a caveat is worth more to everyone than a tidy one that is wrong, and we would rather ask you than assume.

Contact us

Email advisory@orchardtalent.com.au and we will reply within one business day.