Principal Consultant - EU Pay Transparency, Germany

Principal – Total Rewards EU pay transparency

Total Rewards

We all know that great work deserves great compensation. But rewarding deserving professionals is becoming increasingly complex. The workforce is more demanding.  Given the upcoming EU pay legislation and increasing societal expectations, bundled with new pay trends, companies are up to an unprecedented change. New jobs, with no pay precedent, are emerging all the time. Flatter structures and contingent workforces bundled with increased skill focus mean different and more flexible career paths and frameworks. We understand the diverse dynamics of compensation across the global markets and industries. We stay ahead of emerging trends, craft compelling employee value propositions, and design Total Rewards strategies that drive organizational performance. We develop flexible, competitive compensation strategies that align both employees and senior executives with business objectives. Our reward and recognition programs a redesigned to attract and engage a diverse workforce while reinforcing company culture and drive strategic goals.

The Role

The Principal work closely with colleagues to deliver complex, customized and multi work-stream solutions that meet and exceed client expectations. At this level, business development and client relationship management feature as an important focus of the role in addition to delivery. Principals contribute to bids and manage/lead relationships and/or projects of considerable complexity. Principals have developed a deep understanding to solve complex problems in the Total Rewards area. Depending on the size of the project a principal will lead and manage client projects.

This role will focus on EU Pay transparency. Pay transparency means openly sharing how compensation decisions are made—this includes salary ranges, pay frameworks, and rationale behind pay. It aims to promote fairness, reduce pay gaps, and build trust across the organization.

What You'll Be Working On: Pay Transparency Initiatives

• Championing Fair Compensation: Help implement transparent pay practices that ensure equity across roles, demographics, and regions.
• Analyzing and Communicating Pay Frameworks: Support the development and disclosure of salary ranges, compensation principles, and decision-making processes.
• Driving Compliance with Global Legislation: Contribute to aligning compensation strategies with evolving laws like the EU Pay Transparency Directive and U.S. state mandates.
• Supporting DE&I Goals: Use pay transparency as a tool to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion across the organization.
• Leveraging Digital Platforms: Utilize KF Pay Equity solution and related tooling and pay platforms to conduct analysis and provide insights on pay gap remediation and reward strategies
• Engaging a New Workforce Generation: Collaborate with HR and leadership to meet expectations of Millennials and Gen Z for openness and fairness in pay.
• Boosting Talent Attraction and Retention: Help position the organization as a trusted, ethical employer through transparent and competitive compensation.
• Identifying and Closing Pay Gaps: Use data-driven approaches to uncover disparities and recommend corrective actions.
• Building Trust and Accountability: Foster a culture where employees understand and trust how their compensation is determined.

In this role you will focus on:

• Building strong customer relations, typically works with clients across different sectors and countries.
• Conducting complex product and services clients’ onboardings and training for Korn Ferry Talent Suite.
• Analyzing HR clients and market data, creations of insights to provide information and business advice to your clients.
• Facilitating workshops with management.
• Supporting the creation, renewal and maintenance of the reward database in the assigned country.
• Sharing in the EMEA community industry best practices and collaborating with colleagues across geographies
• Effective project management providing accurate forecasts on existing projects with timely status updates.

Korn Ferry is on a fascinating journey of growth globally and locally, considered by clients to be the world leading partner in a very broad array of services. The pace of tools development and change is immense and bring new opportunities constantly.

Experience and Professional Qualifications

• Deep understanding of total reward – ideally from recent international projects as project leader
• Experience of leading complex total reward programs and negotiating solutions with complex range of stakeholders (executive teams, politicians, trade unions…)
• BA/Msc Degree is useful - ideally Business Administration, Engineering, Law, Mathematics or similar.
• Experience in consulting or professional service in Total Reward/Compensation and Benefits, Mobility, HR
• Knowledge of the design of reward and job architecture systems.
• Competent use of Microsoft office programs, especially Excel and data tools
• Good communicator, combined with problem solving competence, analytical skills and team orientation.
• Ideally Experience with Works Counsil or Union exposure
• Client focus and confident, positive attitude and high engagement
• Results and solution focused while managing complex situations.

Skills and Competencies

• Good stakeholder management skills and the ability to build and maintain professional relationships.
• A high degree of customer focus and attention to detail.
• Strong drive for results and a commitment to producing a high level of work efficiently and often within tight timeframes.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills in German and English, proficiency in other EU languages is an asset
• Ability to adapt to new processes and effectively deal with change and ambiguity.