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Executive Rewards: Aligning with Business Strategy. Driving Performance. Rewarding Leadership.

Designing competitive executive compensation that aligns with your business strategy and motivates top talent is increasingly complex. Marsh helps you weigh every critical consideration, so you can build executive reward programs that are compelling, defensible, and built to last.
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The challenge

To remain competitive, organizations must attract key executive talent, motivate and reward the right performance, and align pay with business strategy — all while navigating intensifying scrutiny from shareholders, regulators, and other key stakeholders.

Marsh's executive compensation consultants are trusted advisers to the boards and senior management of both publicly-traded and privately-held companies. We combine deep advisory expertise with the world's richest compensation datasets to help you design programs that serve executives, owners, and the organization alike.

100+

Executive rewards partners & principals globally

75+

Years advising boards and management

Figures reflect Marsh's global executive rewards practice and proprietary compensation databases.

What sets Marsh apart

Your engagement is led by senior specialists who advise on executive and board of director compensation matters full time — not generalists. With 100+ partners and principals focused on executive rewards globally, we bring both depth of expertise and the capacity to meet your needs and timeline.

Our advice is grounded in proprietary compensation data spanning millions of incumbents across every major market. Where many firms rely on published proxy data alone, we pair public disclosures with Marsh's global survey databases to give you a robust, more accurate picture of the market.

Data is the starting point, not the answer. Our consultants translate market intelligence into board-ready recommendations on pay levels, incentive plan design, goal setting, and governance, tailored to your business and executive talent strategy and relevant comparator groups.

As part of the broader Marsh family, we connect executive compensation to the capabilities that surround it — succession planning, benefits, talent strategy, workforce analytics, change and communications strategy, and transaction support — so your executive pay decisions reinforce your wider people strategy rather than sitting in isolation.

We maintain global business standards and formal conflict-of-interest policies and procedures designed to ensure our executive rewards advice to boards and management remains independent, objective, and defensible.

How we help

Our executive rewards specialists support you across the full lifecycle of executive compensation, from program design to governance to transactions.

  • Board and management advisory services

    We advise boards and leadership on the decisions that carry the most scrutiny — overall rewards philosophy and strategy, executive and board of director pay programs, employment, change-in-control and severance agreements, and compensation program risk assessment.

  • Rewards

    We design comprehensive executive and director compensation programs and benchmark them against the appropriate markets for your business. Our work includes executive and board of director compensation benchmarking, peer company selection and review, pay-and-performance alignment, and the pay practices and employment terms that underpin your program.

  • Performance

    We connect pay to results. Our consultants design short- and long-term incentive plans, select and weight the right metrics, calibrate goals and performance leverage, model a range of payout scenarios, and shape equity strategy — including new share requests.

  • Governance

    We help you stay ahead of a shifting governance landscape. We advise on emerging trends and best practices, regulatory and legislative developments, considerations related to disclosure requirements, and the viewpoints of your key stakeholders.

  • Transaction support

    We support you through the moments that reshape a business. Our transaction work spans M&A due diligence, IPO and spin-off pay and equity strategy, private equity and portfolio company compensation, executive retention strategies, and post-merger pay program and workforce integration.

Our data advantage

Marsh operates some of the largest proprietary compensation databases in the world. Our executive rewards consultants draw on these and other proprietary sources, including:

  • Mercer Total Remuneration Survey (TRS)

    Comprehensive global compensation and benefits data covering approximately 25 million incumbent observations and more than 400,000 published positions from over 50,000 organizations, available in 140+ countries.

  • Global Disclosure Database (GDD)

    Proprietary executive pay database drawn from public filings worldwide. Each year we collect top executive pay, board of director compensation, dilution and run rate, incentive plan designs, and additional data for approximately 3,500 companies, with the top executive pay module covering roughly 18,000 executives annually.

  • Mercer SIRS® (Strategic Industry Rewards Solutions)

    Deep, industry-specific rewards data for the High Technology/STEM and Life Sciences sectors, spanning 23 job families with a dedicated executive job category.

  • Mercer Comptryx®

    Best-in-class global technology-industry benchmarking database with more than 5 million data observations from 900+ organizations across 120+ countries, refreshed quarterly.

  • Industry-specific surveys and databases

    Beyond these flagship sources, Marsh maintains a broad library of proprietary industry- and sector-specific compensation surveys and databases, giving our consultants relevant market data across a wide range of industries and geographies.

Related insights

    Ready to design executive compensation that holds up?

    Tell us what you are working through, and one of our executive rewards specialists will guide you to the right path.