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Salary Survey, 2012
The Information Architecture Institute conducts an annual salary survey to capture information on compensation, daily work habits and demographics of information architecture practitioners. Summary data, as well as open-ended responses are presented, helping formulate questions for next year's survey. The most recent Salary Survey as well as past years surveys can be found online at http://iainstitute.org. Please send any feedback or requests to info@iainstitute.org.
The 2012 IAI Salary Survey was conducted from July to November 2012. Members of the IA Institute, IxDA and sigia-l were invited to participate. A link to the survey was also promoted via the IA Institute homepage, newsletter and Twitter account. A total of 309 responses were collected. Respondents who did not enter a salary range were filtered out for salary calculation purposes. You may download the expanded results at expanded results (
XLSX 702KB). We remain a relatively small community, so we removed city data from the results due to concerns about the privacy of individuals in places where a small, easily identifiable population of respondents live. A list of cities is available in the full survey download (
PDF 2.1MB) and a narrower analysis by location is available by request.
Since respondents gave us a salary range instead of an exact salary figure, it is impossible to estimate a true average or median salary. In our analysis, we have estimated the median for various data points by taking the midpoint of the salary range a person selected and then averaging that figure for various data points, eliminating the "Over $200,000" and "Under $10,000" groups, which do not have a midpoint. We also present median salary estimates, based on midpoints, for comparison purposes, but it is better to read the survey results in terms of a percentage that falls within a range rather than thinking in terms of a specific salary.
About the Information Architecture Institute
The Information Architecture Institute (IA Institute) is 501(c)6 professional organization dedicated to promoting the concept, craft and community of Information Architecture. Through education, advocacy, services, and social networking, the Institute supports a community of practitioners, leading the way in demonstrating the value of information architecture to the world at large, and providing a framework for members to improve their skills and enhance their professional standing.
Salary Ranges
- The top five ranges clustered between USD$60,000 and USD$104,999, representing 51.1% of the total.
- Using midpoints, the average salary was estimated to be USD$99,152. (Using midpoints is inexact, particularly since the top and bottom ranges do not have identifiable midpoints.) When excluding the top and bottom ranges, the average salary is USD$96,744, or 2.4% lower, than when these ranges are included.
- Median salary was USD$94,999 both when including and excluding top and bottom ranges.
- Salary rates appear to be just under USD$6,000 per year higher than last year's report, a considerable change sine the previous year when average salar had dropped by USD$2,000.
Freelance Hourly Rates
- Responses for freelance hourly rate ranged from USD$6.00 to USD$600 per hour. One outliers was removed from this chart, USD$600, leaving the maximum rate at USD$295/hour. The average freelance rate (excluding outliers) was USD$94.59. The median was USD$90.00 and the modal rate was USD$100.00, with six people indicating that rate. Average freelance rate is up USD$4.01 over 2011; median up USD$5.00 and mode up USD$10.00 per hour.
- Note on Outliers: We performed a Grubbs test and eliminated the numbers above USD$295. The Interquartile Test for outliers is somewhat more aggressive, as follows:
- Grubbs Test: Eliminates all numbers above 295 in this list, leaving a median rate of USD$94.59. (http://www.graphpad.com/quickcalcs/Grubbs1.cfm)
- Interquartile Test: Eliminates values that are more than 1.5 times the interquartile range (82.5) or above USD$201.38, leaving a median rate of USD$88.56.
- Grubbs Test: Eliminates all numbers above 295 in this list, leaving a median rate of USD$94.59. (http://www.graphpad.com/quickcalcs/Grubbs1.cfm)
- One response that was non-numerical was eliminated from the study.
- Most responses (59.8%) indicated that they were paid an Hourly Rate. Another 24.4% are paid Per Project Rate, 10.3% receive a Per Diem Rate, while one respondent each indicated Commission or Share of Equity. We also had two write-in quotes from freelancers indicating they were paid a "Per Week Rate" and "donuts and coffee."
Region
- The Australia and Pacific Rim held the top median salary by Region at USD$124,999. At 66 responses, second place US: Northeast has a more reliable median salary at USD$114,999, followed by US: West with USD$104,999 (78 responses).
- The United Kingdom's median dropped significantly since 2011, however there were many fewer responses, making the decline difficult to support.
- No responses were collected for the Middle East or US: Alaska & Hawaii in this year's survey.
Country
- Once again our survey had an overwhelming response from the United States, with 74.4% of responses coming from the US. Higher count indicates greater reliability; unfortunately, few countries had enough responses to indicaet a reliable median salary outside the United States.
- Switzerland was the top earner (based on a single response) with a median salary of USD$154,999. This sample is too small to show any reliability for the country as a whole. Of those countries with more than five responses, Australia was the highest at USD$124,999 (8), followed by the United States (229) at USD$104,999, Canada (25) at USD$84,999 and the United Kingdom (9) at USD$54,999.
Metropolitan Area
- Responses sorted by metro area were higher in the US, Toronto and London than in other cities. Only San Francisco reported more than 20 responses. Also, given low response rates in some metro areas, the data potentially could be personally identifiable; therefore we hesitate to report results for metro areas with low response rates.
- The top ten metropolitan areas by salary were all US cities with at least 7 responses. The top seven cities were all over USD$100,000. The metropolitan area with the highest salary was San Francisco at (USD$134,999) followed by New York City and Boston, tied at (USD$124,999). The next ranking cities were Chicago at USD$114,999, Los Angeles at USD$109,999, Washington, DC and Philadelphia at USD$104,999. Seattle, Atlanta, Detroit, and Minneapolis came in at USD$94,999. Toronto and Austin tied for 12th place at USD$74,999 and London came in 15th at USD$69,999.
Note on Cost of Living
Please note that a careful cost of living analysis should be considered when comparing one region or metro area to another, since living costs can be much higher in some areas than in others. Also when comparing one region to another, consider differences in benefits that are offered through the employer versus those that must be paid for by the individual or that are subsidized by government programs. In the United States, for example, while medical insurance is considered a benefit, the difference in actual cost of medical care can be significant compared to other countries.
Salary Increases
- 38.3% of respondents noted 1-5% annual increase in salary.
- 14.3% indicated a 6-10% annual increase.
- 2.7% noted a decrease in income.
- 22.7% entered “not applicable” which could indicate no change.
Age
- The field is predominantly 26-45 years old, although there is also a large group (10%) in the 46-50 year old category. 36-40 year olds have the highest median Salary at USD$114,999. This is 21.1% greater than the next youngest group. (There was one person in the Over 65 group earning more than USD$200,000).
- There is little variation between the 41-45, 46-50 and 51-55 year old groups. Each earns a median salary of USD$104,999, which is 8.7% less than the 31-35 year old group.
- After age 55, salaries drop by 9.5%, an improvement on the previous year when the difference was negative 24%. Average salaries were somewhat more stable for these age groups, with the 46-50 group earning the most at USD$116,718. Average salary did not drop until the 56-60 year old group, but there were fewer respondents, so it is difficult to conclude anything from this change.
- We looked at responses for gender, education level, experience level and years in the industry to see if there might be a reason for the 8.7% drop after age 50:
- There was no significant difference based on education level. Almost the same percentage had a Master's Degree or higher. In fact, in the oldest two cohort groups, the majority had at least a Master's Degree.
- Gender could be a factor. Fifty percent of the 46-50 age group are female versus 73.3% of the 51-55, 80.0% of the 56-60 group and 66.7% in the 61-65 group, compared to under 45% in the 36-40 and 41-45 group.
- There was a slightly higher percentage of part time workers in the 56-60 age group, versus 36.7% in the 36-40 age group and 36.5% in the 41-45 age group, but fewer in the 46-50 age group (21.9%) and the 61-65 age group (33.3%).
- Industry experience also did not seem to contribute to lower salaries for any group, except the 56-60 age group, where 80% of respondents had less than 10 years experience in the IA field.
- It seems that the main difference for the drop in salary after age 50 may be attributed to these cohorts having more women serving in lower level positions. Having a higher degree does not appear to increase salary over age 56, though it is more common in these age groups.
Gender
- This year the gender breakdown was 47.7% female and 52.6% male respondents, a nearly equal swap of genera rates from 2011.
- The median salary for females and males was the same (USD$94,999) and unchanged from 2011.
- Average salaries were higher for males at USD$100,156 versus USD$97,781 for females. Indicating a possible loss of gender parity. The average salary difference between men and women of USD$2,376 has widened versus the salary lead for men of USD$1,619 in 2011. This was curious because men and women occupy management and higher positions at a similar rate, 16.4% of men versus 16.1% of women
- While this year, more women reported working at the Executive/CEO/President level, 4.9% versus 3.1% of male respondents, males who are CEOs tend to earn more than female CEOs. Also, Men with PhD degrees tend to earn more than women with PhDs. These two factors could explain the disparity in average salary.
Education Level
- This year, we added a new series of questions about education, including names of schools, degree programs and certificates. These responses are included in the Appendix and will be incorporated in our Schools Teaching IA page on the website in 2013.
- The highest level of educational attainment for the majority of respondents is a Master's Degree (50.0%), followed by Bachelor's Degree (30.5%) and Some Graduate School (8.1%). 95.5% of respondents have at least a Bachelor's Degree.
- 64.9% of respondents pursued post-baccalaureate degrees and/or certificates. This is higher than in previous year's surveys, a continuation of a trend noted last year.
Job Title
- 154 respondents, or 50.2% of the total, described themselves as User Experience Designer/Planner/Architects. 89 respondents held Experienced/Senior level positions with 29 in Experienced/Mid Level and 24 in Senior Management/VP/Director.
- The next largest group was Information Architects at 16.5% of respondents and Interaction Designers at 10.1%. Interaction Designers were primarily Experienced/Senior Level, while Information Architects were split somewhat evenly between Experienced/Senior Level and Experienced/Mid Level.
- Median salary was USD$104,999 for User Experience Designer/Planner/Architects, which may reflect a higher proportion of Senior Management using this title. Median salary was USD$89,999 for Information Architects and USD$84,999 for Interaction Designers. Information Architect salaries were higher than Interaction Designers, despite having fewer Senior Level workers as a proportion of the total.
- Of five respondents entering “Other”, three entered a variation of “User Experience Manager” or “User Experience Director,” presumably because they identified the “Planner/ Designer/Architect” label with lower seniority levels. Because the Job Title question is not intended to represent seniority, we moved these entries to the “User Experience Planner/Designer/Architect” column to reflect a User Experience focus. The remaining two responses that indicated “Other” in the Job Title question were “Product Designer” and “Behavior Designer.”
Experience Level
- Most respondents (48.9%) identified their position level as "Experienced/Senior Level". The next highest in number were Experienced/Mid level at 27.8% of respondents followed by Senior Management/VP/Directors at 12.0%. Entry Level/juniors were 6.8% of respondents and Executive/CEO/Presidents were only 3.9%.
- Men and women occupy higher-level positions at a similar rate, with slightly more men in Senior Management/VP/Director positions and slightly more women in Executive/CEO/President positions.
Tenure
- The largest group of respondents, 21.0%, has been in their current job for 1-2 years. The next largest group, 17.5% has been in their current job for over five years. More than one third (37.9%) have been in their current job for less than one year.
- Respondents with more than two years in their current job tend to have higher salaries. The advantage is strongest after four years on the job.
- The only Intern respondent has less than three months in their current position. Entry-level staff typically stays in their current job no more than 2 years.
- There was a broad range of tenure for Experienced/Mid Level staff. Data suggests that they tend to move on to new opportunities after two years, but are more likely than entry level staff to remain.
- Experienced/Senior level staff represented a broad range of tenure at their current positions. At this level, they are just as likely to have only 1-2 years with the firm, as they are to have more than 5 years.
- Senior management/VP/Directors also exhibited two manor tenure groups, including 37.8% in the 1-2 and 2-3 year group and 24.3% in the Over 5 years group.
- Two thirds of Executive/CEO/Presidents have been with their current position for more than five years.
- Two thirds of Executive/CEO/Presidents have been with their current position for more than five years.
Industry Experience
- Just under one-quarter of respondents (24.6%) have been in their current field 1-5 years. This is similar to 2011 figures. Only 1.6% have been in working in the field for less than one year, half the percentage in this category in 2011.
- As in last year's report, almost a third (29.4%) have been in the field 5-10 years. Respondents who have at least ten years of experience in the field reported notably higher median salaries than those reporting less than eight years in the field. Between 2 and 5 years of experience, the difference in median salary doesn't show much change.
- Median salary for those reporting more than ten years experience was 35.3% higher than those reporting between 9 and 10 years. Those with at least ten years experience earn twice as much as those with less than a year of experience. The premium for those with more than ten years experience was 223% over entry level.
- Looking at industry experience by position level, the only Intern respondent has less than a year of industry experience. Industry experience reported by Entry Level/Junior employees ranged across several categories, with most having less than four years of experience.
- Most Experienced/Mid Level respondents had between one and seven years of industry experience (72.1%). There was a significant group (16.3%) that had more than ten years of experience. The majority of Experienced/Senior Level staff had over 10 years experience (53.6%). Still a large group, 43.7% had between 4 and 10 years of industry experience, with most of these clustering in the 5-6 and 6-7 year ranges.
- Management and higher positions appear to require at least 8 years of experience in the field. Most of these respondents had more than ten years of industry experience. 73.0% of Senior Management/VP/Directors had over 10 years industry experience. Ten out of twelve Executive/CEO/President respondents have over 10 years of industry experience.
Hours Worked
- The majority of respondents worked 40-50 hours per week (56.6%), with the second largest group (30.7%) working 30-40 hours.
- Only 4.2% work less than 30 hours per week and 6.5% work more than 50.
- Six respondents did not answer this question.
- As expected, the more hours worked, the higher the salary.
Management
- Of 309 people who participated in the survey, 34.6% indicated that they manage staff, down 0.1% since 2011.
- Fulltime employees represent 38.5 percent of staff under management. Contract staff makes up another 30.8% and Temp agency staff make up 2.9%.
- 27.8% of the staff under management are at the management level themselves, versus 7.7% in 2011.
- These figures indicate that management level employees must be able to supervise a significant number of contract and temporary employees.
Type of Organization
- The highest paid group by organization type was those who marked "Other" at USD$114,000 median salary. The highest paid respondent in this group was a game developer, earning over USD$200,000. The Other group also included a number of financial services, insurance, internet provider, utilities, retail/e-commerce employees and one Google employee.
- The next highest paid groups tied at USD$104,999 were those working at Consulting firms, Freelancers and a Recruiter.
- Those at government (USD$64,999) and Educational Institutions (USD$74,999) were paid the least.
Type of Product
- This is a new question this year. All but 3 respondents entered answers to this question. We allowed respondents to select more than one answer.
- 87.3% work on websites, 70.6% work on mobile applications, 52% work on Desktop/web software, 25.5% work on social media applications, 12.7% work on physical products, 9.8% public kiosks and 4.9% work on entertainment consoles, including game systems, DVDs and Blue-Ray applications.
- In the Other category, which represented 10.5% of responses, we received the following write-in responses:
- Advertising and experiential campaigns
- Artwork (stills/moving pictures)
- ATM
- design process
- Digital repository
- EIM
- Email marketing
- Email Marketing (Design and coding )
- ENG SERVICES & PLANING & DESIGN
- Enterprise Apps
- Enterprise Content and Records Management Systems
- Full ecosystems, including environments & services.
- In that past I have also worked on physical products or devices, including packaging and instructions/help.
- Intelligent Transportation Systems, in-vehicle devices, connected vehicles
- Interactive environments, POS, CRM, iPad apps, non-screen devices
- intranets
- Intranets (if not included under websites defn)
- medical devices, services
- Outdoor experiences including projections
- PC Games
- Print materials
- search engines, technical documentation in .html and .pdf, etc.
- service design
- Service design, entertainment systems (non-game boxes or DVD players listed above
- Software, SAAS
- Tablet
- Tablet
- tablet software and cross-device experiences
- Telematics, in-store UI, POS UI, Interactive Television, etc.
- workforce communications high-level decision-making materials
Working Group
- 35% of respondents work at organizations employing more than 3,000 people. Only 5.6% were self-employed. 22.1% work at organizations employing less than 50 people.
- 72.5% work on a team of 1-5 people. 24.7% indicated that they are the only person performing IA work in their workgroup. 14.1% indicated that they were the only person at their company performing IA work.
- 57% spend 75-100% of their time working at their Employer/Company offices. 74.3% spend up to 25% of their time working at home. There is also a significant number of respondents who spend up to 25% of their time working at Client office/premises (31.2% of respondents) or Other locations, such as airports, trains, cars, cafes, etc. (38.8% of respondents).
Tasks Performed
- We noted a higher response rate for this question than last year. As in previous surveys, the most frequently performed, hands on tasks are Wireframing/sitemaps and User Flow/scenario development. 91.4% of respondents reported either performing or review/delegating these tasks. 84.6% work on Wireframing/sitemaps at least some of the time and 81.0% do at least some User flow/scenario development.
- The third most likely task performed is Interaction design: 11.5% review and/or delegate this task while 79.7% perform this task themselves at least some of the time.
- At least two-thirds of respondents indicated hands-on involvement (occasionally or frequently performing the task with 78.4% doing some Strategic work (business models, high-level categorization, requirements analysis, life cycle assessment), 74.4% performing Audience definitions/persona development, and 70.2% doing Other user research.
- Tasks that were most likely reviewed and/or delegated to others included Graphic/interface design, Content generation/copywriting, Design template/style guides, Content management/inventory/strategy and Accessibility reviews.
- Tasks that were least likely to be performed by survey respondents included Database design (76.1% are not involved), Programming/IT integration (75.7% not involved), General IT consulting (also 75.7% not involved) and Non-IA Business administration and operations (61.3% not involved).
- We noted an increase in the number of respondents who are doing Content management/strategy work and Staff training/recruiting/team management.
- Staff training/recruiting/team development was a recently added category. While most respondents do not perform this task frequently, 66.2% have some involvement and 16.7% perform this task frequently.
Benefits
- The most cited benefits were Health/Medical Insurance, cited by 86.8% of respondents, 401K or Other Pension/Investment Plan (73.0%), Life Insurance Plan (70.6%), Flexible Schedule (68.5%), Disability Insurance at (66.1%), Family Leave (Maternity/Paternity/Partner/Adoption) (59.9%), Professional Training/Continuing Education/Tuition Reimbursement (58.8%), Pretax Flexible Spending Account (e.g. medical or childcare use) (56.4%), Bonus Pay (55.7%) and Conference Registration (50.5%) Except for Conference Registration, the number of responses in these categories was down across the board from 2011.
- While Professional Training/Continuing Education/Tuition Reimbursement and Conference Registration were otherwise similar to 2011 figures and more respondents received Professional Dues Reimbursement (26.0%) than last year (24.3%).
- While 55.7% receive Bonus Pay and 48.1% get Personal Time off or Sabbatical Leave, only 29.1% get Compensatory Time, or additional time off. (Check your local laws, though. Compensatory time off in lieu of pay is illegal in many areas.) 11.1% receive Overtime Pay up from 8.8% in 2011.
- In addition to the 73.0% receiving a 401K or Other Pension/Investment Plan, 27.7% receive a Stock Options/Purchase Plan from their companies, 9.3% indicated Other Profit Sharing Plan and 38.4% have access to corporate discounts.
- As for family related benefits, while 59.9% get Family Leave (Maternity/Paternity/Partner/Adoption) benefits (a drop of 10% since 2011), only 34.9% receive benefits covering Domestic Partnerships; 68.5% have access to a Flexible Schedule, if needed a drop from 72.6% in 2011), 20.4% have access to a Dependent Care/Child Care/Babysitting Program (up 18.6% over 2011); and 16.3% get Housing/Relocation assistance (up 13.7% over 2011).
- A healthy 27.3% get a Health Club/Gym Membership reimbursement. Though down a percent from 2011, this indicates that some companies are taking care of their employees' bodies as well as their professional development. Transportation/Commuting Reimbursement (21.5%) and Meals/Entertainment (21.1%, up from 17.7% last year) round out the physical needs of our respondents.
- For vacation, 77.0% receive more than two weeks, with the majority, 28.3%, in the 11-15 Days range. 77.0% get an additional four to eleven public holidays in addition to their paid vacation. A lucky 11.6% get more than 11 public holidays to top off their vacations.
Complete question-by-question results from the 2012 IA Institute Salary and Benefits Survey, including tasks and benefits, are included in the Appendix of the full survey download (PDF 2.1MB)
This page was last modified on January 31, 2013 07:24 PM.