Article Career Development 1 min read

Best Benefit Ever: A Look at Designer Compensation

It's always good to have a sense of how much your colleagues are making, as the nation's biggest design industry association knows.

Morgan Little

March 29, 2016

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What is it? When negotiating a raise or setting a proper baseline salary for a new job, it’s essential to know what your industry’s benchmarks are. Luckily for designers, that knowledge is available courtesy of AIGA  (opens in a new tab). The organization periodically partners with Readex Research and Communication Arts magazine to release the Survey of Design Salaries. By heading over to the survey’s site  (opens in a new tab) and logging in with their membership IDs, designers can get a clear breakdown of compensation rates for work across many different specialities, company types, regions, and more. And the survey isn’t limited to 2014. AIGA also offers an archive of salary data stretching back to 2008  (opens in a new tab).

Why it works: “As the principal source of information on the design economy, AIGA produces this salary survey as part of a comprehensive program of activities developed to serve the professional designer with strategies for success,” the association’s site reads  (opens in a new tab). And the reason for this benefit’s utility rests in those strategies. By helping keep members updated with the latest in salary information across such a wide array of parameters, AIGA gives its members an advantage against the competition when making a career move.

Other benefits: To continue with the theme of developing designers’ talents, AIGA also offers members a number of professional development courses  (opens in a new tab), a job board  (opens in a new tab), and a platform for members to display their work via portfolios  (opens in a new tab) viewable not just by fellow members but by recruiters as well.