Salary Survey

The 2023 ACEC Alaska, Oregon + Washington 
Salary & Benefits Survey is available! 

This comprehensive survey exclusively covers consulting engineering firms in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington. It reports the most current salary, bonus and benefit data available on local firms. 

Survey results become available around mid-October and are provided free of charge to participating ACEC Alaska, ACEC Oregon, and ACEC Washington member firms, $250 for non-participating members, $750 for non-members and $500 for non-member participants*. 

INTRODUCTION
The American Council of Engineering Companies of Alaska, Oregon and Washington present the results of our 2023 Annual Salary and Benefits Survey. We received responses from a total of 106 firms in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington combining to report on 7,703 employees. Alaska accounted for 711 positions, Oregon accounted for 2,595 positions and Washington accounted for 4,397 positions.

Nine firms provided salary data only, six firms provided benefit data only, while 100 firms provided salary data plus completed the online survey. Three firms submitted salary data that was excluded due to data integrity concerns. Additionally, two participants started the online survey, but did not complete the submissions process. Not every question was answered by every participating firm.

The purpose of this report is to help firm leaders, managers, and human resources directors compare historical salaries for their firms to salaries throughout the industry in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington. Benchmark salary data is included for a range of job families, grouped in eight main categories: Engineers, Scientists and Planners, Professional Land Surveyors, Technicians, Administrative positions, Management, Marketing/Public Relations positions, and IT Systems positions. Job classifications for Engineers and Scientists & Planners incorporate the standard ASCE performance-based grade descriptions 1 through 8. Marketing/Public Relations positions follow the SMPS job descriptions.

The survey collected actual employee pay for each job matched, plus incentive bonus paid by reported position. Collecting data at this level enhances the accuracy and reliability of the reported statistics. Note that the incentive bonuses reported were used only to calculate the percentages shown under Bonus Plan Practices on page 8 – they are not included on the salary tables in any form. The salary tables include the 25th, 50th (median) and 75th percentile, as well as the average. This further provides perspective on the relationship of the average to the actual data distribution.

A comprehensive Employee Benefits section precedes the salary information and includes data on benefit plans and employment practices offered in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington. Plan costs and cost-saving strategies are also highlighted.

ABOUT THE SURVEY
Part one of this report shows the benefits survey results, while part two shows the salary survey results. The salary data reported includes the average, the 25th, 50th (median) and the 75th percentiles. The percentiles and average are calculated from the actual distribution of the salaries reported for each position.

The survey data shows the number of employees reported (NER) for each set of data. The figure for total number of respondents is a sum of the number of employees reported (NER) by each respondent for each position in the survey. It should be noted that for some positions, not enough data was available to be credible. Data was considered not credible if it was based on fewer than three NER’s or if it came from less than two firms.

Data is broken down into three categories: 25% reported as small firms (less than 25 employees), 36% as medium firms (25 to 99 employees), and 39% were large firms (100+ employees). The chart at upper right shows above data further broken down by state. Composite figures for all respondents are also shown in each grade for every category. Firms were surveyed as to the number of employees in Alaska, Oregon and Washington, and World (total worldwide employees including those in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington).

COMMENTS
Your comments regarding the format, contents and methodology of this salary survey and its use are welcomed and encouraged. Send comments to the appropriate ACEC address on page i or email your comments to either info@acec-wa.org or mwebber@acecOregon.org.