InnoGames GmbH encourages salary transparency in German games industry by publishing salary bands

InnoGames GmbH has become the first company from the German games industry to share information on its salary bands. 

While they don’t cover every single employee (they cover around 80%) they do share information on the minimum and maximum that can be earned at the various levels of the company, in a selection of roles. 

The numbers given only apply to employees actually living and working in Germany, and may not apply to those working remotely in other areas. To simplify things further, MCV/DEVELOP has sorted through the information, to present readers with the lowest and highest salary in each role. They are as follows: 

DEVELOPER
€ 48,000 – ​€ 115,000

GAME DESIGNER
€ 34,000 – € 85,000

MARKETER
€ 44,000 – € 106,375​

ARTIST
€ 32,000 – € 68,000

ANALYST
€ 45,600 – € 104,280

COMMUNITY MANAGER
€ 32,000 – € 85,000

PRODUCT MANAGER
€ 40,000 – 115,000

QA ENGINEER
€ 20,000 – € 85,000

SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR
€ 45,000 – € 110,000​

InnoGames believes the information released to be in the interest of fairness for both employees of the company and future applicants that may wish to join them. They also believe that it helps to ‘debunk the long-standing misconception that our industry pays people poorly’, although Michael Zillmer, Co-Founder and COO of InnoGames admits their salaries are actually in the top third of the German market anyway. 

“We expect several positive effects from our publication, including lower dropout rates in the application process and greater attractiveness for talent from outside the games industry. We are also sending a clear signal to potential female applicants that pay gaps don’t exist at InnoGames. The bottom line is that this is a ‘win-win-win’ situation. The company, our employees, and current and future applicants all stand to benefit from this disclosure. We appreciate that salaries can be a very delicate topic, and we are aware that the decision to publish our bands comes with a certain level of risk, but we firmly believe this is the right move for both InnoGames and the industry.” said Dr. Andreas Lieb, Director of Human Resources at InnoGames. 

InnoGames has announced that their job advertisements going forward will contain salary information, although due to costs salary bands will only be created once at least six employees meet the appropriate criteria.

If you’d like to apply for a position at InnoGames, you can find their open positions here.