2026–2027 Base Salary Benchmarks

Across the portfolios we’re watching, the savings from getting lean aren’t showing up where you’d expect. They’re being funneled upward. That upward pull is showing up in four ways: VC-backed companies are hiring fewer leaders and expecting more from each one; executives are carrying broader mandates; AI is repricing technical and go-to-market talent; and the biggest compensation gains are going to operators who create the most leverage with AI. For boards and investors trying to benchmark pay, that’s a moving target. Here’s a larger summary of what we’re seeing.

Key market shifts shaping compensation:

1. 01AI fluency is now the compensation floor across every function, not just technical roles.

   GTM, product, finance, and people leaders who can point to AI workflows that materially change how their function runs are capturing 10–15% higher base pay packages because the AI-native competition is real, and the pool of leaders who’ve actually operationalized AI is small.

2. 02Frontier labs are pulling engineering, product, and RevOps talent out of every VC-backed company.

   OpenAI PMs at ~$860K TC, Anthropic Senior SWEs at ~$563K, Databricks L6 Staff at ~$1.03M. Equity share of TC at frontier labs jumped from 35–45% in 2023 to 60–70% in 2026. Refresh grants, retention equity, and expanded scope are the primary defense. Cash alone doesn’t compete. (Forbes, 2026)

3. 03Efficient operators are outpacing pure scalers.

   Boards are hiring leaders on how efficiently they’ve grown, not just how fast. Those who scaled revenue without burning through cash are commanding real premiums. The blitzscale-era operators whose track record is “growth at any cost” are seeing offers flatten.

4. 04Executive scope is expanding across every function.

   CMOs are absorbing brand, revenue, and product responsibilities. CFOs own tech investment and growth strategy. CHROs are transformation partners to the C-suite. Comp is following the operators who can carry that broadened mandate.

5. 05Longer paths to liquidity are reshaping the cash-equity mix.

   With time-to-IPO stretched to 10+ years and secondary markets remaining uneven, executives and senior operators are pushing for more guaranteed cash compensation to bridge the gap; a shift most pronounced at the executive level.