FNDN

FNDN exists to empower startup success through strategic pay practices that drive growth and create clarity for your people.

We transform compensation into a clear, strategic advantage by ensuring fair, budget-aligned pay practices that drive your business's growth.

Director

Kindred Minds Advisory Board

An advisory group of HR/People leaders who are helping build the future of People tech. Learn more: kindredminds.com/

Advisor

Oyster®

Senior Director of People Experience

An expanded remit taking on responsibility for both people operations and employee experience of the end-of-end journey that all each professional undertakes in their employment with Oyster.

Director of People Experience

Leading the People Operations function for Oyster:
• Enabled Oysters scale from 200 to 700+ (across 70 countries) within 12 months
• Led establishment and roll-out of compensation philosophy through detailed communication campaign. 
• Led team in the construction of a global pay calculator - delivering an ability to benchmark any Oyster role across 140+ countries within minutes.
• Led pay transparency efforts in support of values. This included building our own compensation tool and launch to internal employees. Comprehensive reporting and enablement efforts on understanding philosophy and basis for mechanics of comp benchmarks.
• Development and rollout of Oysters job levelling framework to provide career paths to all and standardise roles and salaries internally and for candidates coming in to the business.
• Delivered implementation and rollout of a performance enablement platform based on a continuous feedback framework, providing an objective capability for progression and internal mobility.
• Led the growth and development of a globally distributed team of People Ops professionals, delivering an Operating Model to dedicate our team specifically towards service and project delivery.

Director of People Operations

Rheinmetall

• Responsibility for; Talent Acquisition, HR Business Partnership and Workforce Planning.
• Led national workforce planning, reporting and analysis in line with national capital projects and secondary defence contracts.
• Established and led the annual performance and compensation merit cycle. 
• Led team accreditation and adoption of Korn Ferry job evaluation methodology.
• Implemented market dataset in TA benchmarking and merit cycle process. Training talent acquisition, hiring managers and leaders broadly in compensation methodology and uptake.
• Led talent acquisition team in hiring ~250 people over 10 months, as well as key initiatives including the launch of RDA’s referral program.

SilverRail

Procured and implemented a global HR system (HiBob), replacing myriad expensive and non-integrative systems. This provided a single system for employee data, leave management, onboarding, performance, analytics and surveys across our global workforce.

Led development and implementation of a global job levelling framework across four global sites.

Procured and leveraged market benchmarking data for to enable offer benchmarking. Further utilised this dataset to establish market relativity and in developing and leading SilverRail's first global compensation cycle efforts.

Senior Director, People Operations (Boston, London, Brisbane)

Delivering a people agenda focused on creating a workforce of unrivalled growth in capability across initiatives such as; global job levelling, benefits and remuneration; talent identification and selection; organisational value and behaviours; leadership development; and, day-to-day stakeholder engagement across business and corporate executives.

People Operations Manager

Various Companies

Mid-Senior People Operations roles across tech, FMCG, legal and professional services industries.

Mid-Senior career roles

People | Tech | Community

I help startups know what to pay their people.

If you’re leading a People function, I’ve been where you’ve been.

I know you have a thousand things to do, and working out how to do compensation is just one of them.

I know this because my experience isn’t just compensation. I am a career People Operations expert — I just really like nailing comp strategy. 

When I establish and implement practices, I do so with the experience not just of a comp specialist, but someone who's been responsible for the manager conversations, the employee experience and the commercial wellbeing of my company — like you are for yours.

My experience spans small and large tech-scale ups. From seed startups in a small office, to multi-country, to hundreds of people fully remote and globally distributed across 70+ countries. I’ve supported companies that grew to acquisition and that achieved unicorn valuation.

I like to help scaling technology businesses get comp right and get it out of the way — so that you can be the commercial leader your company needs you to be.

My most recent experience was scaling the unicorn and hyper-growth company, Oyster.

Results:
• Oyster scaled from 200 people to 650+ across 70 countries, enabled by the precision and agility of our compensation strategies and operations.
• Underpinned by our compensation strategies Oyster ramped hiring to capture market share that achieved a 390% growth in revenue.
• Our global compensation strategy enabled us to scale and expand the company while achieving an average salary cost reduction of 23%, and maintaining a candidate closure rate of >80%.
• Established Oyster's inaugural pay equity review, closing identified gaps through role-based benchmarking and a newly implemented job level framework.
• Won an employer of choice award from the prestigious HR Transform awards.

Today I help Heads of People and Chief People Officers of scaling technology companies build and grow their company through their compensation strategy.

To work with me, reach out via my website www.fndn.com.au or send me an email at matt@fndn.com.au 

I have deep experience within the tech domain:
→ Global compensation strategies
→ Pay transparency strategy and rollout
→ Career frameworks and job levelling
→ Executive compensation
→ Pay reviews and pay equity audits
→ Salary benchmarking and market pricing
→ Sales compensation & incentive plans
→ Pay for performance

Matt McFarlane

I don't care who you are.

You're never important enough that people need an email to send you a connection request.

If I have to be spammed as soon as I accept a connection request from a random, so do you. 

It's called shared trauma. 

We're all in this together.

Building startup compensation practices 👉 Compensation Philosophy + Job levels + Salary bands.

I just got off a call with a Head of People, and they're dealing with something we've all faced, repeatedly. but often don't know how to solve.

The moment when a manager storms in, desperate to save their top performer, and the data shows they’re already sitting at the top of their salary band.
 
No room to move. No obvious lever to pull.
 
They've got a high-impact employee at risk...
... and you've got a framework you spent months building, which suddenly feels like the thing holding you back.
 
This is where People teams can often collapse into reactive decision-making:
– stretching bands to “just make it work",
– throwing cash at the problem without a strategy,
– or holding the line so tightly that you lose the very people your system was meant to retain.
 
But a top performer at band maximum isn’t the real problem.
 
It could be symptomatic:
– Of outdated bands,
– Of unclear levelling,
– Of weak promotion pathways,
– Or of a business case you haven’t articulated strongly enough.
 
And while managers will always push hard (“we can’t lose them”), you’re the one who has to defend fairness, avoid precedent, and keep your comp philosophy from crumbling under pressure.
 
It usually feels like a no-win scenario. Unless you reframe the problem.

Fortunately, there's a straightforward playbook for tackling everyone's most common problem, and there are ways to recognise and retain your best people without blowing up your structure or creating inequity.

And the timing couldn't be more perfect, because it just got published.
 
In this piece with comp platform Ravio, myself and Ekaterina Potter share a few of the ways to handle this challenge.
 
We give step-by-step guides, with practical examples and decision paths you can actually use.
 
And it's one worth saving, because if you've ever faced the “top performer at band maximum” dilemma, you know it's never a once off.
 
Grab the article here: https://lnkd.in/gtH-84md

And let me know below — how many times have *you* dealt with a high performer at the top of their band?

The role of the People professional has never been more important, or more uncertain. 

Here to help make every people pro successful, is In Good Company. 

A community for People people that want insights into the conversations about culture, AI, leadership and the future of work — without the spin.

I'm stoked to be an ambassador of IGC, joining incredible leaders such as: Adam Weber, Jessica Z., Hebba Youssef, Angela R. Howard,Christine Song, Johannes Sundlo and many more.

I'd love to see you in there: https://lnkd.in/gbUWzCZu

Everyone says they want to be rich, but they're using outdated goals like 'I want to earn six figures'.

Not me.

I want to be the kind of rich where I can buy a *new* Aesop hand soap, instead of refilling that one I bought 12 months ago with cheap stuff.

That's true wealth.

Ok LinkedIn friends, I have a relatively vain ask of each of you. 


I’m 100 people away from 20,000 followers, and I wanna see if I can hit it before I get back to Australia (on Saturday). 

But I’m not just going to ask for you to follow me (I'm not *that* vain).

Instead, I want to use this as an exercise for uncovering some of the best people to learn from on this platform.

The people you might miss because sometimes this platform isn't as great at uncovering them.

So, who are the 100 people you think I should connect with?

Let’s see if we can’t fill these comments with the best people, posting the best content on being a startup People professional.

I'm sure collectively we can unearth some amazing professionals and give them the recognition they deserve.

I’ll even kick things off with a few legends I adore following:
- Jessie Schofer - doing the lords work finding and sharing the best in the world of HR tech
- Luke O'Mahoney - leading the charge on people as a product with amazing content and events
- Melissa Theiss - some of the most pragmatic and commercial People content you can find
- Matt Bradburn - for everything at the intersection of people and AI
- Vanessa Monsequeira - चित्रलेखा - incredible leadership and org design and amazing build in public.

Now, just reply back with the 1 (or more) people you thoroughly enjoy (and why) and I’ll connect with them. 

Then by Saturday, if I’m at 20,000 people, I’ll be able to enjoy my jet lag just that little bit more easily. 

Thank you for your service.

LinkedIn is making it harder to find the best voices in HR. So I curated the most important list of people to follow if you're a HR professional.

I'm sure you're feeling it, too.

Every week I see only a limited, narrow segment of my full network.

And I feel like I'm losing the chance to learn from fresh names and faces, who are doing important work.

So I did something about it.

Last week I asked my network for help identifying the top 100 people I should connect with.

What happened next created a chain reaction of hundreds of the most important people to follow in the people profession.

My amazing network recommended the best people to learn from.

Then those same people recommended who they learn from.

It was a who's who of the best
- Thinkers
- Leaders, and
- Doers

All helping to lift the profile of our profession with their thought leadership.

They say you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with.

I believe the same can be said of the network you build around yourself.

Level ourself up and check out the full list here:
https://lnkd.in/gjwCCehP

Who's the most important person *you* learn from on LinkedIn?

2025 might be winding down, but on the FNDN Series, things are only heating up ﻿🔥
﻿
And we're closing out the year with powerhouse guest, Sarika Lamont. Chief People Officer at Vidyard.
 
We've got three incredible episodes, tackling three incredible topics.
 
This coming Sunday we'll be dropping episode 1, on everything to do with leading AI adoption from the People team.
 
(Fun fact, that's what Sarika is doing at Vidyard)
 
She shares a thing or two on the challenges facing people teams and how she's overcoming it.
 
For the final two episodes, we focus on my favourite theme: comp
 
In episode 2, we're covering how to personalise comp during a downturn. 

And how you can continue to make it meaningful and impactful despite a difficult business environment.
 
(Which might be particularly relevant given the bubble everyone thinks we're in...)
 
Then we hit a fun one in episode 3, with 'How to have the tough pay conversations'.

All three of them are bangers (promise).
 
First one is coming Sunday, and you can read, watch or listen (link below).

Grant Lee grew Gamma from 0 to $100M in annual rev, in under 3 years. He wrote a 6-step post on how he did it, but the thing that struck me was what he said about culture — and I think it's where a lot of companies go wrong.

Rather than write a set of principles and curb behaviour towards them, he used this concept of a '60 day moving average' to craft them.

Your culture is constantly changing (especially in growing companies), and it should be.

The goal is to always hire bar-raisers (famous Amazon term) and allow it to continue to perpetuate.

As it does, consistent threads of excellence will start to emerge.

It's these threads that start to form your culture.

They become the standards against which you measure your people.

So the next time you're considering 're-doing' your values, consider whether you're grounding them in what perpetuates your companies excellence, vs something you've seen elsewhere and think will work well for you.

Your company will already have signs of excellence, you just need to surface and strengthen them.

What stood out to you about his comments on building culture?

We’re in the most challenging era of salary progression of the last decade. And there's two compounding factors I see that are reducing how to grow your pay.

Pave has just published their 2026 Compensation Budgets & Trends Report, and it's a detailed snapshot of the market.

(grab the report here btw, well worth a read: https://lnkd.in/gnErrHN9)

But here's the two things that stood out to me:
 
1. Salary growth has stalled, with companies budgeting a pitiful 3.5% merit increase for 2026
 
2. Job hugging is growing, with turnover plummeting (especially in public companies) and people staying put for longer.
 
So why does this matter?
 
For those playing at home, a 3.5% increase on a $100k salary is $3,500...
... or $67 a week. 

*Before tax*
 
Not great for anyone who’s already absorbed record-high inflation. 

Prices may not be rising as fast, but they’re still elevated.
 
But sure, salary increases have sucked for a little while now, who cares?
 
Well I can tell you both from first-hand experience, and report data, the biggest pay increases you will get in your career will likely come from switching employers.
 
– The data shows an average 15% pay increase from switching companies,
– I've personally experienced closer to 30%.
 
That's anywhere from $11,500 to $26,500 you're leaving on the table by accepting your companies 3.5% pay increase.
 
And the gap compounds in years 2+
 
Which is why the rise in job hugging matters.

It represents the biggest impact to salary growth we’ve seen in years.
 
Now I'm not advocating for everyone to up and quit their job every 12 months.
 
But I am advocating for being clear-eyed about what’s driving this, and it's impact on you.
 
Job hugging is being driven by fear.

Months (years?) of high-profile layoffs and hiring freezes, have lead the majority of employees (55%) to state they're now prioritising job security over ambition.
 
And that creates a perfect storm:
 
We’re in a market where the two biggest levers for salary progression (annual increases and job mobility) are collapsing at the same time.
 
The result?
 
Professionals are experiencing the weakest real earnings progression in a decade, largely because fear is keeping them in roles where pay growth has flat-lined.
 
People aren’t earning more because the mechanisms that normally drive meaningful pay growth simply aren’t functioning.
 
Low salary budgets + risk-averse “job hugging” = stalled earnings.
 
So I'm not telling people to job hop.
 
But I am telling you the current environment is structurally stacked against your salary growth.

And you need to understand the forces at play so you can act deliberately, not passively.
 
Because staying put and hoping for a better pay increase isn’t a great strategy.

Not in this market. And probably not for a long while.

I get it, you're tired. But if there is one thing that is the most tiring part of being a Head of People, it's headcount planning.

Luckily for you - this weeks guest author on the FNDN Series is Melissa Theiss. 

A 4x Head of People that drops some of the most sage wisdom on being a commercial people leader getting around.

And this week's article (you guessed it): 'How to Build a Headcount Plan That Actually Works.'

Melissa shares a straight-forward 3-step process for taking the most stressful part of the year, and turning it into a process that works for you (and the business).

So hop on over to the FNDN Series newsletter and subscribe to get this article and many more nuggets of wisdom, straight to your inbox 📫

One of the biggest unlocks of my entire career has been the mantra 'ask and you shall receive'. Here's what I mean and how it worked for me just last week.

There's a famous quote I love, that is a little cliched, but perfectly sums up my approach to life.

"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" 

So many people let the fear of rejection prevent them from ever asking someone for something.

And they reject themselves from the opportunity before anyone else is given the chance.

But asking for something has been the biggest unlock for my entire career:

- Can you help me with this
- Can I get involved in this
- Can I do this piece of work

Whatever it was, 'simply asking' can be the biggest hurdle between yourself and opportunity.

Here's an example that worked for me even just last week.

I was at 19,900 followers on LinkedIn. I wanted to be at 20,000.

I asked my network for help recommending 100 people I should connect with that would help me get there.

A few hours and 100+ comments later, a post curated with some of the most amazing people that I and others could follow was generated.

So ask the question.

Don't let the fear of rejection reject you before someone else can.

Because even if they do, you're no worse off after the ask than you were before it.

What's one thing you've been wanting to ask for that you've been putting off?

Despite the feeling, AI isn’t a threat to HR. It’s an opportunity to grow your responsibility (and yourself).
 
Most Heads of People are scared to say it out loud, but when I speak to them, their fear is real.
 
- Fear of being replaced.
- Fear of stuffing it up.
- Fear of one more responsibility dumped on an already overloaded team.
- Fear of not being “technical enough”.
 
But AI is already reshaping the People function. And it will do it whether we lead that charge or ignore it.
 
The fastest-moving leaders I’m speaking with aren’t waiting for permission.
Instead, they're claiming AI as a lever for culture, productivity and influence.
 
Not a risk to be managed, but a mandate to lead.
 
And the shift is simple: Instead of seeing AI as a tech project, view it as a people project (because it is).
 
It's a shift in mindset, a focus on adoption, and a need for behaviour change.
 
This and more came out clearly from my recent interview with Sarika.
 
In the latest FNDN Series interview, Sarika Lamont (CPO at Vidyard) shares how she not only placed AI squarely within the People remit, but why it worked.
 
And the outcome every HR leader (and Founder/CEO) wants?
 
She was able to avoid an entire People Ops Coordinator hire because automation reduced a full workload of admin.
 
These outcomes weren't just theoretical, and not just "future state". This was a present day impact.
 
That’s what leaning in (not stepping back) can look like.
 
In the latest episode, Sarika even goes into detail on how the hurdle to getting started isn't as high as everyone worries.
 
Don't be intimidated by starting with “transformation”.
 
You can start with something as simple as a low-stakes workflow:
Employment letters,
Policy retrieval,
Pre-boarding.
 
You just need one experiment that proves the point.
 
If you want the playbook for leading this shift, this episode is it.
 
The latest episode of the FNDN Series is live now, and Sarika dives deep into how she's taking AI by the reins and seeing real benefits at Vidyard.
 
Jump into it in the comments.

“Employer of choice” awards can unfortunately have a bit of a credibility problem.
 
Too many rely on opaque scoring or pay-to-play models.

The result is predictable: companies buy an accolade instead of building a workplace worth celebrating.
 
What cut through for me with Inspiring Workplaces was the opposite dynamic.
 
The process is transparent.
The bar is clear.
 
And my favourite part 👉 the award recognises progress over perfection. 

Organisations doing the work to build better workplaces, not just the ones polishing a submission.
 
It’s also why I agreed to join the judging panel for the 2026 awards.
 
And not just me. My co-judges are even more incredible. People like Nicole Karagiannis GAICD, Melanie Cole, Charlotte Anderson and Alex Pusenjak (and many more)
 
A who's who of those who have been in the trenches, pushing for the same people-first outcomes.
 
So if you’re a Head of People, ask yourself: what's that one thing you've delivered this year that deserves recognition? The thing that others could benefit from, even if it's not perfect.
 
PS: Early-bird pricing runs until 5 December. So jump online and get involved.

A guilty pleasure of mine when travelling is checking the internet speed wherever I go. Here’s the speed everywhere I went in Europe over 5 weeks. 

- Madrid Airbnb: 92 down, 50 up (bad start)
- Malaga Airbnb: 487 down, 450 up (😍)
- Malaga airport: 25 down. 17 up (tragic)
- València Airbnb: 287 down. 184 up. 
- Lisbon Airbnb: 519 down. 372 up (hello)
- Lisbon to Porto train: 9 down. 4 up (🤮)
- Porto Airbnb: 38 down. 8 up. 🙈
- Porto Airbnb 2.0 (didn’t like the other one): 737 down. 371 up (🔥🔥🔥)
- Turin Airbnb: 327 down. 155 up. 
- Lucca Airbnb: 67 down. 55 up (😞)
- Cagliari Airbnb: 83 down. 20 up. 
- Rome hotel: 368 down. 129 up (acceptable)

What’s the weird thing you do when you’re in the vacuum of holiday travel?

I know a lot of Australian People teams are grappling with how to improve the way they do work. If you're looking to implement Product-led thinking into your people practices, I can't think of anyone better to help you than Megan.

🐝 | UXer turned PXer | Speaker, Coach & Facilitator | Empowering leaders to unlock team performance through HCD

Years ago, when I was still in UX, I kept talking about wanting to work in teams that felt like intellectual beehives. 

🐝 I come alive when I’m working with collaborative, innovative and adaptive teams who are working towards something bigger than themselves.

If you've followed my journey as a UXer turned PXer, you know I've spent years advocating for people functions to adopt product-led, human-centred approaches. 

Before moving back to Australia, I told a friend about my dream of setting up a business to help founders and people leaders design organisations where people could do the best work of their lives.

 ➡️ 💬 He replied “Sounds like you’re a pollinator of design thinking”...

In the last two months I've been running my own discovery & design phases to get PollinateXD off the ground.

Now, what I'm working on is:
 • Sharing insights and ideas on how to design impactful & human-centred people experiences
 • Partnering with founders and leadership teams to build high-performing organisations
 • Coaching people leaders to build their confidence in moving beyond traditional approaches

I've got capacity for a few projects and coaching clients in the new year, so for those who have asked how you can help, I'd say:

♻️ Engage with posts that resonate. 
Likes, comments, shares - they help build community

📬 Subscribe to the collaborative newsletter I'm writing with Mark Lewis from Crewmojo. 
Every other Sunday, you'll get practical insights on how to adopt a truly people-centred approach to performance. (Link in comments)

☎️ Get in touch if you or someone you know is wrestling with adopting a truly PX approach to building organisational performance. 

and a MASSIVE thank you to my wonderful community across the globe for all your support so far!

Moving home, getting married and starting a business all in one year has been no small feat. But it's been nourishing for the soul and I'm excited for what's to come.

#PeopleExperience #OrganisationalDevelopment #CultureDesign #HumanCentredDesign #Leadership

Head of UX Research

- Founded and grew the Research team
- Developed a Continuous Discovery Research practice for conducting rapid, iterative product research. 
- Created and shared a dashboard of actionable UX Metrics in collaboration with Product, Marketing, and Customer Experience.

Lead UX Researcher 

- Owning the UX research design initiatives across all teams and supporting ongoing research projects.
- Work closely with Product designers and product managers to bring customer insights that help inform design decisions.
- Work closely with the Lead Designer to develop and expand UX research initiatives.
- Work in a highly collaborative fashion with design, product, and stakeholders.
- Participate actively as a member of the Product design team to help improve and mature our company’s product design overall.

Senior UX Researcher 

adplist.org

Mentor

UX Guide To The Galaxy Podcast

UX Guide to the Galaxy is a monthly no BS podcast to help educate, inform and inspire designers around the globe. It's a space we discuss a range of UX topics, chat about our UX experiences and even have healthy debates. Tune in for a new episode each month

Co-Founder & Podcaster

The University of Sheffield

Conducting research in cognitive psychology with a team of researchers from the University of Sheffield. Focused on research methods and neurodevelopmental disorders.

Honorary Research Associate

CrowdSurf Limited

- Conducted discovery research informing the design of the product
- Led research from concept to alpha testing
- Created personas and user journeys
- Established the Research process and collaborated with Design, Marketing, and Leadership

Senior UX Researcher

University of Derby

External Examiner

Blue Prism

Part of a small but fast-growing UX research team. 
Develop and execute research plans - leading product teams through discovery and validation research, synthesise insights, communicate findings to impact design and strategy, and collaborate with the team to reflect those learnings in the product.

UX Researcher

The University of Salford

Taught various undergraduate and postgraduate modules (e.g., Cognitive psychology, Media Psychology), supervised undergrad and postgraduate students, conducted research on human-computer interaction. Involved in enterprise and public engagement.

Lecturer in Cognitive Psychology

Staffordshire University

Founded the Virtual Reality lab and created a module focused on Cyberpsychology. Supervised student projects involving a variety of methods with a focus on cognitive psychology and human-computer interaction.

Lecturer

Arctic Shores

Arctic Shores create Games-Based Psychometrics, an objective and engaging approach to personality and cognitive assessment. They combine validated psychometric methodology with machine-learning and mobile game design to provide deeper candidate insights for better hiring decisions.

Fulfilled multiple roles; researcher and data scientist. Responsible for running validation studies, UX research (secondary, surveys, usability studies), recruiting participants, analysing data using a combination of classical statistics and machine learning, and writing reports. Presented research insights to stakeholders and non-experts.

Research Psychologist/Data Scientist

Head of UX Research at Oyster HR. Lifelong learner with a passion for UX, Technology, and Psychology. Check out my substack and my podcast to find out more!

My background is in Cognitive Psychology and Cyberpsychology and it frequently informs my work in UX; I did a Ph.D. and worked as a lecturer for over 5 years before fully embracing the UXR side. 15 years of research experience and counting...

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Matt McFarlane

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The Battle

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Engagements

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