There's always been a lot of talk about pay transparency as a progressive step for companies to make.

Me? I'm a classically trained HR pro, so I'm against it. But one company has gone big (Buffer) and not only made salaries available to all employees, but also to the outside world.

The company size? Of course, Buffer is very small - 10-15 employees. If they grow to 300 employees, the exceptions they'll have to make will more than likely render the model useless. But for now it's interesting.

See more on the model as well as the actual salaries of employees at Buffer by clicking here. For now, here's the highlights:

The salary formula

Salary = job type X seniority X experience + location (+ $10K if salary choice)

job type = base

happiness hero = $45,000

content crafter = $50,000

engineer = $60,000

designer = $60,000

Operations officer base = $70,000

Executive officer base = $75,000

seniority = base multiplier

Senior + 5% base and 3k/$m revenue

Lead +7% base and 4k/$m revenue

VP + 10% and 6k/$m revenue

C-level +20% and 8k/$m revenue

COO +20% and 10k/$m revenue

CEO + 20% and 12k/$m revenue

experience = multiplier

Master: 1.3X

Advanced: 1.2X

Intermediate: 1.1X

Junior: 1X

location = additional

A: +$22K (e.g. San Francisco, Hong Kong, Sydney, London, Paris, New York)

B: +$12K (e.g. Nashville, Birmingham, Vienna, Austin, Vegas, Tel Aviv)

C: +$6K (e.g. Talinn, Warsaw, Bucharest, Santiago)

D: +$0K (e.g. Manila, Delhi, Hanoi)

equity / salary choice

you get a choice of more equity or more salary, if you choose salary, you get +$10K

See more on the model as well as the actual salaries of employees at Buffer by clicking here.