To report meaningfully on pay gaps, employers need to group employees into “categories of workers” - clusters of roles that can fairly be compared.

The Directive goes beyond equal pay for the same job. It also requires employers to ensure equal pay for different jobs that are of equal value.
 

The Directive requires employers to report on both unadjusted and adjusted gender pay gaps. These two figures tell different but equally important stories

The Directive takes a broad view of pay. Base salary is only one part of the picture — employers must also include bonuses, allowances and non-cash benefits

The Directive applies broadly - not just to full-time staff, but to almost anyone with an employment relationship.

The EU Pay Transparency Directive is a new law designed to make pay across Europe more transparent, consistent, and fair.

Or HR & Payroll Pulse research has shown that discrimination in the workplace is still one of the most prevalent issues facing employees in Europe. In response, SD Worx has collaborated with Laura De Boom, FWO PhD Fellow at the University of Antwerp, to discuss the statistics and actions employers can take.

Picture this: Margaret, your company's payroll manager for 28 years, announces her retirement. She's the one who knows exactly why certain employees get that mysterious quarterly adjustment, how to navigate the labyrinthine state tax codes for your multi-location business, and which vendor relationships took years to cultivate. In three weeks, she'll be gone—and with her, nearly three decades of hard-earned expertise that no manual or system documentation could ever capture. 

Margaret's story isn't unique. Across organisations worldwide, a seismic shift is reshaping the HR and payroll landscape as baby boomers retire at a rate of 10,000 a day, taking with them an irreplaceable treasury of institutional knowledge, relationship dynamics, and battle-tested problem-solving approaches that can't be easily transferred through a handover document. 

In today’s competitive talent landscape, work-life balance is no longer a nice-to-have—it’s a strategic priority. At SD Worx, we’ve made it part of our DNA, not only to attract and retain top talent, but to foster a culture where people thrive. Here are five practical ways organisations can support work-life balance, with examples from our own journey.

What happens if we keep treating sustainability as someone else’s job? What if short-term wins come at the cost of long-term well-being, equity or adaptability? And what happens if your people outgrow the systems around them? 

AI won’t replace HR, but HR that doesn’t evolve is quietly slipping out of relevance. It’s a reality many leaders are slowly waking up to. We’re entering a new chapter in how people and performance intersect, shaped by intelligent systems, changing expectations and more fluid ways of working.