Defensible range — how to build an offer that holds up to internal and regulatory scrutiny

Recruiters and TA leads have always made offers under pressure. The candidate has another option, the hiring manager wants the close, the market has moved since the role was opened. "It feels right" has carried more decisions than anyone admits.

Under the Pay Transparency Directive, "feels right" is no longer the standard against which the offer is measured. The offer is measured against three things: where it sits in your documented internal pay structure, how it compares to colleagues doing the same work or work of equal value, and whether the rationale for any difference is explainable on objective, gender-neutral grounds.

The three components of a defensible offer

The directive does not require all three to align in any specific way. It requires that each is observable in the offer record, and that the rationale connecting them is gender-neutral and applied consistently.

Internal position — where does this offer sit?

Every role has — or should have — a documented pay band. The band has a floor, a midpoint, and a ceiling. An offer at midpoint is the default; an offer above or below requires explanation.

The Article 4 lens applies. Two candidates in the same role band, with comparable skills/effort/responsibility/working conditions, should receive comparable offers. An above-midpoint offer to one and a below-midpoint offer to the other in similar circumstances is observable in the data — and the difference must be explainable.

Cohort comparison — what are existing employees paid?

This is where many recruitment processes stop short. The cohort comparison asks: among current employees doing the same work or work of equal value, where does this candidate's offer sit?

The quartile distribution of the cohort matters. An offer that comes in at the cohort P75 immediately compresses anyone currently between P50 and P75 — see the compression article. An offer at the cohort P10 raises questions about whether the role band is too wide.

Three checks before the offer is extended:

• P50 reference — what is the cohort's median for the same role and level? The offer's position relative to P50 is the first observable signal.
• Below-P25 check — does the offer sit below the existing cohort's P25? If yes, the candidate may receive an immediate market-rate raise within 6 months that the cohort does not.
• Above-P75 check — does the offer sit above the existing cohort's P75? If yes, the offer creates new compression on the people already there.

Documented rationale — why is the offer positioned where it is?

The rationale is the connective tissue. It explains how the internal position and the cohort comparison combine into the specific number on the offer letter.

Valid rationales the directive's framework respects:

• Performance signal at the role level. The candidate brings demonstrable evidence of above-band performance — quantified outcomes, credentialed expertise, validated portfolio.
• Scarcity. The role faces a documented hiring difficulty (time-to-fill data, prior failed searches). Scarcity must be observable in the company's own hiring history, not declared in the moment.
• Geographic adjustment. The candidate operates from a higher-cost location than the cohort baseline. The adjustment factor must be documented and applied consistently across genders.

Rationales the framework does not respect:

• "We want them" without further structure. Subjective evaluation absent a documented criterion.
• "They asked for it" anchored to prior pay. Salary history is no longer a valid anchor under Article 5 — see the salary history ban article.
• "Market pressure" as a generic argument. Market is observable; "pressure" without data is not.

The defensible offer is the offer where, six months later, the company can answer the question "why did you offer this?" with a sentence that does not start with "we felt".

Where the diagnostic starts

The defensible offer requires three inputs that exist before the offer is constructed: a documented role band, a cohort distribution, and a rationale framework. The directive does not assemble these for you; the company has to.

HireGapCheck™ provides the cohort comparison view at the point of offer. It surfaces where the proposed offer sits in the existing-team distribution, what compression it creates if extended above P50, and what rationale categories are most relevant given the cohort shape.