CNBC.COM
People often agonize over how to ask for a raise at work, trying to determine when to speak up and how to make their case. One company wants to take the nerves out of the scenario: It plans to award every employee a 10% raise on their work anniversary.
Lovable, an AI software company based in Stockholm with 200 employees worldwide, says it will give each of its staffers the 10% pay bump because "people get more valuable the longer they stay, and they shouldn't have to worry about getting a raise or not," co-founder Anton Osika posted on LinkedIn on Friday.
The boost will be awarded to employees on their work anniversary that falls between July 2026 and July 2027, Lovable chief people officer Maryanne Caughey tells CNBC Make It.
"We wanted compensation to recognize the contributions that we really think compound over time," she says. "Our belief is that the longer someone's here, the more context they carry, and the more impact they can have."
After a year-long trial, Caughey says the company will assess the universal raise policy based on how it influences employee retention rates and how much time it saves managers and their reports during their performance review and pay assessment cycle.
"My hope is that by doing this, we can also give some time back to the business" and better serve customers, Caughey says.
The company, which has employees in Stockholm, Boston, San Francisco, London and New York City, has plans to grow to around 400 employees by the end of 2026. It's currently hiring for employees across most of its departments including engineering, product and sales.
Lovable doesn't disclose retention rates, says Caughey, adding that this incentive policy is a proactive move rather than one meant to address a turnover problem. The new 10% raise will be the minimum pay increase awarded across the board to employees, as long as they're meeting expectations, she says.
Beyond the anniversary raise, she says the company's compensation strategy involves a quarterly analysis to ensure employees are on track in terms of performance, a twice-yearly checkpoint to adjust salary if they've taken on new responsibilities or been promoted, and ongoing checks to ensure people doing the same work in the same region are paid the same. Caughey adds that Lovable uses data from Pave, a compensation platform, to target paying in the 90th percentile of an employee's market value based on their role and location.
Loyalty isn't generally rewarded in bigger pay raises in the American workforce: Those who stay at a job tend to see smaller raises than those who switch roles. As of April, U.S. workers who stayed in their jobs saw their pay grow roughly 4.4% since April 2025, according to data from payroll processor ADP; those who switched jobs saw pay gains at 6.6% in the last year.
Sweden is known for its generous flexibility and paid leave policies, making it a top spot for good work-life balance. Swedish people report being more engaged at work and feeling less stressed, and are more likely to be thriving in their overall lives compared to Europe regional averages and global averages, according to Gallup data.
But even in Sweden, where wage growth is projected to hover around 3.5% in 2026, Lovable's 10% anniversary raise "would be considered a highly atypical offering," Caughey says.
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