People often struggle with deciding when to speak up and how to make their case for how to ask for a raise at work. Some companies want to take the tension out of this scenario. We plan to give all employees a 10% raise on their work anniversary.
Stockholm-based AI software company Loveable, which has 200 employees around the world, will increase each employee’s salary by 10% because “the longer people stay, the more valuable they become and they don’t have to worry about getting a raise,” co-founder Anton Osika said in a LinkedIn post on Friday.
The boost will be awarded to employees on work anniversaries that fall between July 2026 and July 2027, Marian Coffee, Lovable’s chief people officer, told CNBC Make It.
“We wanted a reward that recognized a contribution that we actually thought would grow over time,” she says. “Our belief is that the longer someone is here, the more background they have and the more impact they can make.”
Coffee said that after a one-year trial, the company will evaluate the universal pay increase policy based on how it impacts employee retention and how much time it saves managers and their reporting during performance review and pay review cycles.
“Hopefully by doing this we can get some time back into the business and better serve our customers,” Caughey said.
The company, which has employees in Stockholm, Boston, San Francisco, London and New York City, plans to grow to about 400 employees by the end of 2026. The company is currently hiring employees in most departments, including engineering, product, and sales.
LaBable does not disclose retention rates, Coffee said, adding that the incentive policy is not intended to address turnover issues, but rather is a proactive measure. The new 10% raise will be the lowest across-the-board increase given to employees as long as they meet expectations, she said.
He said that in addition to annual raises, the company’s compensation strategy includes quarterly analyzes to ensure employee performance is on track, twice-yearly checkpoints to adjust pay if they take on new responsibilities or are promoted, and ongoing checks to ensure employees doing the same job in the same region are being paid the same. Caughey added that Lovable uses data from compensation platform Pave to target paying employees at the 90th percentile of their market value based on their role and location.
In the American workforce, it’s not common for loyalty to be rewarded with significant raises. People who stay in their jobs tend to receive fewer raises than those who change roles. As of April, wages for U.S. workers who stayed on the job rose about 4.4% since April 2025, according to data from payroll processing company ADP. Wages for people who changed jobs rose 6.6% last year.
Sweden is known for its generous flexibility and paid vacation policies, and ranks among the top countries for a good work-life balance. According to Gallup data, Swedes report being more engaged and less stressed at work, and are more likely to be more fulfilled in their lives overall compared to the European regional average and the global average.
But even in Sweden, where wage growth is expected to remain at around 3.5% in 2026, LaBable’s 10% anniversary raise “would be seen as a very unusual proposal,” Cowie said.
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