The Association for Supply Chain Management (ASCM) has released its 2024 salary survey. And the biggest takeaway? The average Supply Chain salary is over 6 figures for the first time. Read on to see what other salary insights the survey has to offer. 

On the Argentus Blog, part of our mission is to share the latest intel about the intersection of supply chain management and talent issues. Part of that effort involves sharing info about salaries in the field. And salary data, unsurprisingly, is some of the most popular content that we share. 

It’s easy to see why. Money talks. No matter where you are in your career, salary data is useful information to have. If you’re a senior supply chain leader looking to hire, it’s good to know where to benchmark a salary for the job. If you’re just starting out in supply chain, it’s helpful to know the salaries for different disciplines like purchasing and logistics, to help plan your career. 

Most of all, though, people are so interested in salary data because they want to know: am I making more or less than other people in similar roles?

So today, we’re writing a post about a new salary survey, released by the Association for Supply Chain Management (ASCM) in the U.S. Every year, ASCM (a leading industry association and accrediting body) polls several thousand supply chain professionals about a host of topics related to salary, job satisfaction, and skills. A few weeks ago, they released their annual Supply Chain Salary and Career Report, which compiles the results of the survey for their members. Based on a survey of 5435 supply chain professionals across the globe, it represents one of the biggest salary surveys in the industry. 

And there were some interesting takeaways. Here are the biggest, from our perspective: 

Salaries are over six figures, on average:

For the first time, the average supply chain professional is making over $100k a year. The average salary for all those surveyed was $103,000 (on a $95,000 base salary), representing a 4% year-over-year increase from last year’s survey. 

Overall, supply chain salaries are healthy. Industry publication SupplyChain 24/7 broke down the salary bands from the survey on a table, which we’ve pasted below.

(Note: While the survey had respondents from across the globe, the numbers are presented in USD.)

At the beginning of the year, we wrote a post about how supply chain salaries have seen a significant bump since before the pandemic. Interestingly, these numbers are mostly in line with our estimates. 

Despite strong compensation for supply chain professionals across the board, there were a few warning signs for managers looking at talent retention: 70% of survey respondents said that salaries weren’t keeping up with inflation, and that number was even higher in Canada, at 77%. As everyone knows, the past several years have been tremendously difficult from an inflation standpoint. Even though inflation appears to be cooling, hitting the Bank of Canada’s 2% target in August, a certain amount of price increases from the past few years are baked in, and salaries still haven’t quite caught up. 

Job satisfaction remains strong, and perceptions around the job market are resilient:

Traditionally, supply chain management has often been seen as an “accidental” discipline for many—with people “falling into” the career rather than choosing supply chain at the outset. From our daily conversations this appears to be changing, with more young people choosing supply chain management as a field. But no matter whether people “accidentally” join the supply chain field or choose it, few people express regret about becoming a supply chain professional.

This survey shows that attitude, with 85% of those surveyed expressing pride in the work that they do. A whopping 81% of those surveyed plan to stay in the supply chain field over the next 5 years, showing resilience in people’s impressions of the supply chain industry after a tumultuous few years. Despite the stresses of the pandemic leading many to burnout—or something close to it—most people aren’t interested in leaving the field. 

According to the survey, 49% of candidates expressed positive or very positive views about the state of the job market, and 42% were neutral about the state of the job market. There were few people who had negative views of the job market, but almost half expressed a “neutral” view. The previous point about inflation and affordability may be driving this “neutral” view, because from our perspective hiring remains brisk, and compensation continues to rise. 

Tech skills and soft skills are key to career development:

ASCM surveyed supply chain professionals about both key emerging technologies that they’re embracing in their work, as well as the key soft skills that they’re seeking to build. 

Here were the top 5 emerging technologies that supply chain professionals are implementing, as well as the percentage that are implementing them:

1. 52% – Machine learning
2. 50% – Cloud computing
3. 47% – Robotics
4. 32% – Additive manufacturing (3D printing)
5. 22% – AI chatbots

And here were the most important key soft skills identified by respondents in the survey: 

1. 44% – Critical thinking
2. 38% – Collaboration
3. 37% – Troubleshooting and problem solving
4. 31% – Judgement and decision making
5. 24% – Building relationships

We’ve long argued that the best supply chain professionals are people who have a strong mix of the technical skills needed to uncover and implement efficiencies, and the soft skills needed to communicate insights to other stakeholders in a business and build alignment. The survey results show supply chain people digging into both these key aspects, embracing new technologies to deliver supply chain improvements as they develop the soft skills necessary to implement them.

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We hope you found this salary data useful! Check out ASCM’s report as well as SupplyChain 24/7’s coverage of it to dig more into the data. And stay tuned in the coming weeks as we continue to bring you up-to-the-minute insights from the intersection of supply chain management and talent. 

And as always, if you have any immediate or upcoming hiring needs in Supply Chain Management, Procurement, Logistics, Operations or Planning, reach out to Argentus today! Call 416 364 9919 or send an email to recruit@argentus.com outlining your requirements.