2026-01-17T15:30:02.019Z
A version of this story originally appeared in the BI Tech Memo newsletter.
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Silicon Valley is sending a clear message about how staff should perform, and how it wants to pay them.
Instead of obsessing over punishing the bottom of the stack, Big Tech is increasingly choosing to shower rewards on the top:
Meta’s overhauled performance system is the latest and most striking example. Under its new “Checkpoint” program, standout employees can earn bonuses worth up to 300% of their target. That’s tens of thousands of extra dollars tied purely to impact, not promotions or title changes.Google is loosening the funnel into its top performance buckets and shifting more bonus and equity upward.Amazon is doubling down on sustained excellence, allowing long-term top performers to earn above traditional pay-band caps.
What’s especially notable is how this is being driven by AI, according to Zuhayeer Musa, cofounder of Silicon Valley compensation data cruncher Levels.fyi.
As AI tools get more powerful, the value of high-leverage individuals is rising. The most prized employees today are “player-coaches,” people who ship work themselves while also guiding projects, mentoring peers, and shaping strategy. AI makes that hybrid role even more potent, allowing a single strong contributor to amplify their output, and their influence, without managing a large team, Musa wrote this week.
The result is a revival of the individual contributor track. You no longer have to become a full-time people manager to earn top-tier pay. At companies such as Meta, Google, Amazon, and Nvidia, senior ICs can now match (or beat) the compensation of managers simply by delivering outsized results, he noted.
For ambitious employees, the takeaway is simple: in the AI era, execution compounds. And Silicon Valley is increasingly willing to pay for it.
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