Most companies treat compensation as a math problem: get the number right and the rest takes care of itself. Matt McFarlane says that’s backwards, and it’s the reason so many pay conversations go sideways even when the number itself is fair.
In this episode of Building Tech Teams, James MacDonald sits down with Matt McFarlane, founder of FNDN, the compensation consultancy he built after years running People Operations inside fast scaling startups. They get into why counteroffers rarely work, the exact headcount where pay problems start to bite, why equity has stopped doing its job as a retention lever in Australia, and how the AI hiring market has quietly made token costs a bigger line item than payroll.
CHAPTERS
0:00 - Cold open: the number is only half the story
0:44 - Who Matt McFarlane is, and why James wanted him on
1:30 - Welcome, and the trust problem behind every pay number
3:08 - Pay compression, and getting ahead of the market before you're asked
5:54 - Rebalancing cadence, and when a counteroffer is worth it
9:37 - Bringing in outside help, and titles as currency
11:35 - Building a real pay philosophy, and hiring your first people leader
13:52 - The 50 to 100 headcount inflection point
15:32 - Why the people function is bigger than most founders think
17:31 - Onboarding, ways of work, and staying focused in the age of AI
20:50 - What Zapier gets right about AI adoption
23:29 - The AI engineer bidding wars, and the "jump is too big" excuse
26:29 - Token costs vs headcount costs, and mission over salary
29:20 - Is equity still worth offering
32:50 - The naivety of chasing the next Canva
34:08 - Building a team with a blank cheque
37:52 - Rock stars, superstars, and hiring past 100 people
40:38 - How AI agents are reshaping org structure
42:47 - The Ralph Wiggum loop, and why AI leaderboards backfire
47:13 - Attraction and retention beyond salary
48:50 - The ComBank toilet tracker
49:39 - Advice for individuals chasing a pay rise
53:41 - Why "prove it first" is dying: Gen Z's pushback
56:31 - Staying technical, and why people teams need to get technical too
1:01:27 - Building a personal brand from scratch
1:02:22 - How the podcast happened by accident
1:05:37 - What personal brand does for individual engineers
1:08:17 - The Startup People Summit
1:10:50 - One trend to watch
1:11:50 - James's takeaway, and the gap you need to close
ABOUT THE GUEST
Matt McFarlane is the Founder and Director of FNDN, a compensation consultancy helping startups and scaling tech companies build pay practices that are clear, fair and competitive. He previously led People Operations functions at companies including Oyster, a global employment platform, where he was Senior Director of People Experience. Matt also publishes the FNDN Series newsletter and podcast, co-founded the Startup People Summit, and was named to the 2026 HR Influence Awards Top 12 for ANZ and LinkedIn’s Top Voices Australia.
LINKS
Matt McFarlane, FNDN · LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewmcfarlane/ · Site: https://www.fndn.com.au/
James MacDonald, NTP Talent · LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesmacdonaldau/ · Site: https://ntptalent.com.au
Hosted by James MacDonald, Managing Director of NTP Talent.
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Building Tech Teams is produced by Day One®, trusted partners in the technology space and the production partner behind Blackbird Ventures' Wild Hearts. Sister shows include First Cheque, Oversubscribed and In The Blink of AI. Episodes are cross-promoted across the network.
