Retention bonus

Retention bonuses are paid to current employees in exchange for committing to stay through a specific date or milestone — often used during M&A integrations, leadership transitions, critical projects, or when a competitor is actively recruiting.

Typical structures:

• Lump-sum paid at the end of the retention period
• Installment paid in chunks across the retention period
• Equity-based vested at the end of the retention period

Retention bonuses are typically benchmarked separately from regular comp because they're situation-specific. Most major comp-surveys publish retention-bonus prevalence and average amounts as part of their pay-practices modules.