Most employees dissatisfied with their salaries: Survey

Wisdomjobs.com, one of India’s leading end to end online recruitment and career solutions portals, today released the outcome of its survey on the Employee Satisfaction on their Salary Structure.

The survey was conducted across Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru and Pune; and covered 10 sectors; IT, Telecom, ITES, Retail, Education, Media and Entertainment, Infrastructure, BFSI, Healthcare and Logistics. The report examines and throws light on the satisfaction levels of employees with their salary structures.

• 70 percent of the dissatisfied respondents say their salaries structures are not in line with market standards
• Only 30 percent satisfied with the Maternity and Paternity benefits
• 60 percent women feel non-monetary benefits are equally essential as higher salaries

There has never been a term called a satisfied employee, particularly when it comes to the matter of their remuneration or salary structure. More often than not, salaries and benefits are the make-or-break factors when it comes to an employee’s decision to join a particular company, or to stick with the company in the long term.

While the ‘take-home’ salary is usually the key determinant of the decision to join a company, other monetary and non-monetary benefits offered in the employee’s pay package gradually play an important role.

Ajay Kolla, Founder & CEO, Wisdomjobs.com said, “Millennials, popularly known as the Gen Y, make up the largest chunk of employees in most organisations. We are also seeing a growing proportion of Gen Z employees, to be precise those in their early 20s’, are being taken on-board every year.

Considering the overall generic prerequisites, companies are adapting to the mindsets of this young workforce by redesigning compensation structures to bring them in line with their expectations.” He further added and said, “ Apart from this, we also see that the companies to offer innovative perks and benefits to employees in order to make their job offers seem more enticing.”

Below are the overall findings of the survey:
• 53 percent of those surveyed felt that the fixed or base component of their salary is the most important factor while around 42 percent said that variable or differential pay was important to them.
• Salary structure continues to be seen as the defining factor when it comes to a professional taking up a new job or deciding to stay with an employer, with nearly 80percent of the respondents giving it a high weightage.
• 62 percent Gen Z employees said they are not content with their current salaries structures along with 46 percent of the Gen Y employees. The overall percent of discontent employees of those surveyed are 54 percent.
• Nearly 70 percent of those dissatisfied with their salaries felt that it was not in line with market standards while 30percent felt that it was not commensurate with the responsibilities being handled by them.
• 45 percent said that they were getting paid lesser than their peers who started working at the same time as they did.
• 58percent of Gen Z employees and 39 percent of Gen Y employees said they want higher ‘take-home’ salaries.
• Among non-monetary components of their salary structures, those surveyed were most dissatisfied with child-related benefits and retirement benefits.
• The respondents showed the following levels of satisfaction with non-monetary components:
o Telecommuting – 55 percent
o Flexible timings – 48 percent
o Maternity and Paternity
benefits – 30 percent
o Retirement benefits –
28 percent
• 28 percent and 44 percent of Gen Z and Gen Y employees respectively said they would prefer more non-monetary benefits such as medical/health insurance coverage, flexible work arrangements and post-retirement benefits.
• Almost 30 percent of Gen Y and 18 percent of Gen Z employees preferred work-from-home benefits over increased salaries.
• While nearly 60 percent of women surveyed felt non-monetary benefits to be equally important as higher salaries, only 30 percent men felt so. However, among men with more than 6 years of experience, this number rose to 45 percent

Sector wise salary structure satisfaction percentage:
• Across all sectors, only 55 percent of respondents were satisfied with their current salary structure.
• Though the ITES sector has been one of the most booming sectors, providing Transport and other additional benefits; it has the second-lowest level of satisfaction at 43 percent.
• The IT sector shows that 35 percent of the respondents are reasonably dissatisfied with their salary structures.
• Education sector which creates the base of the country’s development has the most dissatisfied employees at 60 percent
• The Telecom sector, despite having the highest median salaries among all sectors, only showed a 50percent satisfaction level.
• Post demonetization, the BFSI sector which is bound to witness an enormous growth in the industry along with soaring digital payments; showed only 53 percent of salary structure satisfaction.
• The Media and Entertainment sector showed a satisfaction level of just 58percent, the second-highest satisfied among all the sectors surveyed.
• The Healthcare sector shows a 50-50 satisfaction-dissatisfaction level.
• The Logistics sector showed the third-highest on the dissatisfaction level with salary structures, at 52percent
• The Retail sector also witnessed a similar dissatisfaction level of 52percent with their salary structure.
• The Infrastructure sector showed dissatisfaction level of 48percent with their salary structures.