Lost perks: Its a hard time to be an employee MiamiHerald.com
Once a week for three months, Eric Ferrer shut his office door, made a phone call to his life coach, and spent the next hour shaping his personal and career goals. The sessions were paid for by his employer — a company benefit that 28-year-old Ferrer ranks as valuable as health insurance.
“It helped me figure out my vision and stay on track,” says Ferrer, a senior recruiter at Signature Consultants, an IT staffing firm in Fort Lauderdale.
While surveys show coaching is one of the job perks young workers covet, it’s one of the rare benefits companies offer. Most employers have cut back on benefits, particularly in the past year, keeping only the basics such as healthcare and retirement plans.
While employees like Ferrer appreciate the perks their companies offer, only half of workers recently surveyed cite benefits as “very important” to job satisfaction. A new study by the Society of Human Resource Management shows job security now has overshadowed benefits as key to job satisfaction.
