Figuratively Speaking: Missing enrollment costs $500 on average

Percentage of human resource managers who said missing open enrollment costs employees, on average, at least $500 in out-of-pocket expenses, according to CareerBuilder: 34
Percentage of workers who reported that they don’t pay attention to benefit changes, figuring the same benefits would roll over from the previous year or feeling that the whole process is too confusing: 25
Percentage of hiring managers who estimate more than 10 percent of their employees miss annual open enrollment deadlines each year on average: 15

Perks beyond money
Percentage of technology professionals who said companies can offer job security as a benefit when salary increases aren’t a viable option, according to a Dice survey: 35
Percentage who cited training and certification classes: 32
Percentage who said flexible work hours: 31

Workplace tenure
Median tenure of workers – the midpoint of wage and salary workers’ length of employment in their current job – according to a study by the nonpartisan Employee Benefit Research Institute: 5.1 years
Median tenure for private-sector workers in 2008: 3.9 years
Median tenure for public-sector workers in 2008: 7 years

Satisfied employees
Percentage of employed executives with an average annual salary of $206,000 who are satisfied or very satisfied with their current job, up from 61 percent in 2008 and 53 percent in 2007, according to a survey by ExecuNet: 70
Average percentage of sales, engineering and information technology executives who are most likely to be happy at work: 61
Average percentage of marketing, human resource and consulting executives who are most likely to be happy at work: 75

No health coverage
Percentage of American adults who lacked health insurance coverage in 2009, up from 14.8 percent in 2008, according to the Gallup Healthways Well-Being Index: 16.2

Advancement opportunities
Percentage of workers who say their jobs are stagnant, according to Development Dimensions International’s 2009 Pulse of the Workforce survey: 46
Percentage of stagnant workers (and 1 in 3 workers overall) who just do their jobs and go home: 50
Percentage of those who said their jobs are stagnant who cited no room to advance as the reason: 32

Corporate climate control
Percentage of workers who said that a “too hot” work environment made it difficult to concentrate, according to a CareerBuilder survey: 22
Percentage of workers who said the same about a “too cold” workplace: 11
In an effort to save money, percentage of workers who feel that their company has turned down the office temperature this year: 19

Perk pressure
Percentage of workers who confirmed that their workplace perks had been taken away during the current recession, according to a survey by Quiznos: 70
Percentage who indicated that a paid vacation day is the compensation they’d most like to have in return for lost perks: 60

Crisis of care
Percentage of U.S. health care executives who believe the U.S. health care system is in crisis and are concerned health care reform legislation may negatively impact the quality of care and hospitals’ profit margins, according to the 2009 National Survey on the Impact of Technology in Healthcare Reform: 74

Travel protection
In 2008, estimated number of people insured against travel-related loss, according to the U.S. Travel Insurance Association’s Travel Insurance Market Survey for 2006–08: 120 million
Percentage of total sales that were accounted for by policies with trip cancellation/interruption: 90
Percentage of travel insurance sales accounted for by travel medical and medical evacuation-only policies: 5.5

Salary thaw
Percentage of the companies that froze salaries in the past year that now plan to unfreeze them in the next six months, according to surveys by Watson Wyatt: 54
Percentage that plan to reverse hiring freezes at least partially in the next six months: 49
Percentage of employers who are planning to reverse reductions to 401(k) match contributions in the next six months: 35

Idle Thought
“I’d rather see a sermon than hear one any day; I’d rather one should walk with me than merely tell the way.”
—Edgar Guest, poet

John MacIntyre is a Nova Scotia-based author and former city magazine editor. His “Figuratively Speaking” column, launched in 1989, is published in more than 40 newspapers and magazines.