4 in 10 Workers Prefer Remote Work Over Bigger Bonus

After working remotely for almost two years, 41% of workers in Singapore would instead continue working from home than get a bigger bonus. This statistics is based on a survey conducted by Randstad.

Ms. Jaya Dass, Randstad's managing director for Singapore and Malaysia, said that this finding is likely because of various benefits the employees have experienced when working remotely. Some of them are:

• Extra personal time,

• Saves time and money from commuting, and

• Higher productivity.

 

80% of employees have received a salary increase in 2022

Among those surveyed, at least 80% said they had received a salary increment in 2022, with 9% of these workers seeing a pay rise of over 20%.

Half of the participants also believed they would receive a bonus this year, with 43% of this group expecting a bonus payout that averages one to three months, excluding the 13th-month bonus. 

This percentage is lower compared to the findings of Randstad's 2019 poll, conducted before Covid-19, which saw 83% expecting a bonus that year. 69% of this group expected bonus payouts averaging one to two months.

In the group who said they would be receiving a bonus, one in four believed they would get a bonus of less than a month, while 12% said they would receive a bonus of seven months or more. 

The 65% of workers expecting bonuses also said they were satisfied enough to stay with their employer for the next six months. 

 

Employers must be ready to share their profits to retain employees

Ms. Dass stated that companies must be prepared to share their profits to keep valued employees while they are in the middle of the Great Resignation or the great reshuffling phase of the pandemic. 

She said that talents with in-demand skills in the candidate-short market have a strong bargaining power to ask for higher salaries. They will likely find a new employer if their current boss cannot meet their expectations. 

Ms. Dass also believed that employers must adjust benefits schemes and work policies to meet the changing expectations of candidates and employees. 

Commenting on employees' preference for working remotely, she said that employers that plan to make hybrid work a permanent part of their workforce culture after the pandemic should also begin to roll out policies ASAP so they can retain their employees.

 

Randstad's 2022 Salary and Bonus Expectations poll was conducted online from Feb 7 until 14 and gathered responses from 300 workers based in Singapore.

The agency said that the survey, whose results were published on Tuesday (Mar 15), highlights how employers are rewarding their employees after a year of economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.

 

Source: The Straits Times