Salary and Benefits Managers

A Day in the Life

As a salary and benefits manager, you are a key member of a company or organization's human resources team. Your colleagues may refer to you as a compensation manager, benefits managers or employee benefits specialist. Regardless of your title, you handle employee compensation systems to ensure that all of your employees are paid in a fair and timely fashion. You also work with company executives to find a benefits plan that fits the company's budget while offering excellent value to all employees.

You get to work every morning right as the corporate office of the business that you work for opens. Your company is in the midst of redesigning its compensation structure. As the compensation manager, you are in charge of this project. You check in with the employees who work under you in your HR department and then head to a meeting with company executives. You talk to executives about adjusting the personnel budget to meet the demands of the job market. During the meeting, you explain that salaries must be adjusted if your company expects to attract the top talent in your industry.

After your meeting, you head back to your office and check your phone messages and emails. You see that an employee at a satellite location is having problems with your company's insurance provider. First you call the employee so that you understand the nature of the problem and can best guide her. You listen to the employee's concerns and tell her that you'll call the insurance company and try to get everything sorted out. You place a call to the insurance company and leave a message for the person you need to speak with about your employee's problem.

For the rest of the morning, you work with your employees to sort out any minor benefits and compensation issues. You guide them as they prepare paperwork for your workers' compensation insurance provider. One of your teammates works with you to prepare budgetary projections based on the new information you received while talking with company leaders this morning.

You take a quick lunch so that you can meet with an employee who is leaving your company. You conduct an exit interview to determine why she's leaving and if there is anything that your company could improve so that employees don't quit. She mentions that her daughter has a serious medical issue and that your insurance simply didn't cover enough of the hospital costs. You make a note of this, deciding that you should talk to other employees about their experiences with the insurance company.

Before you leave for the day, you check in with your employees and briefly go over tomorrow's schedule. You put your office in order and pull out information about your insurance company so that you can evaluate whether or not the company's insurance plan is meeting employee needs.