Slightly more than half of survey respondents claimed to have been working for their present employers for 10 years or more. Another 28.7 percent said they had been with their current companies for more than five years. Only 7 percent of those responding had been working for their employers for less than 24 months. Perhaps it's the perks. Another 66 percent of respondents report that their companies provide tuition reimbursement programs for continuing education.
Salaries seem to be across the board for managers with bachelor's or master's degrees.
Only 2.2 percent of those responding to the survey hold Ph.D. certificates, so any salary conclusion at this level would not be accurate. Our biggest challenge for retaining workers is finding a way to provide the worker with a sense of ownership in the job. Interestingly, the Southwest beat out Canada's well-publicized labor efficiencies by about 1.5 percentage points. Salary increases for both managers and agents have an interesting synchronization, with most respondents predicting only a 2 percent to 5 percent pay raise for calendar year 2001. Our biggest challenge is allowing true advancement within the company, instead of paying lip service to the idea.