Compensation and benefit surveys have long been offered by professional associations as valuable benchmarking tools. Traditionally, these studies have been conducted by sending forms to members to complete, tabulating data once a sufficient amount had been received, and then distributing reports of the aggregated data to members several weeks to months after the start of the process. While the data gleaned through this traditional process was certainly valuable, it was anything but fresh and certainly not malleable to an individual’s unique demographics.
Dynamic Benchmarking has made significant improvements to this process by collecting and aggregating data online, in real time, at the member’s convenience. Because of the simplification of the data collection process, associations are now able to expand the scope of their surveys to include questions on competencies, experience level, accreditations and more. This expanded scope provides even greater value not only to organizations, but to individuals as well as they compare themselves to their peers. Adding the use of customizable filters such as gender, location and years of experience, makes the data becomes even more meaningful as users can see a true “apples-to-apples” comparison.
The greater depth and breadth of information collected and the ability to manipulate in ways meaningful to the individual organization or professional has expanded the usefulness of these surveys beyond simply comparing compensation packages to becoming what is now a true career assessment tool. Associations are now able to help individuals make career decisions by providing a platform that lets them compare their personal compensation, professional development and even job descriptions with their peers and this same data is also being used by organizations to ensure that their staff are fairly compensated as well as appropriately trained and accredited as compared to similar organizations.
The Association of University Programs in Health Administration (AUPHA) recently implemented just such a platform for their Compensation and Benefits Survey and immediately saw the increased value to its membership.
“Faculty are now able to enter their own data and then compare themselves against all other faculty members or against faculty that match a certain criteria via pre-set filters,” comments Lacey Mackey, Director of Membership for AUPHA. “This new format has been well received by the members, because they now have this important data right at their fingertips. And the most important thing, the system is easy to use and takes only minutes for faculty to enter their information and generate comparisons and reports.”
For information on online benchmarking and how to implement your own compensation and benefits survey platform, contact Dynamic Benchmarking today.
