Pay and Benefits

Showing 72 articles

Career Development

How to Negotiate Salary with Your Employer and Get the Raise You Deserve

By Venus Gentile, Monster Contributor

A crucial element of job satisfaction and happiness is getting paid what you deserve. If you're earning less than what your skills, experience, and contributions are worth, it can lead to decreased job satisfaction and a lack of commitment to the company and its goals. Therefore, knowing how to negotiate salary using a positive and informed approac...

Career Development

How to Handle a Pay Cut and Take Control of Your Career

By Venus Gentile, Monster Contributor

Are you facing the possibility of a pay cut? Whether it's due to changes at work or personal decisions, this can be a tricky situation to navigate. But with the right mindset and approach, you can manage this challenge effectively. In moments like these, it's essential to take a step back, assess your options, and think about how you can adapt. ...

Career Development

Feel Like You’re Being Underpaid? Here’s What to Do About It

By Jennifer Verta, Monster Contributor

Do you suspect you’re being paid lower than others in the same role as you? Being underpaid, meaning that you’re receiving lower compensation than others for the exact same job in the same industry and location is frustrating, and unfortunately all too common. The wage gap is still very real, especially if you’re a woman or belong to a minority....

Career Development

Is a Flexible Spending Account Right for You?

By Jennifer Verta, Monster Contributor

Does your new benefits package include an FSA? But, wait, what does FSA stand for? This financial benefit is a Flexible Spending Arrangement. If you’re already feeling overwhelmed by basic healthcare related terms such as In-Network, HDHP, HSA, co-pays and deductibles don’t worry. In this article we’ll help you unpack the FSA, aka the flexible spen...

Career Development

How Does Maternity Leave Work? We Have the Details on Pay and More

By Camilla Andersson, Monster Contributor

If you’re getting ready for a new child to arrive, or are planning to have one soon, chances are that the costs involved have been on your mind. No matter how exciting it is to become a mom, concern about missing paychecks can hamper joy. Maternity leave can help you bond with your new child and recover after childbirth, but how long is maternity l...

Career Development

What Is Paternity Leave and How Can it Work for You?

By Venus Gentile, Monster Contributor

There's no overstating the pride and excitement of becoming a dad. The birth or adoption of a child marks the beginning of an extraordinary time in your life. And while this significant life transition can be an enriching experience for you, it also brings challenges. A shift in your priorities and a change in lifestyle can take some adjusting to, ...

Career Development

Federal Government Salaries: The General Schedule (GS)

By Martina Mascali, Monster Contributor

The General Schedule (GS) is the most common pay system for federal government salaries. It is used for more than 1.5 million civilian white-collar employees worldwide in administrative, technical, professional, and clerical positions. Other types of federal government salaries are paid via the LEO scale used for law enforcement officers, whereas t...

Career Development

How to Negotiate Equity in a Startup

By Jennifer Verta, Monster Contributor

Working for young, ambitious companies, the so-called startups, can be exciting, refreshing and teach you a ton of valuable experience. However, there’s no doubt that joining one is, to some extent, a gamble. For example, choosing to work for equity, meaning for a stake of the business itself, instead of or in addition to your salary, is certainly ...

Career Development

How Many Hours Do Nurses Work?

By Martina Mascali, Monster Contributor

Are you interested in a nursing career and are asking yourself “how many hours do nurses work?” On average the answer is 30 to 40 hours per week with shifts of eight to 16 hours per day, but that is not always the case. Since nurses provide care to patients in a multitude of settings, labor laws change from state to state, and the nation faces an o...

Career Development

The Gender Pay Gap is Real

By Venus Gentile, Monster Contributor

The Equal Pay Act was established in 1963 in response to a lengthy campaign of dispute against wage disparity in the United States. Although the act was a significant breakthrough for improving gender equality, the gender pay gap remains a persistent concern. But despite the substantial movement toward pay equity and the immense gains made by women...

Career Development

How Much Should I Save For Retirement?

By Martina Mascali, Monster Contributing Writer

Whether you just started working or you're nearly done, it is never too soon or too late to ask yourself “how much should I save for retirement?” Always staying on top on your current finances can also help you with predicting your future needs, which is a vital tactic to figure out the best way to save for retirement for you. Those who begin think...

Career Development

What to write in a maternity leave out-of-office email

By Dawn Papandrea, Monster contributor

Taking a few weeks or months off from work to care for a new addition is an exciting time, and can be seamless if you plan and prepare. One of the things you’ll want to do is create a maternity leave out-of-office email to let your clients, contacts, and colleagues know where you are and who can help them with their inquiry. The last thing you w...

Career Development

What Is Short-Term Disability? Here's How to Apply for a Leave

By Camilla Andersson, Monster Contributor

Are you worried about lost income from work because of a health issue? Short-term disability insurance gives you monthly payments when you’re unable to work due to an illness or injury. While long-term disability insurance covers you for a longer period of time, you’re statistically much more likely to use short-term disability at some point in you...

Career Development

How to take a personal day

By Laura J. Vogel, Monster contributor

When it comes to taking paid time off in America, the reality is stark. Over half of Americans don’t use all of the vacation days you’ve accrued each year, though disconnecting from work is one of the top ways to counteract burnout. Personal days—if you’re lucky enough to have them included in your benefits package—can feel even more nebulous and d...

Career Development

Is Wage Stagnation Reason Enough to Leave Your Job?

By Vicki Salemi, Monster career expert

You know the drill: You work hard, get noticed and are rewarded with a big, fat raise on an annual basis. That’s how it goes, right? So what's with this wage stagnation holding you down? Womp womp. Enter reality. You work hard—as in really hard, as in holding-a-sandwich-in-your-left-hand-as-you-type-with-your-right-hand-during-lunchtime hard....

Career Development

8 health insurance questions to ask before accepting a job offer

By Dawn Papandrea, Monster contributor

You might be a slick negotiator when it comes to salary and time off, but health insurance is increasingly becoming a more and more important factor when choosing a new employer and deciding whether or not to accept a job offer. For one thing, your health benefits should be comprehensive; you don’t want to be stuck with inadequate coverage shoul...

Career Development

What Is Bereavement Leave?

By Daniel Bortz, Monster contributor

Losing a loved one is never easy, and neither is going back to work when you’re grieving. But many companies offer their employees time off for bereavement, which is a period of time characterized by deep grief and mourning. Bereavement leave is paid time away from work that an employee can use for a variety of purposes after the death of a love...

Career Development

How much should consultants charge?

By Dawn Papandrea, Monster contributor

After years of experience in the workforce, you’ve got a valuable bank of knowledge that companies are eager to pay good money to leverage. Consulting jobs, freelancing, and contract work are hot topics and poised to get even hotter. As such, although these's no hard and fast contractor salary out there, you’d better have an answer to the question,...

Career Development

Why you shouldn't take a job just for the money

By Elana Lyn Gross, Monster contributor

It’s the best and worst scenario. You’re staring at a very lucrative job offer. How lucrative? Very. As in, you can finally get your own apartment (or car—or both). Hey, you’ve earned it! But something isn’t quite sitting right with you. The job seems…just ok. Maybe even a little not-OK. Ugh, but would you really turn down all that money? Look, ...

Career Development

14 part-time jobs most likely to offer health insurance

By Lily Martis, Monster contributor

There can be many benefits to working a part-time job. Working moms and dads can spend more time with their kids, students can put their earnings toward their tuition, and aspiring business owners can have a steady cashflow while pursuing their passion. Heck, some part-time jobs even pay just as well as a full-time job. But what about health ins...

Career Development

20 companies that offer great fertility benefits

By Lily Martis, Monster staff

Being a parent is often described as the most rewarding life experience. Unfortunately, though, infertility impacts one-in-eight Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s national survey of family growth. To help, people often turn to costly fertility treatments, such as in-vitro fertilization (IVF), in which an em...

Career Development

Tis the Season: Uplift Your Holiday Spirit with a Christmas Bonus

By Dillon Price, Monster Contributor

You’ve worked hard all year long to help your employer meet its goals. While you no longer expect gifts under the tree from Santa Claus, you may be looking forward to some extra cash for presents, travel, and other holiday expenses. Or you’re hoping that your employer will spread some holiday cheer during the next virtual holiday party. Yet, you’re...

Career Development

Companies that include caregiver support in their employee benefits packages

By Jeanne Kal, Monster staff

Employee benefits are a major piece of any job offer you’ll ever consider, and with good reason. From health insurance to paid time off, the compensation is money in your pocket. Naturally, depending on where you are in your life, certain benefits will be more important to you. For instance, if you’re planning on starting (or growing) your family,...

Career Development

The best way to ask for time off at a new job

By Jon Simmons, Monster contributor

Regardless of the reason you need to be out from work, paid time off (PTO) is precious when you’re working a full-time job. However many annual paid days off you’re granted in your acceptance package—12, 15, 18—they stand out. But if you’ve just started, your vacation days might not be available to you yet. Many companies require you to accrue d...

Career Development

7 companies with epic wellness programs

By Lily Martis, Monster staff

Remember that New Year’s resolution you made to get healthy? We’re guessing the majority of you haven’t given it much thought since. We totally get it—it’s hard to balance work and wellness. At some companies, though, it’s a little easier, thanks to the awesome workplace wellness programs they offer. While workplace wellness programs aren’t a...

Career Development

New study shows when waiters earn the best tips

By Lily Martis, Monster staff

Any restaurant server is all-to-aware of this bitter reality: One night you take home hundreds of dollars in tips and the next, you go home with a few measly singles. Typically, working as a waiter or waitress, you have no idea how long you’ll be working for, how busy your shift will be or whether you’ll get stuck with that wonderful customer wh...

Career Development

How to tell if your employer's health insurance benefit is any good

By Stacy Rapacon, Monster contributor

Question: What’s worse than getting sick? Answer: Getting sick and getting stuck with a huge bill. Health insurance is supposed to prevent both of those things—the getting sick and the huge bill. But that’s not the case with all plans and providers, which vary wildly. That’s why an employer’s health insurance benefits can add a lot to the ...

Career Development

Ask Vicki: Is it okay to ask a recruiter for a job's pay range before applying to it?

By Vicki Salemi, Monster career expert

Each week, Monster’s career expert Vicki Salemi—a former recruiter who utilizes 15-plus years of experience in recruiting and human resources to empower job seekers—answers user questions on Quora. We’ll be republishing the answers here. If you have a question for Vicki, send it to socialmedia@monster.com. Q. Is it okay to ask a recruiter about ...

Career Development

How to figure out what you should earn at your first job

By Daniel Bortz, Monster contributor

When you’re fresh out of college or early in your career, negotiating your first salary can feel like you’re trying to hit a moving target—blindfolded. First, you don’t have any personal salary history to start from. Second, most companies don’t publish their employees’ salary information. And, third, odds are, none of your college courses covered ...

Career Development

Companies that offer tuition reimbursement

By Caroline Zaayer Kaufman, Monster contributor

Pop quiz: What makes you valuable to an employer? No, it’s not your winning smile (though we bet it’s pretty impressive). The correct answer is your skill set. Growing your skill set plays a big part in advancing your career—unfortunately, that can get pricey. But there's help to be had! Companies that offer tuition reimbursement aren’t about to le...

Career Development

5 companies that will pay 100% of your health insurance premiums

By Dominique Rodgers, Monster contributor

When it comes to employee benefits, today’s companies are offering everything from fully stocked office kitchens to video game consoles in the break room to telecommuting options. And yet, all those new-fangled bells and whistles aren’t detracting from the allure of good old-fashioned health benefits. Health care/medical benefits is the No. 2 benef...

Career Development

Which employee benefits are actually worth getting excited about?

By Vicki Salemi, Monster career expert

Back in the day, companies used to offer basic benefits packages—you know, medical, dental, prescription programs and 401(k) matching. Now? There’s a whole lot more on the table, ranging from the practical (paid sick leave) to the practically unbelievable (in-house massage services). According to the 20th anniversary edition of SHRM's yearly Emp...

Career Development

5 remote areas where RNs can make surprisingly good money

By Catherine Conlan, Monster contributor

If the idea of wide-open spaces appeals to you, you’re in luck: Nurses in some nonmetropolitan areas can make much more than the median annual wage of $71,000, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The reasons some of these salaries are so high varies, says Peter McMenamin, an economist with the American Nurses Association. “Sometimes it...

Career Development

6 companies with sweet time-off perks

By Caroline Zaayer Kaufman, Monster contributor

Remember when you were a kid and the unmitigated joy you felt when you got to stay home from school for a day or two? Ah, there’s nothing like a day off—except, of course, many days off, especially when you’re getting paid to do so. But increasingly, it seems employees aren’t taking advantage of their days off. According to the U.S. Travel Assoc...

Career Development

9 companies that offer unlimited vacation days

By Caroline Zaayer Kaufman, Monster contributor

Of all the innovative job perks popping up in the workplace, one old standby keeps its appeal year after year: Vacation days. Nothing quite sweetens a job offer like the promise of plentiful paid time off. Though the average full-time American worker gets 10 to 20 days of paid vacation a year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a growing ...

Career Development

Silicon Valley interns are making way more than the average worker

By Kristen Felicetti

Ambitious college students are gearing up for their summer jobs, and the lucky ones who scored Silicon Valley internships may well be earning more than you. That’s right: Valley tech startups are not just paying employees in college credit and free lunches anymore—at some of the top tech companies, the median monthly base salary for an engineeri...

Career Development

Can you guess how much the average CEO makes?

How much do you think the average CEO makes? A few million? Or a few dozen million? If you’re anything like most Americans, you’re probably guessing far under the mark, a new study says—finding that the majority of workers think CEOs make $1 million annually. The actual figure is about 10 times that. Stanford University’s Rock School for Corporate ...

Career Development

How you should budget your first paycheck

The first paycheck from a new job is like a freshly baked apple pie. When you see it, you’re not sure how exactly to divide it, and you probably want to devour it all immediately. One thing is for sure—on either side of this metaphor, an impulsive approach will leave you regretting your decision. Money management is a foreign concept to many ...

Career Development

If you're a PA or an NP, this is how to improve your pay and better your career

Physician assistants (PAs) and nurse practitioners (NPs) provide many benefits to health care teams—and yet, they’re not always given the credit they deserve. In fact, most health care facilities classify them as ancillary staff, therefore categorizing them as “overhead” instead of revenue generators. These providers are often overlooked when it...

Career Development

5 companies that will help you pay back your student loans

Could student loan repayment be the next big thing in benefits? We’d certainly like to think so: With total student debt topping a trillion dollars in the US, education-related perks could be a surefire way for companies to attract job-seeking millennials. While many companies will pay for you to get more education via tuition reimbursement prog...

Career Development

Do you think waiters should get higher wages or tips?

By Robert Fucci

If you're a waiter or waitress, a good tip can make all the difference in your shift. Maybe it's the extra cash that will help you to make a special purchase, or it's the money you need to get you through to your next paycheck. But a growing number of eating establishments are saying "no" to gratuities, which definitely could change the game for...

Career Development

Most Unique Environmentally-Friendly Benefits at Green Companies

Everyone’s going green. In the last 10 years, environmentally-friendly or “green” innovation has sprung from nearly every corner of every industry — high-efficiency electric cars have zipped into the marketplace, organic foods stuff grocery store walls, the phrases “high efficiency” and “washing machine” have never felt so inseparable. In par...

Career Development

What's Inside an International Compensation Package?

By Dona DeZube, Monster Finance Careers Expert

Negotiating compensation can be tricky in the US, but if you’re offered an international job, compensation issues grow exponentially more complex. While packages differ by company, some items appear in most international employment offers: a housing allowance, help paying taxes, spousal employment help and trips home. Those extra items can more ...

Career Development

Sales commissions: Find the plan that works for you

By Dona DeZube, Monster Finance Careers Expert

For every sales representative, there’s a perfect product and a perfect commission structure. Finding both leads to sales success. Common structures for sales commissions include being paid a high salary with low commission or being paid based on individual sales, territory sales volume, a share of the profits, bringing in new business, maintaining...

Career Development

5 non-traditional benefits to be thankful for

By Jon Simmons, Monster contributor

Nothing screams boring more than “401k,” “flexible spending,” or “dental insurance.” Enjoy planning for retirement? Might as well list alphabetizing your books on tape as one of your interests. Yawn. Obviously these benefits are core to many company’s benefits packages—and they should be. No one likes cavities and small bank accounts. But increa...

Career Development

When Friends Ask the Money Question (And What to Definitely Not Do)

You love them, but sometimes your friends ask inane questions, like, “How much money are you making?” Let’s face it. Recently, you were all racing to get to class on time; now you’re in the workforce – Adultland – and for some, this means the starting gun has fired and the race to riches is on. You may be stuffing your pockets. You may be ear...

Career Development

When does a commute become paid working time?

By Ed Zalewski, Monster Contributing Writer

Two provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) that otherwise appear simple sometimes come into conflict. Employers don’t have to pay their non-exempt (hourly) employees for an ordinary commute to and from work, even if an employee reports to different locations. Companies do, however, have to pay such employees for travel that they require ...

Career Development

Must employees be paid for time spent prepping for the work day?

By Katie Loehrke, Guest Blogger

Many employers have employees who must arrive to work before their official start times to get their workstations ready for work. For example, a call center employee who works from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. may need to arrive to work several minutes early to boot up a computer, log in to company systems, and otherwise be ready to take the first call at 9 a....

Career Development

5 States that Will Take the Most of Your Paycheck in Income Taxes

By Monster Contributor

By Caroline Zaayer Kaufman Monster Contributing Writer If you’re planning a move to another state for work it might be wise to consider what you’ll pay in property tax, sales tax and, of course, how big of a chunk the state government is going to take out of your paycheck. The federal government will get its share wherever you go, but states ca...

Career Development

10 things to know about workers' compensation

By Dona DeZube, Monster Finance Careers Expert

When you slice off your finger working in the deli, fall off your executive chair and crack your skull, or develop an illness because of your job, workers’ compensation is supposed to cover your medical costs and pay you for any days of work you miss. Almost all employers have to buy workers’ comp insurance. But workers’ comp doesn’t cover ever...

Career Development

Jobs where women make more than men

By Lydia Dishman, Monster contributor

Do women get paid less than men? The data doesn't lie. Research from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) shows that if the gender wage gap continues to close as slowly as it has over the last 50 years, it will take until 2056 for women’s earnings to equal men’s. “The labor market has changed dramatically during the last few decades...

Career Development

Working for Less: When It's OK to Take a Pay Cut

By Dona DeZube, Monster Finance Careers Expert

Salaries, like the stock market, are taking a beating in the current economy, and that has people puzzling over changes in pay. Workers who’ve been laid off worry their salary history will eliminate them from job opportunities in this new budget-conscious business environment. Those who still have their jobs are sometimes asked to take a cut in sal...

Career Development

Four Types of Pay Cuts

By Caroline Potter, Monster contributor

Recession. Slowdown. Correction. Whatever you want to call it, when the economy is suffering, the effects of this are far-reaching and impact almost every job sector. Layoffs abound as do hiring freezes and pay cuts. As we saw with the 2008 recession and Covid-19 pandemic, employers are sometimes forced to furlough staff and reduce salaries if t...

Career Development

Are You Really Exempt?

By Larry Buhl, Monster Contributing Writer

One of the most common mistakes employers make is misclassifying employees. Qualifying exempt employees get salaries but not overtime pay. Nonexempt employees are usually hourly workers and sometimes misclassified salaried employees who must be paid overtime. If you’ve been misclassified as an exempt employee, your company may owe you money. Exe...

Career Development

Be a Bottom-Line Contributor by Saving Your Company Money

By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

When analyzing what it cost her company to appear at the industry's leading trade show the previous year, a marketing professional turned up a variety of costs -- like exorbitant furniture rentals from the convention producer -- that were ripe for reduction. Her solutions -- including buying furniture from stylish discount chains for much less than...

Career Development

Learn to Manage Your Sales Income

By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

Any salesperson will tell you the downside of the “unlimited potential” of commission-based compensation: The unlimited potential for your personal income to plummet when business or seasonal cycles head south. But salespeople often have trouble facing this music. “The number one person that salespeople must sell is themselves,” says John Sestin...

Career Development

Should You Bill by the Hour or Project?

By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

There's more than one way to make a buck. You can charge your client by the hour, or you can negotiate a set fee for the entire project. Which is the best business decision? To some extent, it depends upon the nature of the services you perform. However, the independent professionals we spoke with recently surprised us with their strong consensu...

Career Development

Hourly vs. Flat Rate for Auto Techs

By Jim MacPherson, Monster Contributing Writer

Automotive technicians are generally paid by the amount of work they produce (known as “flat rate” compensation), or by the hour. Some shops combine hourly pay with incentives for above-average productivity. Here’s what to consider when determining which is right for you: Defining the Terms In a shop that pays by the hour, employees are compensate...

Career Development

Is Long-Term Care Insurance Through Your Employer a Worthwhile Option?

By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

As Baby Boomers watch their aging parents grow frail, long-term care and its escalating costs are of increasing concern to mature workers. With nursing-home care running around $81,000 annually, according to a 2012 Genworth Financial survey and assisted-living and home-care costs rising, forward-looking Boomers are considering the purchase of in...

Career Development

What's the difference between exempt and nonexempt workers?

By Paul W. Barada, Monster contributor

Exempt and nonexempt: You've likely seen these terms when filling out an application, noticed them in job postings and heard them used in conversation. But if you're like most people, the difference between the two categories is fuzzy at best. Do you even know what exempt workers are exempt from? Let's start at the beginning. The Fair Labor Standa...

Career Development

Entry-Level Salary (Probably) Isn't as Negotiable as You Think

By Peter Vogt, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

Even in the best of economic times, salary negotiation is a risky proposition for most new college graduates pursuing entry-level positions. Sure, you might have some bargaining leverage these days if you’ve majored in a hot field like accounting or engineering, or if you’ve developed some rare skill that is very much in demand among prospectiv...

Career Development

The Working Uninsured

By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

How do lives unravel? For working people, it often begins with a measure of bad luck and accelerates with the loss of health insurance. And so it goes for Risé Horton. “We had health coverage [in 2006], but my husband had a heart attack in February, lost his job, and so we lost coverage,” says Horton, a team lead quality inspector with Quality Ind...

Career Development

Be Paid What You're Really Worth

By Barbara Stanny

I asked more than 150 high-earning women, "Are you doing this for the money?" The overwhelming response was a definite no. What drove them were passion, recognition, challenge and independence. At the same time, they wanted to be well-compensated, because they felt they were worth it. But that's not the case with most of us. We instinctively dev...

Career Development

Hospitals Offer Creative Benefits to Recruit and Retain Nurses

By Linda Childers, Monster Contributing Writer

Despite the nursing shortage, Yakima Valley Memorial Hospital in Yakima, Washington, has no problem attracting a steady steam of job candidates. “We’ve never offered nurses a sign-on bonus,” says Kathy Franz, the hospital’s director of human resources. “Sign-on bonuses typically keep nurses in their jobs for two years. Our goal is to attract can...

Career Development

A Job's Worth

By Paul W. Barada, Monster Salary and Negotiation Expert

Many job seekers think employers, as a general rule, try to hire them for substantially less than they're worth. While there's nothing wrong with negotiating a better compensation package, consider that employers focus on what the job is worth, not what you think you're worth. For many companies, determining what a job is worth depends on a variety...

Career Development

A Recruiter's Take on Salary

By Paul W. Barada, Monster Salary and Negotiation Expert

On whose behalf do recruiters work? This is a common question Monster members post to the Salary & Negotiation Tips message board. And according to Sara Zimmerman, technical recruiter for Adecco Technical, this is how it all plays out: "There has to be a position to fill first, so I'm hired by the employer to find a candidate. But I want the candid...

Career Development

Calculate Your Benefits' Worth to Evaluate the Offer

By Peter Vogt, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

The best way to put a dollar value on benefits as part of a job offer is to ask the prospective employer to do it for you, says management expert Lonnie Pacelli, author of The Project Management Advisor. Jim Greeley, director of career services at Merrimack College in North Andover, Massachusetts, acknowledges that might make you nervous, as it ...

Career Development

Know Your Adoption Benefits

By Dan Woog, Monster Contributing Writer

For years, American companies have offered benefits like paid leave and medical-care reimbursement to employees having a baby. Many employers feel it's the right thing to do -- and it's the law. But not every employee has a child through birth. Some adopt. Now, spurred by increasing numbers of international adoptions, greater acceptance of adopt...

Career Development

Perks Keep Public Accountants at Work

By Dona DeZube, Monster Finance Careers Expert

There's no getting around it: Public accountants work a lot of hours. But accounting firms are betting that family- and work/life balance-friendly benefits like telecommuting, on-site day care and formal programs to help returning employees ease back into the workplace after a leave will keep more accountants on the job. Given the resources firms i...

Career Development

Know Tip Policies Before You Take a New Restaurant Job

By Jamie Popp, Monster Contributing Writer

Waiters love tips -- so long as they're the ones collecting them. But when it comes to sharing tips with fellow restaurant colleagues, or tipping out, some members of the wait staff aren't so enthusiastic. Tipping out and other policies vary from restaurant to restaurant and can have a sizeable impact on a waiter's take-home cash. Open tipping, ...

Career Development

Contractors Deserve Vacations, Too

By John Rossheim, Monster Senior Contributing Writer

Have you put yourself in the position of not getting a vacation every year since you became a contractor? You really shouldn't, because you need time off to rest, recharge and get to know your family and yourself again. That's why I've put together a six-step program to help you beat vacation avoidance syndrome and have your day in the sun. 1. B...

Career Development

The Benefits of Working for Uncle Sam

By Tammy Flanagan, Monster Contributing Writer

Want to make sure retirement treats you well? Work for Uncle Sam, and those golden years could have a little added shine. Not only are federal retirement benefits portable, but being the largest employer provides the government excellent leverage in securing benefits for its employees. Take the example of Jane Smith, a fictional but possible exa...