Are good coworker relationships more important than pay?

As much as we love to complain about our cubemates, most workers are actually quite happy with their coworkers, according to a recent poll from employment site Monster.com. What are workers’ real gripes? Low salaries. The survey, run in conjunction with the WageIndicator Foundation, discovered that almost eight out of 10 workers “find great satisfaction with the people they work with,” despite reporting dissatisfaction with their salaries.

U.S. workers are more satisfied with their coworkers than with their salaries. From Alper Çuğun.

The survey, which targeted workers globally as well as regionally throughout the U.S., found that wages in small U.S. firms (those with fewer than 10 employees) average $14 per hour; wages in U.S. firms with more than 5,000 employees are an average of $30 per hour. Yet, job satisfaction is lacking in both small and large firms, according to the study: “[W]hile employees at larger companies in the U.S. might be raking in higher wages, employees across the board are still relatively dissatisfied with how much they make.”

In fact, 65 percent of the U.S.-based employees surveyed were dissatisfied with their salary. But there’s good news, too: a majority — 77.6 percent, in fact — of employees are “relatively satisfied” with their relationships with their colleagues.

That satisfaction holds true in other countries, too. In comparing the U.S., Germany, Spain and the U.K., the survey shows that Germany reported the highest satisfaction in both wages and employee relationships, despite the fact that Germany’s wages are similar to the wages in the U.S. Over 50 percent of the Germans surveyed reported being satisfied with their pay, and more than 8 of 10 respondents reported satisfaction with their colleagues. Approximately 76 percent of workers in the U.K. were satisfied with their colleagues, while nearly 80 percent of Spanish survey takers reported colleague satisfaction.

(Average wages in each country varied, too: for example, the pay in small U.K. firms averaged $14.50 hourly, $10.10 hourly in Spain, and $14.80 in Germany; the pay in large firms in the U.K. averaged $22.30 hourly, $18.70 hourly in Spain, and $29.40 hourly in Germany.)

“Today we see a rapidly shifting, dynamic labor market, with pockets of tight demand and others of tight supply. This has made keeping current employees a priority for many employers, so while making room in budgets for pay increases isn’t always an option, there are other things that employers can do to keep employees happy and motivated to work hard,” Joanie Courtney, Senior Vice President, Market Development at Monster.com, said in a statement. “Fostering a collaborative and comfortable work environment and encouraging office activities is a great way to keep morale high in the office. In addition, rewarding employees with an extra vacation day when they’re doing great work is another way to show appreciation.”

As for takeaways, Martin Kahanec, Visiting Research Fellow at Harvard University’s Labor and Worklife Program and scientific director at Central European Labour Studies Institute summed up in a statement: “The survey indicates that in the U.S., workers are significantly more satisfied with their work relationships with colleagues than with their wages… This demonstrates that there are other factors besides wages that motivate U.S. employees to work hard and remain loyal to their colleagues and company.”