A study on rewards satisfaction amongst employees at Petronas Exploration and Petroleum Engineering Departments

Due to the changes in the general business environment, new developments and revisions to existing benefits programs have occurred. The three key factors affecting benefits offering are shifts in workforce compositions, new legislation, and the rising cost of medical care. The significant changes to the composition of workforce are due to the
increasing participation of women, the increasing proportion of dual-income families
and the arrival of the new generation into the labour force. The passing of the new legislation has also placed additional pressure for employers to enhance their benefits programs for example the American Disability Act 1990. The overall rising health care costs has also translated to higher contributions to employers and has forced them to be more innovative in strategizing the employee benefits plans to tackle the rising health care costs. Hence, the objectives of the study were to examine the level of current rewards satisfaction amongst PETRONAS employees and to analyse the difference of benefits preferences by age, gender, and category of employees. The reward satisfaction is measured based on five items i.e. pay level, raises level, benefits level, administration and structure level and training & development. A total of 300 respondents from Petroleum Engineering and Exploration Departments, PETRONAS Carigali Sdn Bhd were randomly selected as sample of the study and data was analysed using “Statistical Package for Social Science” (SPSS Window) Version 20.0. The tests involved are Pearson Correlation Coefficient, Multiple Regression, etc. The results of the findings demonstrated that current benefits plan has the strong relationship with rewards satisfaction, and there are different preferences of benefits based on age, gender and category of employees. Hence the findings showed that PETRONAS employees are satisfied with the current benefits scheme provided to them