FA$T
(Financial Awarenes$ and Tracking)

Topic: Understanding Total Compensation Packages

Program Description: When engineering students near graduation and begin searching for employment, many of them will be receiving employment offers that for the first time contain compensation elements that go beyond a base hourly wage.  The purpose of this proposed S-PAVe is to educate student branch members about the types of compensation elements that are generally available, what their purpose is, how they are utilized, and whether they mesh with what a student may be looking for in an employer.  Following a review of this material, a student will realize that their is much more to selecting an employer than just picking the one that offers the highest annual salary.

Approach:  To make information regarding total compensation packages available to as many IEEE student members as possible, we are proposing the creation of a web site that documents compensation elements in a hypertext format.  This web site would outline the major types of benefits generally offered by employers.  Each compensation type would have drill down capability to actual specific elements that an employer may offer.  A description of what the purpose of each element is and how it may be utilized would be provided.  The following list outlines the compensation types, and their associated elements, that would be included on this proposed web site.

Direct Compensation

• Annual Base Salary
• High Performance Awards
• Result Sharing / Profit Sharing
• Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOP)
• Employee Stock Purchase Plane (ESPP)

Retirement Plans

• 401K Plans
• Pension Plan

Insurance

• Medical / Dental Plan
• Medical Reimbursement Accounts
• Dental Reimbursement Accounts
• Core Life Insurance
• Accidental Death or Dismemberment
• Long Term Disability
• Short Term Disability
• Subsidized Extended Insurance Options

Vacation and Leave

• Discretionary Leave Policy (Sick or Personal Days)
• Vacation
• Floating Holidays
• Holidays
• Flex Time

Educational Reimbursement

The above elements would be divided up and assigned to members of the implementation team.  Each member would then be responsible for researching and developing the web site content for that particular item.  Resources used to develop web site content include human resource departments, student placement offices, and practicing engineers.  Upon determination of content, the implementation team would decide on the graphical layout of the web site.  Content would then be implemented into the proposed layout by members of the implementation team familiar with web site design.  Materials required to implement this project
include access to personal computers and to a web server.  Web site construction would be performed by expertise within the student implementation team.  It is anticipated that the web site will be visited by all student branch members within the school.  With proper promotion, the web site can also be made available to student branch members from other universities; thereby, greatly increasing the possible impact of the proposed project.

Suggested Time Frame:  The web site would remain in operation as long as its content was accurate and pertinent.

Intended Outcomes:  The purpose of this SPAVe is to educate the IEEE student branch members on how to evaluate all of the compensation components that may comprise an employment offer.  The anticipated tangible outcomes of this project are a well designed informative web site detailing each type of compensation available, and a written project planning document.  Intangible benefits of this project include:  the knowledge gained by students viewing the web site, the experience gained by the web site implementation team, and the contacts made by the implementation team while researching content for the web site.

Milestones for this project include:

1. Organization of a planning committee within the student branch.
2. Appointment of implementation team members.
3. Contact with possible financial sources.
4. Development of a written proposal outlining the proposed project
5. Receipt of letters endorsing the proposed project.
6. Submission of the proposed project to IEEE.
7. IEEE approval of the proposed project.
8. Receipt of IEEE funding.
9. Initiation of project development.
10. Completion of the content to be used in the web site.
11. Completion of the web site graphical layout design.
12. Implementation of the web site.
13. Promotion of the web site to fellow student branch members.
14. Distribution of thank you letters to key people.
15. Submission of final report to IEEE