NEW YORK (CNN/Money) -
The number of employees who say feeling safe at work is a priority for their job satisfaction has jumped in the past two years, according a survey released Thursday.
The study, released by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) and the cable network CNNfn, found that 62 percent of employees surveyed feel safety at work is a "very important" issue, compared to only 36 percent in 2002.
In addition, the survey showed that women placed more importance on feeling safe in the workplace than men. But both genders said that feeling safe at work is one of the top five aspects of their overall satisfaction.
"Terrorist warnings in the U.S. and the wars in the Middle East have put employees' concerns for safety at the forefront," said Susan R. Meisinger, president and CEO of SHRM.
"Employers need to be keyed into what's important to employees in order to implement practices that will keep valuable employees satisfied and productive in the workplace," she added.
The survey also found that more employees are feeling satisfied with their jobs, as 77 percent of those surveyed said overall they are satisfied, up from 72 percent in October 2003.
When asked which components are "very important" to overall job satisfaction, benefits and compensation were also ranked among the highest in the survey.
The components that were the least important included networking, relationships with co-workers and job-specific training.
The survey was based on questions e-mailed to more than 1,000 human resource professionals and workers in the United States.
SHRM is a professional organization for human resources management that represents more than 175,000 individual members, while CNNfn and CNN/Money are owned by New York-based Time Warner Inc. (TWX: Research, Estimates)
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