While competitive pay continues to be crucial in recruitment and retention, it’s not enough to keep people from handing in their notice or choosing to work with your competition.
One of the most effective ways to make your company a desirable employer and make your people want to keep working for you is to invest in their overall job satisfaction by providing them with the perks and benefits they want most. These perks are extra incentives outside of a regular salary and government-required allowances and can be cash-based or non-monetary.
Let’s look at some of the best employee perks we’re inspired by.
Do “Perks” Really Matter?
Yes, workplace benefits really matter. In today’s ultra-competitive hiring market, a generous benefits package is essential for attracting and retaining top talent.
A good set of employee benefits and perks helps workers stay happy, create work-life balance, learn career skills, take control of their schedules, and become more engaged, productive, and creative. They’re also less likely to send their resumes to your competition.
The Best Employee Perks We’ve Seen
Here are some of the best employee perks that can help excite, motivate, and inspire your staff as well as attract top talent to the recruiting process:
Regular Employee Recognition
Regular employee recognition at work is an important perk that employers can leverage to increase productivity, boost morale and engagement, improve employee satisfaction, streamline retention, build positive relationships, prevent burnout, create a healthy company culture, and decrease absenteeism and turnover.
A big part of ensuring your employees feel valued is offering positive feedback, recognition, and rewards for their achievements. Research has shown that nearly 70% of employees would work harder if they felt that their efforts were recognized, while 82% consider recognition an essential part of their happiness at work.
Recognition should be given regularly and focus on each employee’s achievements separately. The more frequently employees receive individual recognition, the greater the effect. A good employee recognition program is timely, involves all management levels, includes monetary and non-monetary rewards, ties to company values, and recognizes big and small accomplishments.
Flexible Schedule
Without a doubt, flexible schedules are one of the most important perks employees want from their employers. In fact, 92% of millennials identify flexibility as a top priority when job hunting. A Flexjobs survey found that 80% of respondents said they’d be more loyal to their employer if they provide flexible working arrangements.
Allowing employees to own their schedules comes with tremendous benefits. Apart from attracting top-tier talent, your employees will have a better work-life balance, work more during their most productive hours, and become more engaged with their work. That translates to increased productivity, lower turnover rates, and improved profitability for your company.
A flexible schedule can include:
- Flextime: Employers with a flextime policy allow their workers to stagger arrival and departure times as necessary, as long as they work their contracted number of hours.
- Telecommuting: Allows employees to work outside the physical workplace, such as a home office or coworking space. They may telecommute daily or only during special conditions, such as inclement weather.
- Remote work: While remote work and telecommuting are often used interchangeably, remote work can differ from telecommuting regarding whether physical attendance is required and whether employees need to live near the workplace. Often, companies employing remote workers will have staff located in different countries.
- Hybrid work: This flexible work schedule is where some staff will work onsite, some will work off-site via telecommuting or remote working, and others will have the freedom to work onsite on some days and off-site on others, based on circumstances, objectives, and personal preferences.
- Condensed schedules: Instead of a five-day workweek, a condensed schedule fits the same amount of work over a shorter amount of time, such as three or four days, giving the employee an additional day or two off during the week.
- Reduced schedules: Working fewer hours than the standard workweek constitutes a reduced or part-time schedule.
Wellness Program
Employees are invaluable assets of any company, and their mental and physical health usually directly affects company productivity and profitability. But the sedentary nature and demands of the American work-life make it harder for employees to stay healthy, increasing their risk of diabetes, cardiovascular issues, depression, and anxiety.
Workplace wellness programs are one of the best employee perks you can offer to promote good health behaviors, improve workers’ lives, and create a workplace wellness culture. When you offer your employees a wellness program, you show them that you care about them and want to do everything you can to keep them in good overall health and optimal performance. This makes them feel welcome and valued as essential parts of the organization.
Wellness programs can bring your organization immense benefits, such as increased productivity, better employee engagement, decreased absenteeism and burnout, improved employee morale and retention, and reduced health risks and healthcare costs. People are happier, more energetic, creative, and innovative when they are healthy.
Examples of employee wellness initiatives include healthy lunch and snacks, assistance programs for issues such as substance abuse, stress, anxiety, and depression, wellness screenings, fitness activities like onsite gym services, and fitness classes and community service activities.
Clear Development Plans
According to a recent Gallup study, 65% of workers believe employer-provided upskilling is very important when evaluating a potential new job. In comparison, 48% of American workers would switch to a new job if offered skills training opportunities. So, if your organization aims to attract and keep the best talent, you should make an employee development plan a core component of your benefits package.
Employees plateau when they feel they’ve reached a professional dead-end, but development plans ensure they progress, stay engaged within their role, and give them the confidence to step up and take on more challenging tasks. This often results in higher performing employees, better employee engagement, improved job satisfaction, reduced staff turnover, and increased profitability.
Depending on your business objectives and the needs and goals of your employees, you can incorporate various types of professional development plans. Some of the most common include:
- Continuing education courses: This development plan may be a good fit for those interested in pursuing a higher degree or certification to help them win a promotion opportunity. A professional development plan could also include tuition reimbursement.
- Professional organizations and seminar participation: This can include attending conferences and workshops hosted by partner organizations, serving as a board member, or coordinating events sponsored by the organization. These events should offer opportunities for employees to network and take on a more active role in their organization and industry.
- Increased duties and responsibilities: This may involve learning about new developments in the industry to stay competitive in the field. Alternatively, employees may take on more challenging responsibilities to help them advance in their roles.
Child Care
Childcare benefits are becoming a huge factor for many working parents when deciding on their next job. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, both parents work in about 60% of the households with children in the US, but only 6% of companies offer childcare benefits to their employees.
Offering childcare benefits to your employees can help you stand out from the competition, attract top talent, and retain your employees longer while helping reduce working parents’ constant financial and emotional burden.
Working parents aren’t worried about their children’s safety or financial security with childcare benefits. This will make them more productive and engaged, and your company will enjoy lower turnover rates, improved attendance, and increased employee satisfaction and morale. Additionally, the Internal Revenue Service allows you to claim 10 to 25 percent of the cost— or up to $150,000—each year when you directly pay for an employee’s childcare expenses.
Different types of childcare benefits you can offer to your employees include onsite childcare, paid maternity and paternity leave, Flexible Spending Accounts (FSAs) that allow parents to set aside pre-tax dollars to pay for work-related daycare expenses, childcare subsidies, backup childcare, dependent care assistance programs, childcare center discounts, and flexible work schedules.
401k, Retirement Plan, or Pension
A great employee benefits idea to add to your compensation package is providing your full-time employees with financial security when they retire. Helping workers save for the years ahead can give your organization a competitive edge in attracting top talent—and keeping current employees engaged, productive, and loyal to the company.
401ks allow employees to deposit pre-tax dollars from each paycheck into a retirement account. Offering to match a set percentage of your employee’s contributions is a fantastic way to help employees save more money for retirement faster and encourage them to stick with your organization.
If your company can’t match contributions, consider offering extra retirement plan options like a traditional IRA or a Roth IRA. These options can help supplement their 401k account and boost their retirement savings.
The Best Employee Perks Give You the Chance to Have the Best Employees
At a time when record numbers of workers are voluntarily quitting their jobs, a thoughtful and generous benefits and perks package is crucial for keeping your best people around. You’ll maintain a healthy, motivated, and productive workforce while recruiting top talent to join your team. Visit the Refresh Platform to discover how we can help you meet your company’s wellness, communication, and engagement needs.