You’ve gotten the signoff from management and put together a competitive offer. All that’s left now is for them to accept—but they don’t. Despite a lucrative salary on the table, they decide to take a job with one of your competitors. Why?

Losing out on a great candidate is perhaps the most frustrating part of recruiting, especially if you’re confident that salary isn’t the issue. The fact is, though, that today’s top talent weighs much more than just income when deciding on who to work for. In fact, employees say many benefits are more important than salary; they range from flexible schedules to more empathetic bosses.

If you want to outperform the competition, you must focus on the most important employee benefits. Consider offering these innovative employee perks to secure more accepted offers. 

Best Employee Benefits

Health, dental, and vision insurance

Offering strong health, dental, and vision insurance was rated the most important of all employee perks by Fractl’s 2017 Employee Benefits Study. It was also the top benefit based on correlation to employees’ overall satisfaction with their employer’s benefits packages in a recent Glassdoor survey. 

By providing the best insurance plans possible, your employees will feel like you actually care about their overall health and well-being. This will lead to improved job satisfaction, which in turn will increase employee retention rates and productivity.

Providing high-quality, extensive health insurance will cost you more than many other “trendy” perks, such as free beer or yoga in the office. But it’s often a major factor in a candidate’s decision to accept a job offer, especially if they have a family relying on their coverage. Therefore, investing in expanding your employee health insurance coverage can give you a high ROI when you’re able to attract and retain top talent more effectively.

Paid family leave

A poll of more than 1,200 workers found that paid family leave was number one on the list of the most important employee benefits. The 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act made 12 weeks of maternity leave a requirement for companies with over 50 employees. Still, it doesn’t mandate that the leave be paid, and it doesn’t offer any benefit to new dads or caregivers of other family members, like aging parents.

58% of all workers said paid time off to care for family members was their most desired benefit. Among millennials, that number jumped to 64%. Though more employers are responding to the demand and adding paid family leave to their benefits package, progress is slow. It’s a perk accessible to just 14% of all civilian workers. Employers in finance and tech have made the greatest strides, with about a third of employees in these sectors able to take paid family leave.

If you want to stand out in the employer pool, offer this highly in-demand perk to ease the strain of caregiving.

Adoption and fertility coverage

With more people opting to have children later in life, there’s a growing conversation surrounding fertility issues since it becomes harder to conceive naturally with age. Thus, more employees are interested in coverage for fertility-related services like egg freezing and in vitro fertilization. Forward-thinking companies like Apple and Uber have begun to cover a portion of the cost for employees who wish to freeze their eggs.

Adoption is another option for starting a family, but it can be prohibitively expensive. Employers are stepping up to help their employees cover the costs. For example, Ferring Pharmaceuticals and Citizens Bank provide more than $20,000 in financial support toward team members who wish to pursue adoption.

The modern family can take many forms. Employers can stand out by offering unique employee benefits that serve the diverse ways their employees choose to plan and grow their families.

Sabbatical leave

Sabbaticals were once limited to academic professionals and only available after many years with one institution. That’s no longer the case. Though still relatively uncommon, about 17% of employers offer them—that’s compared to virtually none 40 years ago.

Taking an extended period of time off has obvious benefits for employees, like a reduction in stress, an increase in well-being, and a fresh sense of motivation to come back to work. However, there are upsides for the employer as well.

In research on the topic, organizations found that leaders who took a sabbatical of at least three months came back with new ideas for innovating in the organization and a greater level of confidence in their ability to lead. What’s more, the people who had stepped in to fill their shoes in the interim were more effective and responsible on the job when the leaders returned.

If you want to be as competitive as, say, Facebook, consider taking their lead on sabbaticals as an innovative employee perk. Facebook allows its employees to take 30 consecutive days of paid time off every five years.

Student loan repayment

With student loan debt in America soaring to an estimated $1.4 trillion and the average individual debt burden hovering around $37,000, it’s no wonder that student loan repayment is a highly attractive perk for candidates. In a 2017 study, 45% of professionals surveyed cited student loan repayment as the single most compelling employee benefit, while 58% said they would prefer receiving debt repayment assistance over additional retirement contributions.

Over 44 million Americans have student loan debt — yet less than 5% of companies currently offer student loan repayment assistance. However, this benefit has really picked up steam in recent years. From health insurance giant Aetna to beauty conglomerate Estee Lauder to Penguin Random House publishing, companies in all sectors are adding student loan repayment as the latest perk in their benefits package to attract the best and brightest talent. It will help you stand out from other competitors who aren’t offering these kinds of valuable and unique employee benefits to attract top talent — plus instilling in them a sense of loyalty and commitment to your company that will increase retention long-term.

Financial planning resources

A 401(k) with a company match is a great starting point for your financial benefits package, but it’s just the beginning of what you can offer to entice fiscally-minded candidates. Financial planning services are growing in popularity as part of the crop of unique employee benefits for 2020.

Help candidates see your organization as part of their bigger picture for the future by offering financial services above and beyond a retirement plan. This might include complimentary consultations with financial advisors, budgeting assistance, long-term financial planning, and even assistance with the homebuying process.

According to a survey by benefits provider Prudential Financial, the proportion of employers offering these so-called ‘financial wellness’ services rose 63 percentage points between 2015 and 2017. When said programs are offered, both employees and employers report greater satisfaction with their overall benefit plans.

Mental health support

In recent years, there’s been a growing national conversation on the topic of mental health and a push to destigmatize the treatment of mental health issues. Top employers are joining the effort, putting mental health benefits like counseling on equal footing with traditional health services like routine physicals and dental care.

Capital One Financial, for example, provides a range of useful mental wellness services through its Employee Assistance Program. Employees can receive telephone or face-to-face counseling through the program and find assistance coping with major life changes like moving or becoming a parent.

Emphasizing your employees’ mental well-being can go a long way toward achieving the all-important work-life balance and sense of fulfillment that the best talent craves.

Related: How to Improve Employees’ Mental Health

Wellness benefits

44% of organizations that invested in increasing their benefits offerings in the last 12 months enhanced their wellness benefits as part of their employee retention strategies. 

Wellness benefits include offering yoga in the office, creating a designated meditation space, or providing nutritional counseling services. With more than a third of employees saying they’d see a company-paid gym membership or access to an onsite fitness center as a valuable perk, many companies are also reimbursing gym memberships or looking for office spaces with a workout facility.

Investing in these benefits is valuable because they help your employees reduce anxiety and manage work-related stress, ultimately improving productivity and overall job satisfaction. This is also a proactive way to improve the overall health of your staff, which reduces the medical costs you’re required to pay later. In fact, wellness benefits can help reduce the likelihood of your employees developing four of the ten health conditions that are most costly to U.S. employers: chest pain, high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart attacks.

Pet insurance

The cost of veterinary care has been on a steady incline for years, spiking 11% from 2022 to 2023 alone. No pet parent wants to have to choose between paying their bills and getting their furry family member the medical care they need. Pet insurance is a viable solution to cover the costs, and it can be an attractive benefit to candidates who live in one of the 70% of U.S. households that own a pet. Pet insurance helps cover the cost of vet visits, medical procedures and medication, and works similarly to employer-sponsored health insurance when offered as a benefit. 

Subsidized child care

For parents, particularly mothers, re-entering or remaining in the workforce is challenging after having kids. Employer-subsidized childcare can make the choice an easier one. Childcare benefits typically cover a portion of a child’s daytime care costs before they reach school age. Some even cover after-school programs for older kids. It’s a meaningful way to support working parents and signal that family is important to your organization. 

Top Employee Perks

Remote and hybrid work

The ability to work remotely all or some of the time is one of the top factors candidates say they want when looking for a new job. Giving employees location flexibility enhances work-life balance and can even increase productivity, as employees feel empowered to work under the conditions that are most comfortable and conducive to work for them personally. 

Offering remote opportunities is a highly effective way to broaden your candidate pool. By some accounts, remote positions receive nearly three times as many applications as those that are strictly in-office. 

Four-day workweeks

As long as your employees are getting their jobs done, does it really matter what days the work takes place on? More employers are deciding that it doesn’t.

Microsoft made headlines when it reported a 40% increase in productivity after a trial run of being closed on Fridays in one of its Japan offices. New Zealand estate planning company Perpetual Guardian switched over to a four-day workweek permanently after a trial produced a 20% jump in productivity, reduced stress levels, and improved employee engagement.

Employees consistently say they crave greater work-life balance; if it’s feasible for your organization, offering a four-day workweek helps facilitate that while making a show of confidence in your employees’ ability to manage their schedules and workloads.

No scheduled work hours

Most of us are so used to a rigid work schedule that it’s hard to imagine not punching a clock, but one of the most innovative employee perks does away with working hours altogether.

Netflix, for example, doesn’t require employees to log work hours or be in the office at certain times. The company famously operates by the core principles of freedom and responsibility; as long as employees meet expectations and contribute positively, the company says they are free to create their own schedules.

Unlimited PTO

Do you sense a trend among these people on this list? If it’s not already incredibly obvious, a perk candidates overwhelmingly want is greater control of their time. Unlimited PTO is just one more way to give it to them. When you stop counting the number of hours or days employees take PTO, you signal your trust in them in a powerful way. Employees feel empowered and, as a result, valued, which is a crucial factor in retaining them. 

Blackout meeting hours

What’s more frustrating than getting a meeting request for 4 p.m. on a Friday? If it’s not urgent, it can probably wait until Monday. Some ingenious companies have turned this line of thinking into a perk by instituting blackout hours. 

Blackout hours are a set of times the company has deemed ‘off limits’ for meetings that aren’t absolutely necessary. Friday afternoons, as are the first and last hours of the workday, are a popular blackout time. 

Can employees adopt blackout hours on their own? Sure. However, the mandate being communicated as an official company policy carries much more weight and is, as such, much more attractive to candidates seeking to minimize meeting overload. 

Career development opportunities

For 86% of employees, professional and career development benefits are important to their overall job satisfaction. The most common benefit in this category is paying for an employee’s professional memberships to networking or industry-specific groups. You could also hold on-site workshops and training, send your employees to offsite events or conferences to develop further skills in their field or help cover certifications and professional license application or renewal fees.

These employee perks are incredibly beneficial to both parties. How? If your employees are stagnant and not continuously growing, they’ll quickly become bored in their position and want to make a career move. Plus, they won’t be learning any new skills that create additional value for your business. But, by investing in development opportunities, your employees will be happier, more engaged, and on top of the latest trends and technologies affecting their field — making them more productive and valuable to your business.

Volunteering time off

Volunteer time off, also known as VTO, allows employees to take paid time away from work to volunteer for charitable causes. It can range from a few hours per month to a few days per year, and it’s independent of other paid leave like PTO and sick days. In addition to being an appealing perk for philanthropy-minded candidates, it also demonstrates a tangible investment in giving back on behalf of the company.

How to Communicate Your Benefits and Perks Effectively

Simply offering compelling benefits and perks isn’t enough; you must also communicate them enticingly to would-be applicants. Here’s how to do it. 

Be assertive

Present what you have to offer beyond salary clearly and succinctly. Be proactive about promoting them. Make sure your benefit offerings are prominently showcased on the careers section of your website and in job postings. Highlight them in social media posts and in recruitment marketing materials. 

Communicate early

All too often, candidates don’t begin learning about a company’s benefits until they’re already well into the hiring pipeline. To optimize your recruiting, however, the communication should happen much earlier, before a candidate even fills out an application, or at least immediately afterward. Don’t make it information a candidate has to go searching for. Make your perks easy to learn about; incorporating them into your candidate engagement plan is a great strategy. 

Make it a two-way conversation

Once you’ve communicated your benefits, follow up and invite candidates to ask any questions they might have. Ensure they fully understand what makes the company a unique and desirable place to work. Using testimonials and Q&As from current employees can also bring your benefits to life and help illustrate their real-world applications.

Attract The Best Talent In The Business With 4 Corner Resources

If you want to win the recruiting game in 2020, add the experts from 4 Corner Resources to your staffing team. Our seasoned headhunters work with each company on a case-by-case basis to understand your unique needs and what you’re most looking for in a role. Then, we use our extensive talent network and proprietary sourcing methods to find and match you to the perfect candidates.

Schedule a call today to start the conversation about your staffing needs for 2020 and beyond.

If you do not have a reliable labor cost formula, there is no way of knowing how much each additional employee actually costs your organization. Without this intel, it is impossible to project your current and future hiring capabilities accurately. You cannot properly price your goods or services if you do not know the labor cost associated with producing them. 

While calculating labor cost may seem straightforward, many businesses take an approach that is too narrow, merely accounting for the cost of employee wages. This is part of the labor cost formula, but your true labor cost includes the full range of expenses associated with attracting, onboarding, training, and retaining your employees. This also includes payroll taxes, benefits packages, and other expenses associated with employees, like space and equipment. 

Here, we will discuss the importance of calculating labor costs thoroughly and accurately and give you a reliable breakdown of every expense you should factor in.

Why Calculate Labor Cost?

You would not sign a contract for a new office space without doing the math to see if you could afford the monthly rent, right? Likewise, you should not hire a new employee before you fully assess whether the benefits of hiring them will outweigh the financial cost. 

As companies grow, many run into trouble when they overestimate their staffing needs and underestimate the true cost of labor. In the best-case scenario, this ends up hurting profits, and in the worst case, it results in laying people off.

Using a labor cost formula gives you a precise dollar figure for what every hour of labor directly costs your organization. With this number in mind, it is much easier to determine how many full-time and part-time employees you can afford to bring onboard, rather than guessing. 

Knowing your labor costs helps you set optimal prices, which maximizes your profits. If you underestimate your labor costs, you will set too low prices and wind up with margins that are not feasible to stay in business. If you overestimate labor costs, you will set prices that are too high and unable to compete in the marketplace effectively. Labor costs should be considered alongside the cost of goods sold when you are deciding how much to charge.

Finally, calculating your labor cost helps you pinpoint revenue leaks that are eating into your earnings. Some examples include employee cell phone usage, company vehicle mileage, and hiring costs. Monitoring spending trends in these areas can also help you flag potential fraud. 

How to Calculate Labor Cost

Now that we have established why getting an accurate read on your labor cost matters, here are six categories of expenses you need to factor into your labor cost formula. 

Recruitment 

You begin accruing labor costs before you even hire your first employee. After all, it costs money to maintain a website, promote job listings, participate in job fairs, and conduct other recruiting activities. Some niche roles may cost you more to fill, while other roles, like entry-level positions, may cost less. The average amount it costs to attract an employee for any role is known as cost-per-hire. 

Recruiting costs are calculated by summing all of your internal and external recruiting expenses. Some common recruiting expenses to include in your calculation are job board fees, background checks, drug testing, career fairs, setup and maintenance of your careers page, and fees paid to recruiters.

Related: Tips for Managing Your Recruiting Budget

Wages

This is the most obvious employee expense, and it is pretty straightforward. This is the total cost of salaries or hourly wages you pay to all of your employees.

Make sure that whatever unit of time you are using to measure wage costs—typically looking at the cost of employment for a full year is the simplest—you use the same time frame for all of the other categories outlined here. 

Benefits and health insurance

Employee benefits are another major labor-related expense. Of the $40.23 hourly employee cost, we told you about earlier, $11.86 of that was made up of benefits. That is roughly 30%. 

Generally speaking, the more employees you have, the less your benefits will cost per employee. Health insurance premiums, employer retirement contributions, retirement program administrative fees, paid time off, and supplemental pay like overtime should all be included in your benefits calculation. 

Related: Ways to Lower Your Employee Benefits Cost

Employment taxes 

For every person you employ, your company bears a tax burden. This includes federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare taxes, and unemployment. Federal income taxes are withheld from the employee’s wages, so we do not include them here (as they are already covered as part of the wages category above). 

Social Security and Medicare taxes are also withheld from employee wages, but the employer is responsible for paying a matching amount on top of that. Federal unemployment taxes are paid strictly by the employer. To calculate your portion of the expense for each of these taxes, use the guidance from the IRS. 

Training 

New employees are not typically productive right out of the gate. Rather, you are going to spend some time and money training them, and these costs should be factored into your labor expenses. According to a report by Training magazine, U.S. businesses spend an average of $1,207 per employee on training.

When adding up your training costs, consider travel, training materials, equipment, software, and other digital programs, and payment for outside help. If you want to get super precise, you can also include loss of productivity, i.e., the amount of money you are not making because the employee is not fully productive yet. These figures might be more readily available in some fields, like sales, while they are not as quantifiable in others, like service-based businesses. 

Overhead 

You are probably familiar with overhead expenses like rent and utilities; you might think these are separate expenses from labor costs. In fact, though, your overhead is directly tied to the number of employees you have. The more people you hire, the more desks you need and the more square footage of space you will require, so it makes the most sense to include overhead as part of labor costs. 

Some items to factor into your overhead costs include the cost of your physical workspace (mortgage or rent), property taxes, utilities, office supplies, equipment, and maintenance. These should also be included if you provide company vehicles, cell phones, laptops, or other devices for employee use.  

Additional costs to consider

In addition to the regular, recurring costs covered above, do not forget to work in flexible costs, like seasonal or temporary labor, and one-time costs that only come up occasionally, like holiday bonuses.

Also, consider the cost of contractors like freelance graphic designers or consultants, keeping in mind that these expenses might actually go down as you add employees (like if you bring on an in-house graphic designer to eliminate the need for outsourcing). 

Labor Cost Formula

Once you have dealt with all of the categories above, it is time to add them up. 

1. To calculate your true labor cost, total the expenses in the categories above and divide the sum by the number of employees you have. This will give you the cost per employee per year (or whatever unit of time you settled on). 
2. Next, you want to break this cost down by hour. To do this, divide the cost per employee from step 1 by the number of hours worked per year. Assuming a 40-hour workweek with two weeks of paid vacation, most employees work about 2,000 hours annually. 
3. This is your true labor cost per hour. 

Using this figure, you can easily do the math to understand how much each additional full- or part-time employee will add to your expense sheet every year and, in turn, see whether it is a feasible expense. 

Ways to Reduce Labor Costs

If you’ve run the numbers and you’re a little dismayed at your true labor costs, it might be time to take steps to rein them in. Here are some options. 

Optimize productivity

This one’s a no-brainer: ensure you’re empowering your staff to be as productive as possible while at work. This includes automating repetitive tasks and streamlining workflows to complete the job in as few steps as possible. As you examine your workflows, you may find that some tasks can be eliminated entirely without negatively impacting the overall product. All of these things can save you labor hours, which translates into lower costs. 

Get a handle on overtime

The next step is to examine the overtime your employees are racking up closely. In many companies, there’s a skewed perception about overtime, and employees clock it with little to no oversight. Ideally, overtime should be an option of last resort when an urgent project can’t be completed within normal work hours rather than a standard part of the job. 

Put a lid on excessive overtime by enacting measures like requiring manager approval for overtime beyond a certain number of hours. You can also offer incentives like bonuses for employees who stay within the bounds of the normal 40-hour week. 

Supplement your full-time workforce

As you can see, based on our earlier breakdown, employees come with more costs than just paying them for their time. Instead of hiring full-time employees, consider using contract or temporary workers to meet your needs instead, as they don’t require all of the benefits and tax expenses of full-time workers. 

Combine sick and vacation time

Traditionally, sick time and vacation time are divvied into two separate buckets, but some employers are getting creative and finding cost savings by combining the two. For example, let’s say you typically provide two weeks of paid vacation and ten sick days. Instead, you might offer three weeks of paid time off in a single bucket to be used at employees’ discretion. Not only does this save you five days of PTO per employee, but it also empowers workers to make decisions about the best use of their time. 

Hire strategically

Hiring more full-time workers can sometimes add up to a net gain–if you hire smart. For example, let’s say you’re in a field like construction that requires estimates. If you’re losing out on work because your estimator is overloaded and takes two weeks to provide a quote, hiring another estimator could easily pay for itself as a new business. This is why it’s so important to have a strategic staffing plan.

Related: How to Reduce Your Cost of Hiring an Employee

Get Expert Help Mapping Your Future Staffing Plan

As you can see, there is a lot to consider when you are deciding how many people you need to hire and what roles to prioritize. Failing to forecast your staffing needs properly can result in lost profits and lagging productivity. We can help you map a staffing plan that meets your organization’s needs and makes sense for your budget. 

Our staffing experts will help you weigh the benefits of full-time employees against alternative options like part-time, temporary recruiting, and contract staffing to determine the best hiring strategy for your current situation and future growth. We also offer a full suite of payroll services to help you tackle tedious but necessary tasks like insurance and benefit offerings.

Contact us today and let us get started building a hiring strategy tailored to your business.

We’ll discuss the upsides of taking a strategic approach to employee benefits and walk you step by step through designing a benefits package that’s effective for your organization. 

Why Create a Strategic Employee Benefits Plan?

Attract top talent

In this ultra-competitive market, employee benefits are a recruitment strategy as much as they are an HR function. The best candidates have their pick of solid job offers to choose from, and they won’t settle for one with a company whose benefits aren’t up to snuff. 

Boost retention

High-quality benefits not only make employees feel valued; they also make it possible for those employees to hold their jobs long-term. Without comprehensive health insurance, for example, an employee who develops a chronic illness or has a family member that does might have to seek out job opportunities at a company with more robust coverage. 

Related: Highly Effective Strategies for Employee Retention

Maximize ROI

For the average employer, BLS reports that benefits account for 31% of total compensation costs. In some cases, that number is as high as 40%. When such a huge chunk of your budget is devoted to benefits, it’s just good business sense to make sure you’re getting it right and deriving maximum ROI from your investment. 

Most Popular Employee Benefits

1. Healthcare

According to SHRM’s 2022 Employee Benefits Survey, which is one of the longest-running bodies of research on employee benefits in the United States, health-related benefits were far and away the most important benefits category according to HR reps. Close to 90% of those surveyed ranked health benefits as ‘very important’ or ‘extremely important.’ 

Telemedicine and mental health services are in high demand in this category, with a growing number of employers adding these offerings in the last three years. 

2. Retirement

94% of employers surveyed said they offer a traditional 401(k), with most also offering employer-matched contributions at some level. Company-sponsored retirement planning and investment advice represent growing segments in this area. 

3. Leave

Leave benefits, like new parent and adoption leave, are among the top three benefits employers say should be offered. However, this is one area where many companies don’t walk the walk. 

Only 35% of organizations surveyed offer paid maternity leave, and the number for paternity leave is just 27%. Despite high employee demand for unlimited time off, it’s offered by a mere 6% of employers.

Related: Attract Candidates With These In-Demand Perks and Benefits

How to Design an Employee Benefits Plan

Set goals

Start by considering your needs as a company and the needs of your employees. Ideally, the benefits plan you develop should be at the intersection of these two sets of objectives. 

To develop organizational objectives around benefits, ask questions like ‘how does this play into our mission?’ For example, if your mission is to be a leader in your industry, that can’t happen if you don’t offer employees basic benefits like health insurance and retirement.

When developing objectives, also consider factors like your size, location, industry, and any labor union contracts. 

Assess employee needs

Next, it’s time to assess the needs on your employees’ side. 

One of the best ways to understand which benefits matter and are most useful to them is to ask them directly using a tool like a benefits survey. If you do this, be prepared to actually factor their input into your decision-making. 

Another good strategy for assessing employee needs is to examine your existing benefits plan if you have one. Which benefits do employees take advantage of the most? Are there any benefits you’re offering that are under-utilized? If so, is it due to a lack of actual demand, poor communication surrounding this benefit, a high buy-in cost, or something else? These are useful data points as you shape a new benefits package. 

Conduct market research

A competitive labor market means you can’t design your employee benefits plan in a vacuum. You need to consider what your competitors are offering because it factors directly into your offer acceptance rate. 

Conduct some market research to determine what the benefits offerings look like at your top three to five biggest competitors. You don’t have to mirror what they’re doing, but you need to make sure your own offerings are comparable or better. 

Set a budget

If you already offer benefits, you have some data to go on when setting a budget. If not, you’ll need to estimate. 

Take your employees’ base salaries and add between 20% and 50%. This will give you a rough estimate for the low and high end of how much benefits will cost. Then, it’s time to go out and obtain quotes and begin assembling the various pieces of your benefits package to fit within your budget. 

As you forecast costs, be sure to factor in new hires you plan to make in the year ahead. 

Prioritize benefits

Based on the goals and employee needs you defined above, outline which benefits are must-haves and which are nice-to-haves. This may require a careful examination of your employee base and the benefits they’re most likely to actually take advantage of. 

For example, maybe tuition reimbursement is a high-demand benefit, but it’s only desirable to a small handful of early-career employees. This offering may need to be tabled in favor of a benefit that can make a more widespread impact, like telemedicine services or mental health counseling. 

Also, consider the impact your benefits may have on recruiting. If you have a high need for mid-level managers, it makes sense to prioritize benefits that are likely to be important to this group, like family leave or low-deductible health insurance plans. 

Be sure to factor in compliance laws that require you to provide certain benefits. Under the Affordable Care Act, for example, companies with 50 or more employees must offer health insurance. Your state may have its own set of requirements when it comes to benefits like sick leave. 

Analyze results 

Your employee benefits plan should be ever-evolving, just like your workforce itself. This means tracking progress, use and costs and analyzing them regularly. 

Don’t take the cost of your benefits package for granted; shop around for providers at least every other year to make sure you’re getting the best deal and staying competitive. Consider using an outsourced HR or benefits provider to better manage costs and access niche expertise. 

By regularly evaluating your employee benefits plan and making sure it’s tailored to the needs of your employees, you’ll be better positioned to win top talent and help your business grow. 

Remote work has gotten a lot of attention and many employers have already made it a full-time or part-time option for employees. So aside from the ability to work from home, what can employers do to help their staff feel a better sense of balance between in-work and out-of-work priorities? 

Read on to learn about the importance of work-life balance and some strategies for how to promote it in your organization. 

What is Work-Life Balance?

The exact definition of work-life balance depends on who you ask. 

For some, it means a clear delineation between work time and personal time. For others, it means not feeling guilty about unplugging from work to be present in your out-of-work life. Some consider work-life balance the ability to move freely between the two areas, without feeling overwhelmed by one or the other. 

For most people, work-life balance means appreciating that both work and life can be priorities for a person, and one shouldn’t take precedence over the other. 

Here are just some examples of what a good work-life balance might look like:

• Work-related stress doesn’t follow you home
• Disconnecting from work-related messages once you’re off the clock
• Feeling energized and excited to come into work
• Stepping away from work to deal with personal matters when necessary
• Taking time off when you need it
• Being honest with your manager if things outside the office are impacting your work

These are just a few of the many examples of work-life balance in practice. It’s easy to see why they’re desirable qualities for job seekers. 

Why is Work-Life Balance Important?

Work-life balance has a significant bearing on employee wellbeing, which impacts everything from employee engagement to a company’s healthcare expenses. When employees feel a sense of harmony between their personal and professional lives, they feel more empowered, take fewer sick days, and are less likely to quit their jobs. 

In the age of remote work, where work life and home life are physically blended, employees are finding it harder to mentally turn “off” after the work day has ended. This can lead to disengagement and burnout. So, as an employer, it’s more important than ever to find new ways to prioritize work-life balance and retain the workers you’ve put so much effort into hiring and training. 

Related: The Importance of Flexibility in the Workplace

7 Creative Ideas to Promote Work-Life Balance Beyond Remote Work

1. Choose your own hours

If your top performer is most productive from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m., why force them to show up mere hours after sunrise? If your operations allow for it, consider letting employees choose the configuration via which they log their 40 hours on the clock each week. 

2. Summer Fridays

First instituted by New York City publishers on a mission to beat the weekend traffic to the Hamptons, Summer Fridays have become a beloved tradition in workplaces across the country. The custom consists of taking half-days on the final day of the work week from Memorial Day through Labor Day, which is a great way to get a jump start on the weekend recharge.

While it’s tricky to put a quantitative value on having a more relaxed seasonal schedule, a recent poll shows the intrinsic benefits are clear; 85% of workers at companies that observe Summer Fridays said the perk makes them feel happier at work. 

3. Lead by example

The culture around work-life balance is set from the top down. If your managers are accustomed to firing off emails at 10 p.m., their employees will naturally feel that the same level of after-hours communication is expected of them. 

To avoid this, encourage team members to save non-urgent communications for office hours, or use a tool like Boomerang to easily schedule them for the next morning. Make it the default to disable push notifications on platforms like Slack during the hours people aren’t at work. 

4. Take synchronous vacations

We’ve all been there: you’ve just stepped off the plane on your long-awaited trip and are finally easing into vacation mode when a message pops into your inbox. “So sorry to bother you on vacation, but…” One of the major downsides of modern technology is that you’re never truly off the grid. 

Synchronous vacations are when an entire department or company takes a break at the same time. They’re more feasible than you might think with a little planning, and more companies are adopting them. They’re great for pushing employees to truly disconnect because there’s no guilt or pressure to check in when no one is working. 

If you’re thinking of trying out a synchronous break, the typically-quiet week between Christmas and New Year’s is a great one to start with. 

5. Set clear priorities

Work-life balance doesn’t mean that work is never stressful. Rather, it means that the stress that arises from work doesn’t spill over into employees’ personal lives in an unhealthy way. One way to make this happen is by setting clear priorities. 

When everything at work is a priority, nothing is. Instead of acting as if every task is equally urgent, managers should help their reports see what’s truly most important among their projects so they can prioritize their attention accordingly and keep stressors in check. 

6. Treat employees as individuals

Another benefit of setting clear priorities is that it allows you to hold employees accountable for their work rather than micromanaging their every move. Once you’ve established priorities, trust your employees to accomplish them how and when they see fit (unless, of course, it becomes a performance problem, which you can then address on an individual basis). 

Also, don’t assume that what sounds like a perk to you will be a perk for everyone. For example, while some employees might love the additional day off that a four-day workweek affords, others might resent spending additional time in the office on the days they’re working. 

Have conversations with employees directly to learn what work-life balance initiatives are most valuable to them, or consider instituting an employee focus group to guide your work-life balance efforts. 

Related: Empowerment in the Workplace

7. Make it part of your culture

It takes effort to achieve work-life balance. The most successful employers instill it into their company culture. 

The specifics of what that looks like will depend on your company, but here are some examples of the norms at companies with a strong culture of work-life balance:

• Asking for help is acceptable and encouraged 
• Workers and managers use their available vacation days
• Employees take a dedicated lunch break rather than eating at their desks
• Mental health days are offered in addition to sick days
• Meetings are automatically scheduled with a break in between, rather than back to back

As you can see, these are incredibly specific examples, and instituting one or two of these things isn’t enough to shift the company’s culture. It takes a concerted effort beginning with the company’s management to build a strategic culture that prioritizes work-life balance.

Related: Strategies for Culture Change Management

The situation calls for employers to take a carefully measured approach that strikes a balance between controlling costs and providing adequate employee benefits. While it’s not a fun exercise, it’s a reality thousands of organizations are faced with, and confronting it head-on will put you and your employees in a more favorable position.

Read on to learn six ways to lower your employee benefits cost without making dramatic sacrifices in the quality of your programs.

The Average Employee Benefits Cost

Benefits represent a substantial cost for employers, accounting for 31% of total employee compensation for civilian workers. For state and local government workers, that number jumps to 38%.

On average, it costs a non-government employer just under $12 an hour per employee to cover benefits like paid leave, health insurance, retirement and disability. Annually, that breaks down to about $21,800 a year per employee in the private sector.

Health insurance is the biggest employee benefits cost, accounting for about 8% of overall compensation, followed by legally required benefits like Social Security and Medicare, which make up about 7% of total costs. The education and healthcare fields top the list of industries in which benefits spending is highest.

6 Ways to Lower Your Employee Benefits Cost

If you’re considering slashing benefits as a way to reduce expenses, don’t make any decisions before considering one or of more of the following strategies to reduce how much your employee benefits cost you.

1. Analyze Employee Use of Programs

The first step in lowering your benefits spending should be a careful analysis of how the programs you currently offer are actually being used. If you’re like many organizations, it’s been a while since you’ve done such an assessment.

Take a look at the numbers to see what proportion of employees are taking advantage of every program in your current benefits package. Is there a wellness program that’s not getting much engagement? A new offering you recently rolled out that has failed to pick up steam? A subsidized gym membership that only a handful of people use? These under-utilized benefits should be the first to go, since they can be cut with minimal impacts to most of your staff.

Next, look to healthcare, which represents the greatest and most complex benefits expenditure. Are you offering a low-deductible, high-premium plan that only a small portion of employees choose? You might be able to alter it or cut it out entirely. What about weight loss and smoking cessation programs? These particular programs typically cost employers an arm and a leg but don’t generally get a lot of buy-in because of the high level of commitment they require. These, too, could be candidates for elimination.

2. Don’t Over-Insure

To determine how much your company will pay for health benefits from one year to the next, insurers rely on something called trend. Trend uses your past claims history, known as the experience period, to project your future costs, known as the projection period.

But companies, like individuals, don’t always follow a consistent trend when it comes to their healthcare needs. If you had a year where a disproportionately high number of employees opted into a high-cost plan, for example, it could lead to unnecessarily high costs in the year ahead. Employers can reduce healthcare costs by making sure they’re choosing benefits packages based on what employees actually need and want versus going with a pre-packaged, one-size-fits-all benefits solution offered by a carrier.

Additionally, it can pay to shop around among carriers every few years to make sure you’re still getting the best available coverage for the price.

3. Promote the Right Healthcare Plans

Many employers expend a great deal of effort putting together benefits packages for their employees, only to drop the ball when it comes to educating employees on said benefits. Organizations can help staffers—and reduce healthcare costs—by working to inform employees about the most cost-effective plans.

For example, high-deductible plans, sometimes referred to as “bronze” plans, are often sufficient to meet the healthcare requirements of low-need employees. Such plans cost less in premiums for both the employee and the employer. Companies can encourage more employees to choose bronze plans by upping the employer’s contribution to the premium (which may still be more affordable for your organization than if those employees opted into “silver” or “gold” plans).

Even high-need employees, who are likely to meet the out-of-pocket maximum on any plan they select, can come out ahead financially by choosing bronze plans with a high employer contribution. Once again, employers will need to allocate resources to educate employees on how such cost savings work.

4. Offer an HSA

A health savings account, or HSA, allows employees to set aside money specifically for their healthcare expenses. Any money saved through an HSA and subsequently used on medical expenses is pretax, meaning your employees will get more mileage out of every dollar when paying for healthcare.

HSAs come with another interesting benefit—any un-used funds in them roll over from one year to the next, and some plans pay interest or allow for investing of those dollars into mutual funds and other investment vehicles. The interest or investment earnings are also tax-free. If employees don’t plan to touch their HSA funds for several years, it’s a lucrative way to build a nice healthcare nest-egg with significant tax savings.

This is all good news for employees, but how does this reduce healthcare costs for employers? Because health insurance plans that include a health savings account often come with lower premiums—which means the employer’s portion of those premiums, will also be lower.

5. Reduce or Defer Retirement Contributions

In a candidate’s market, employer-matched retirement contributions are considered a must-have employee benefit if you want to attract top talent. As we’ve seen, though, changing economic circumstances have forced many companies to reconsider this offering. Reducing the amount of your employer match is one way to lower your overall retirement benefits costs; deferring your contributions is another option.

Though employers shouldn’t look at deferment as a long-term cost-saving strategy, it can be an effective stopgap measure to get through a particularly challenging season or avoid making other, more dire cuts. Generally speaking, employers can make the agreed-upon contributions to their employees’ retirement plans at any time before that year’s tax filing deadline.

If your company uses a calendar tax year, this would mean you could defer your employer matching contributions until April 15 of 2021. Filing for an extension would further prolong this deadline. Prolonging the deadline is the key phrase here—you’re not eliminating the expense, but merely putting it off until a later date (and not following through can get you in a lot of hot water).

Your specific cost-deferral options will depend largely on the type of plan you’ve already selected. For example, some plans specify a different date by which employers must make their portion of the contributions. So, be sure to check with your plan administrator about what your plan allows you to do when it comes to deferring or suspending matching.

6. Cut Down on Administrative Costs

The sticker price of benefits isn’t the sole factor in what makes them such a substantial cost for employers. Benefits administration is also incredibly costly. To cut down on these fees, take advantage of automation wherever possible.

Use online portals to allow employees to complete their own benefits enrollment rather than assigning this task to a team member, which costs labor hours. Offer other self-service benefits options, like informational webinars, that help take manual duties off the plat of your HR team.

You may also be able to save on administrative costs by outsourcing your benefits management to a third-party provider. Benefits consultants are well-versed in the nuances of the field and can help you make sure you’re offering what your employees truly need, without any excess expenses. Plus, they can tackle employees’ tough technical questions that HR staffers might not be fully prepared to answer.

Leave Benefits Enrollment to the Pros

4 Corner Resources is a staffing firm, but did you know our clients also enjoy access to our convenient payrolling and benefits services? This offering can be added onto any staffing contract and facilitates rapid new hire onboarding, reducing the amount of paperwork you’re responsible for and the number of hours you spend getting new staffers up to speed.

Schedule your complimentary staffing consultation today to learn how our recruiting experts can help you reduce costs and maximize the efficiency of your hiring process.

While the money can be a lifeline to businesses that are in danger of closing, navigating the loan terms is, as the Wall Street Journal recently put it, as complicated as the bar exam. Here, we will cover the answers to your most frequently asked Paycheck Protection Program questions, including what you need to know about fulfilling the terms of the loan, repayment, taxes and more.  

What is the Paycheck Protection Program?

The Paycheck Protection Program, or PPP, is a small business loan program designed to help companies keep their employees on the payroll in the wake of Covid-19. The first round of $349 billion worth of funding was fully allocated in early April. In late April, a second $310 round of funding was approved. 

Can I still apply for the Paycheck Protection Program?

Yes. Though the initial round of funding ran out in less than two weeks, Congress swiftly approved a second round of funding in the amount of $310 billion that has not been fully claimed. Qualifying businesses can complete a PPP application to be considered for funding. 

Demand for the second round of funding has been nowhere close to the first round. At the time of this article, The New York Times reported there was still $130 billion left in the fund. Some business owners have been deterred from applying due to the confusing terms and uncertainty about whether they will qualify for loan forgiveness. 

Additionally, many large companies gobbled up huge chunks of funding during the first round and later received public blowback. Some of them wound up returning the money. In light of this, the second round was marketed to be more small-business-friendly. 

Do I have to pay back a Paycheck Protection Program loan?

Loans secured through the PPP program are 100% forgivable if certain criteria are met. This includes keeping your employees on the payroll for eight weeks. If you have already laid off employees prior to receiving the funds, loan forgiveness depends on their swift re-hiring. 

How does PPP loan forgiveness work?

To receive full forgiveness of your PPP loan, at least 60% of the loan amount must be used for payroll costs. If you spend less than that on payroll, you may still be eligible for partial forgiveness. 

Forgiveness will also be affected if you lower your employees’ salaries or wages.  

If your company’s full-time employee headcount decreases between the time of the loan and the expiration of the loan, the amount of forgiveness will be incrementally reduced. If you laid off an employee and you offer to re-hire them but they decline to accept the offer, this does not affect loan forgiveness. 

If your business has been affected because of restrictions from the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), or the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), your forgiveness will not be affected by the headcount stipulation mentioned above. 

For example, OSHA’s Covid-19 guidelines state that travel restrictions may make travel in and out of certain countries unadvisable. If this reduces your ability to operate at full capacity and keep the same number of workers employed, you would get a pass on the headcount part of the loan forgiveness rule. 

Who can apply for the Paycheck Protection Program?

The Paycheck Protection Program is open to small businesses or sole proprietorships with 500 employees or fewer. This includes nonprofits. Businesses with more than 500 employees are eligible in certain industries. 

Self-employed individuals, contractors and gig workers are also eligible for PPP loans. 

What can Paycheck Protection Program funds be used for?

PPP money must be used directly on expenses that keep the company running. In addition to payroll, PPP funds may be used for rent, mortgage interest, utilities, insurance premiums, or continuation of group healthcare benefits during periods of paid leave. 

One important note—if you also received an Economic Injury Disaster Loan or an Emergency Economic Injury Grant in addition to PPP funding, you will need to be very mindful of where each set of funding is spent. Keep the funds and their related spending separate; if you accidentally mix the two (i.e. claiming a rent payment was paid using both PPP and EIDL funds), you are likely to run into problems down the road.  

What kinds of records do I need to keep of my PPP fund spending?

Financial software company Intuit recommends keeping a careful record of all expenses on which you use PPP funds. They say you can run payroll as you normally would. For other covered expenses like rent and utilities, track them by using a designated PPP categorization within your normal accounting software. Save hard copies of all bills, invoices and receipts associated with your PPP spending, as you may be required to hand these over when applying for forgiveness. 

I got a PPP loan. How do I get loan forgiveness?

You will need to go through a separate process to apply for PPP loan forgiveness. This must be done with your lender during the designated forgiveness period. 

The process may vary by lender, but you’ll likely be required to provide documentation of the following:

• The number of employees on your payroll and how much they are paid, including previous payroll and income tax filings
• Records of payments made toward your mortgage, rent, and utilities
• Signed certification that the information provided is accurate and the funds were used in accordance with the program terms

Can I apply for PPP even if I don’t need the money?

“Even if you are not sure you need it, you should still apply!” This was a big piece of misguided advice that circulated during the first round of PPP funding that ultimately wound up causing problems. 

On April 23, the SBA release updated guidance that clarified only organizations that need the loan to stay in business should apply for the Paycheck Protection Program. The SBA even went so far as to say that businesses should first consider “their ability to access other sources of liquidity sufficient to support their ongoing operations in a manner that is not significantly detrimental to the business.” In other words, if you are sitting on cash, you must use that first before relying on PPP funding to stay afloat.

The SBA has said it will seek repayment for many of the loans that were made. All loans over $2 million will be subject to SBA review to determine whether the borrower had “adequate basis for the required certification concerning the necessity of the loan request.” In layman’s terms, the organization will work to determine whether the company actually needed the loan. If they determine that is not the case, the borrower will not be eligible for loan forgiveness.

In light of this announcement, thousands of companies have opted to return some $12 billion in loan funding. For some, like Ruth’s Chris and Shake Shack, it was the result of public backlash. Others felt the terms were too unclear or the criteria too stringent for them to feel confident their loan would be forgiven.  

Am I responsible for interest on my PPP loan balance?

If your full loan amount is forgiven, no. If any of the balance is not forgiven, your loan will be subject to interest according to the terms you agreed to with your lender. 

Is PPP loan money taxable?

No. Usually forgiven debt counts as taxable income, but according to the CARES Act, this will not be the case with forgiven PPP loans. 

However, this means that some expenses that are normally tax deductible will not be if they are related to forgivable PPP loans. This is to prevent a double-dipping tax benefit situation. For example, usually wages paid to employees are deductible expenses. But since PPP loan funding will not be taxable, the wages paid using that funding will not be considered deductible. 

How do I apply for a PPP loan?

You can complete a PPP application through any SBA lender or through a federally insured credit union. You can find an approved lender near you using the SBA’s search tool. 

Maintain a Strong Staffing Strategy with 4 Corner Resources

Your employees are the backbone of your company. Having a cohesive strategy to attract and retain top talent in the wake of Covid-19 will help you weather the storm. The staffing experts at 4 Corner Resources are here to be your talent acquisition partners, helping you prioritize your current hiring needs and map a plan for the future. 

Contact us now to schedule your free consultation.

As more employers—mainly in the tech and startup space, but in other industries, too—opt to share pay information openly, you might wonder if an open salary policy could work at your organization. Here, we’ll discuss the pros and cons of pay transparency and give you a crash course on why a company might want to adopt such a forthcoming practice. 

What is Pay Transparency?

Pay transparency, also called wage transparency or salary transparency, is the practice of making employee compensation figures accessible—either internally to members of the company; externally, to the general public; or both. 

There are two main types of pay transparency. In partial pay transparency, a range of salaries is disclosed for a given position. You have probably come across this in job listings, and maybe you even include it on your own. In full pay transparency, an exact salary figure is made available for every employee in the organization. Many companies facilitate this via an online database. 

When considering an open salary policy, it’s important to know that technically, your employees could choose to create one amongst themselves if they wanted to by openly discussing their pay. Under U.S. Executive Order 11246, employees have the right to disclose how much they make and ask other employees how much they make. They can’t be fired, disciplined, or retaliated against for doing so (employees of municipal governments and religious schools are exempt from this order). 

Though employees can disclose their pay, there’s no mandate saying that employers are required.  Some companies like Whole Foods, Stack Overflow, and Buffer are choosing this path. Why? Let’s start with some of the benefits of sharing salary information. 

Pros of an Open Salary Policy

It contributes to stronger wage equality

The primary argument favoring pay transparency is that it promotes wage equity and gives workers a strong leg to stand on when negotiating for fair pay. Wage equality has come a long way in the last few decades, but the hard truth is that it still has a long way to go. 

On average, women earn $0.81 for every $1 men earn. The gap is even wider for women of color (a group which, in these figures, includes American Indian and Alaska Native women, African American women, and Hispanic women), who earn $0.75 for every $1 earned by white men. 

An open salary policy arms these segments of the workforce with the information they need to negotiate more effectively and in turn, earn more, helping close the gap. 

Top candidates expect transparent salary information 

Another compelling reason to adopt a transparent approach to pay is that the most competitive applicants are looking to see it in your job ads. According to a Glassdoor and The Harris Poll survey, 67% of candidates look for salary information when deciding whether to apply for a job. 44% of candidates said the inclusion of salary information contributes to their assessment of whether the company holds long-term potential for them.

To put it plainly, if an in-demand candidate is faced with three job listings that are otherwise equal, but one does not offer a salary range, are they going to spend time going through all the motions required to get that information, or will they move forward with the openings that include a salary? It is impossible to say for sure, but it’s a factor that is strongly worth considering if you want to woo top talent.  

Pay transparency breeds effective employees

A study published in the Journal of Business and Psychology focused less on the fairness aspect of pay transparency and more on how it affects the inter-working behaviors amongst colleagues. What they found was intriguing. 

When pay information about colleagues was openly accessible, researchers found the team members worked together more effectively and were better at asking the right people for help when needed. The researchers surmised that publicly available salary information gave workers an accurate gauge to assess their various colleagues’ skills, making it easier to know who would be most useful to them in solving a given problem. 

The results of another study out of UC Berkeley were even more interesting; researchers found that employees who knew how much their coworkers made—and where they personally fell in the wage distribution—put forth “significantly more labor effort” than those who had no information about their peer’s earnings. 

It can benefit your employer brand 

Among candidates, sharing salary information is generally perceived in a positive manner. According to a Buffer spokesperson, job applications to work at the company significantly increased after it made compensation information public. 

She pointed out that from an employer’s perspective, it’s better to be in control of the narrative surrounding how much your company pays than to let things like online reviews and rumors do the talking. She told TIME, “If an organization doesn’t form its own pay method on transparency, someone else will — and it probably won’t be a complete message.”

Related: Strategies for Building a Successful Employer Branding Strategy

Cons of an Open Salary Policy

While there are certainly upsides to an open salary policy, there are some potential downsides employers must consider, as well. Here are a few of them. 

It can hurt your ability to attract talent on a tight budget

The most obvious negative consequence of pay transparency affects companies that already struggle to keep pace with the market on salaries. Some would argue that when you wait to disclose wages until later in the hiring process, it gives you more of a chance to make a favorable impression and push your non-monetary selling points, like a great company culture or unlimited PTO.

While this approach may have merit, there is also the argument that you should not waste a candidate’s time if your salary range is way beneath the ballpark of what they would accept. It is up to you to weigh whether having some candidates drop off early in the process is worth the upside that comes from offering pay transparency. 

Related: How to reduce your hiring costs without sacrificing quality

Employees won’t always be eager to participate

Though pay transparency pretty much comes with nothing but upside for candidates, established employees might not take so kindly to it. 

In a survey on employee attitudes toward their salary being shared, 46% said they believed salaries should be kept private. 54% felt the opposite or were indifferent, so it’s a mixed bag. Employees under 40 were less concerned about their salaries being made public than those over 40. 

Of course, if you implement an open salary policy, you cannot apply it to some people and not others. Thus, it’s reasonable to expect that pushback from at least some of your staffers will be part of the transition.

It could foster tension among employees 

When stripped down to nothing more than a number beside a name, salary information can be taken out of context. This can be frustrating to the lowest-paid employees, who may see a staggering discrepancy between their pay and that of the folks at the top of the ladder. 

To combat this, it is critical that companies with an open salary policy are also transparent about the method used to determine salaries. Communicate the factors that go into how much each person earns, like job title, number of years of experience, managerial duties, and so on. It is also helpful to elaborate on why the pay is different for different jobs or departments (i.e. sales roles that have a low base salary but are supplemented by commission). 

In the same survey we mentioned a moment ago, researchers also asked employees for their thoughts about how their employers communicated pay information. While the majority felt pay information was communicated clearly, respondents were largely uncertain on whether pay transparency was something their organization was proud of sharing. 

What does this tell us? Employers that choose to adopt an open salary policy need to make a better point of clearly communicating why they have chosen to do so along with the benefits it has for the organization and the workforce as a whole. 

Make a Great Impression on Candidates with Help from 4 Corner Resources

Could your job descriptions use a makeover? Need help selling why you’re such a great company to work for? The staffing experts at 4 Corner Resources can help position you for hiring success. 

Work with the top employers across the country to attract, screen and hire candidates with the right mix of skills, personality and experience. Whether it is a one-time gig or a rolling application process for an entire department, we will help you craft a hiring strategy that meets your needs and fits your budget. Contact us today to get started.

If you run a quick search online, you’ll see that there are millions of resources all over the internet that speak to the advantages of traditional employee benefits such as healthcare, insurance, retirement plans, and paid time off (PTO) for employees. But these employer paid benefits are not the only types of employee benefits that attract talent. As an employer, are there potential advantages to offering non-traditional employee perks in lieu of traditional benefits?

What Are Some Beloved Non-Traditional Employee Perks?

Not all companies can afford to offer cushy salaries and employee benefits. As such, it’s important to first address what some of the most important benefits to employees may be that are not financial or insurance-oriented. Then we’ll launch into how each of these employee perks can benefit the employer as well.

Here is our list of employee benefits and perks that fall outside the conventional benefits offerings:

Employee Perk #1: Fun, Laid Back, and Collaborative Environments

Many businesses are trying to embrace a hip or more modern company culture that offers a variety of cool office perks. Examples of some of these employee perks include yoga classes, quiet spaces for offices with open environments, employee games and competitions, and access to on-site ping-pong and air hockey tables.

How Creating a Fun, Laid-Back Environment Benefits Employers:

Many conventional office environments are siloed. When companies create these fun and engaging environments, it provides a creative outlet for employees to interact and develop relationships with their colleagues — which also helps improve employee retention. This leads to greater cross-team and cross-departmental collaborations throughout an organization. Furthermore, workplaces that offer classes such as meditation or yoga help to increase employee well-being and productivity.

According to a 2017 study published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), these mindfulness practices are beneficial to businesses:

“Our finding of high and increasing rates of exposure to mindfulness practices among U.S. workers is encouraging… Approximately 1 in 7 workers report engagement in some form of mindfulness-based activity, and these individuals can bring awareness of the benefit of such practices into the workplace.”

An Example of an Employee Perk One of Our Clients Offers Their Employees:

Our client, a health sciences company headquartered in Orlando, Florida, has a full-size National Basketball Association (NBA) basketball court for employees to use.

Employee Perk #2: Flexible Schedules

Flexible schedules as employee benefits are in high demand by employees in large and small organizations alike. According to Mercer’s 2018 Global Talent Trends Study of more than 7,600 HR leaders, board directors, executives, and employees, “71% of thriving individuals say their company offers them flexible work (compared to 32% of non-thriving)” and “51% of all employees want more flexibility.”

How Offering Flexible Schedules Benefit Employers:

Not all employees perform at their best during standard work hours — some individuals work best starting in the early morning hours and others may be rock stars at night. For jobs that qualify, offering a flexible schedule gives employees the autonomy to work at times that meet their needs and provides greater work-life balance. When employees can work on their own schedules rather than the traditional 8 a.m.-5 p.m. shift, they are more effective and productive. Studies show that happiness leads to spikes in productivity that range from 12% to 20%.

An Example of an Employee Perk One of Our Clients Offers Their Employees:

Our client, a professional services firm, offers employees the ability to work a set number of hours per week (25) at the office and then the remaining hours (15) are flexible for their location and time.

Employee Perk #3: Remote Work Opportunities

Much like offering flexible schedules, another significant perk that falls outside the realm of traditional employee benefits is the ability to work remotely. According to 1 Million for Work Flexibility, this opportunity saves them money and time commuting to the office, improves morale, increases employee productivity, and reduces employee turnover. Furthermore, it shows that your company’s leadership trust employees enough to let them work away from the office.

How Offering Remote Work Opportunities Benefit Employers:

In addition to the advantages of increased work productivity and reduced turnover, another significant perk of allowing employees to work remotely is that it opens the doors to greater recruiting and hiring opportunities for your business. If your company is not limited to only considering applicants who live within commuting distance, it means that you can attract and hire more diverse and experienced talent who can work remotely.

Employee Perk #4: On-Site Gym or Fitness Benefits

A significant benefit for direct hire and contract employees alike is having access to an on-site gym or providing gym membership discounts or related benefits. This shows employees that you care about their health and want to support them in achieving their health and fitness goals.

How Offering Health-Related Perks Benefits Employers:

Sick or unhealthy employees are a drain on any company and result in illness-related absenteeism, downtime, and decreased productivity. According to a Harvard report, offering these types of health-centered benefits is a strategic move because healthy employees are not only healthier, but they also work harder. Furthermore, this type of investment in employees can help support an organization’s culture and build employee commitment, pride, and trust in the company.

An Example of an Employee Perk One of Our Clients Offers Their Employees:

Our client, the parent company for several specialty hospitals in the Orlando, Florida area, pays a percentage of gym memberships for their employees.

Employee Perk #5: Free Food and Beverages

An unconventional perk that many companies are starting to embrace is keeping the workplace stocked with free food and drinks. Not only does this provide a sweet (and tasty) benefit to employees who can walk to the fridge and grab a bottle or water or another beverage of choice, but it also shows that the company cares about its employees.

How Offering Free Food and Drinks Benefits Employers:

Keeping food and drinks in stock makes employees feel at home and like you are willing to invest in creating a positive work environment. Furthermore, having a mix of fun and healthy snacks and beverages on hand contributes to reducing the amount of time employees spend traveling and eating lunch elsewhere.

Learn More about How You Can Benefit from Employee Perks

As a recruiting and staffing firm that works with companies across the United States, the 4 Corner Resources (4CR) team sees many company cultures and workplace environments because of the nature of our work with clients. We hope that this list of employee benefits and perks gives you ideas for non-traditional employee benefits you can use to attract and retain new talent.

Speak with one of our recruiting experts today to learn more about how your business can stand out in a candidate’s job market.