Benefits that Attract Great Employees

Finnegan Pierson

Good employee benefits have always played a role in enticing people to work for you. As an employer, you can’t assume that having the basics of health insurance and paid vacation time will be enough to attract today’s applicants. In fact, you may be underestimating what job candidates today consider “basic” when it comes to benefits. Knowing what benefits are expected and which will lift you above the crowd of other employers is crucial.

Personal Finance Perks

Providing a retirement plan so that your staff can prepare for their non-working years is standard, but there’s more you can do to help your people manage their finances. Your Benefits and Rewards staff should always be reaching out to local businesses to negotiate special discounts for your workers. One of the smartest and most affordable benefit offerings is to partner with a bank or credit union to offer your employees the chance to open an account with special perks, like no-fee checking or a higher interest rate for savings.  Some financial institutions offer added benefits like free budgeting tools or a new car buying service to their account holders; if your employees opened their account through work, they could associate all these extra perks with your company, at no additional cost to you! You might also find a credit or charge card company that will offer your employees a special interest rate, and they might even provide a unique card design to include your company’s logo.

Health and Fitness

Health insurance is usually the biggest and most important offering in your company’s benefits lineup, but employees increasingly look for perks that help them stay healthy in other ways. Discounted gym memberships or fitness classes have become such a common part of benefit offerings that many of your employees will likely be amazed if you don’t offer something similar. Meal delivery services are an ever-growing trend, and many employers now either cover part of the cost or negotiate a discounted price for healthy meal delivery. Don’t forget your employees’ mental health. Free and confidential counseling, virtual therapy, crisis hotlines and mindfulness apps are increasingly sought out and utilized by employees.

Career Growth

You may not think of using your employee benefits package to encourage your staff to grow out of their current roles, but doing so could help you get and keep the most motivated and ambitious workers. It’s often more cost-effective and smarter to “recruit” people for job openings from within your company rather than via outside hiring; from that perspective, all of the money you spend on training and educating your people is a savvy investment. Reimbursing tuition costs for workers who choose to pursue further university or trade school education is perhaps the biggest investment of this type. It is sadly under-promoted by companies and thus under-used by employees. However, there are also more modest—and faster—ways that you can invest in your staff’s training, from week-long “boot camps” for specific skills to one-day seminars. Even online and video training can be used to give the maximum number of employees a chance for growth.

Work Features

The daily details of an employee’s job may not be what you think of as a “benefit,” but having more control over how their work gets done is an increasingly vital perk for many workers. One of the simplest things you can do is give employees leeway to make their work areas comfortable and productive, from offering a range of different-sized and ergonomic equipment to having a choice of desk or chair type. Where and when they work is as important to your employees as how they work. One of the hottest work options right now is flexible scheduling, often combined with work-from-home options. You may have some anxiety about employee productivity in a fully work-from-home situation; however, you should at least consider introducing as much schedule flexibility as possible.

A good benefits package will typically be based on a foundation of robust health insurance and retirement plans, but that is just the beginning. Stretching just a bit to include other popular perks can help you reach better applicants and boost your company’s productivity and success.