Perk Up! Job Perks Can Help Retain Talent and Support Your Company Goals

Posted in: Employee Benefits

Does your company offer some great, but underused employee benefits? Or, do you have a hard time attracting and retaining top-quality employees? Implementing a job perks program that aligns with your company goals and then maintaining and advertising the work perks is key to recruitment and employee satisfaction. If you’re already offering great company perks, make sure your employees know about and use them! Follow these steps and best practices to create successful employee perk programs at your company.

Step 1: Know your budget and job perks program goals

Each year, determining the budget and goals are crucial, as they will be the driving force behind the types of programs and vendors your company chooses to work with. Examples of goals may include focusing on enhancing employees’ personal life, professional life, a mix of both, retirement, or standing out as the leading company within a certain job market to attract and retain employees.

Below are some tips to help you evaluate and select your company perks based on your goals and budget:

1. Evaluate the success/failure of each existing program. Decide if they should cease or continue.
2. Employee surveys can provide insight to employees’ attitudes and opinions toward the programs being offered to them. If employees are not using certain programs, it can be an indication that the company should change things up a bit. Ask specific questions in the surveys so the company gets specific feedback. Keep these surveys confidential to ensure employee privacy and integrity.
3. When looking into new programs, ask the vendor for references who are currently using their platform or ask a colleague with a connection to the vendor for feedback on the program details before moving forward.

Step 2: Include all mandatory benefits

Be sure to include ALL Federal AND State regulations when developing your company perks program. There are certain benefits you have to offer, but these can still be highlighted as job perks to your employees. Some laws only apply if there is a certain amount of employees within the company/office locations, so know which regulations apply to your organization.

Examples of mandatory Federal and State laws may include (depending on size of company): sick leave, parental leave, FMLA, unemployment insurance, accommodations for nursing mothers, and Social Security.

Bottom line, do thorough research or ask an HR professional for assistance in understanding which Federal and State Laws apply to your company.

Step 3: Customize the job perks

This is the fun part! There are a countless general and industry-specific work perks that companies can offer.

Examples of some typical employee perks include sports game tickets, gym memberships, paid parking, company-provided cell phones, health insurance, life insurance, EAP programs, holiday parties, and PTO.

Examples of some not-so-typical work perks include a free coffee a week, on-site daycare, a birthday gift, flex work time, store shopping discounts, and employee professional development trainings.

Here are some tips to help you customize your program:

1. Look at what your competitors are offering because they are the ones competing for the same talent you are.
2. Understand what interests your work force and what motivates them.
3. Align the “extra” work perks with your work place culture AND GOALS.

Step 4: Communicate your benefits and perks to your employees often

Here are some ways to communicate your work perks to your employees—using multiple mediums of communication is ideal:

1. Create a one-pager that outlines the most attractive benefits that the company offers. Posting it with a job opening, giving it to new hires, and posting it on a company’s intranet or on a bulletin board in the employee break room can help serve as a constant reminder that these benefits and employee perks are available and should be used.
2. Distribute total compensation statements on a yearly basis to help employees get the FULL picture of how much they make/save by working for your company. These statements generally include all forms of cash compensation (salary, bonuses, commissions, and profit sharing etc.), employer and employee contributions to all benefits plans, and tax savings. Benefits without a monetary value should also be listed on these summaries. Some examples may include holiday parties, maternity/paternity leave, or other job perks.
3. Create easy-to-understand and visually appealing Open Enrollment communications to make sure your employees know about and understand all of the benefit plans offered. Distribute multiple types of communications via different mediums (i.e. printed guides, postcards mailed to homes, recorded presentations, and in-person meetings).

Step 5: Connect with your benefits advisor

Ask your employee benefits advisor for assistance in implementing and maintaining each program. You’ll want to know about any compliance requirements for your health benefits offering, protect confidentiality for perks like an employee assistance program, and be aware of legal ramifications of other benefits (such as onsite gym memberships). A professional can help.

Have questions about how you could create successful job perks or alleviate your HR admin burden? Please feel free to contact me at nkahn@psafinancial.com.

About The Author

Nikki Kahn

Nikki joined PSA in 2017. As an HR Coordinator, she supports PSA’s team of HR consultants in the delivery of consulting services to our clients. She is focused on the efficient execution of HR processes covering the entire employee life cycle, with a specific focus on recruiting, compliance, and benefit administration. Nikki holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from University of Baltimore.