Benefits, employee perks, and discount schemes, whatever you call them, all are becoming increasingly crucial for employee acquisition and retention. With the cost of living weighing on everyone's mind, benefits and perks are necessary to stand out from the competition.
Employee rewards are one of the most powerful drivers of productivity and motivation. Employee benefits, however play a more significant role in retention and acquisition.
Typically, employers are investing in all-in-one employee solutions that include a range of rewards, discounts, perks, and benefits to save their teams money.
Comprehensive employee experience tools make running a discount scheme hassle-free, as everything is included in one app. Moreover, keeping everything together means all investments are trackable. An example of an all-one-employee solution is Perkbox.
With Perkbox, employers can give their teams access to an extensive range of resources, including a huge discount scheme, freebies, rewards, wellbeing tools, and more.
Employee benefits tend to include, at the very least, discounted gym memberships, salary sacrifice schemes, and an Employee Assistance Program — or EAP.
An EAP is one of the most valued benefits as it gives greater access to therapists and psychologists who can support your workforce's mental wellbeing.
Other policy-based benefits include:
Benefits that are not policy-driven include discounts that support financial health, access to wellbeing resources (for example, gym memberships, and meditation apps), and personal and professional development resources.
There are also additional lifestyle-based perks, such as enhanced or unlimited annual leave packages that extend beyond the legal minimum amount.
Overall, employees want things that make life easier.
We conducted a survey asking employees what benefits they wanted most, and the overall trend was many small things every day, which add up over time.
While running campaigns can increase awareness and usage of your benefits, for example, celebrating Ride2Work Day and encouraging physical activity — benefits have the most impact when they’re easily accessible and redeemable.
Having a digital home for all your benefits and perks is essential to ensure your employees know what is actually available to them and how to access it.
This is exactly what Perkbox provides — you can even add custom benefits and rewards unique to your organisation, such as free lunches and additional annual leave.
When presented with an objective choice between two roles, the first offering the bare minimum and the second offering the same but with perks, a person will likely choose the second option — provided other significant factors such as commute and contractual hours are the same.
Benefits are part of an organisation’s Employee Value Proposition, or EVP. An EVP is essentially why an employee should work for you instead of your competitor. Offering a few benefits that are within your capabilities goes a long way to making you an employer of choice.
Larger businesses have more budget and resources to build out a host of high-impact benefits and additional perks, but that doesn’t mean small businesses can’t too. Flexible work, pets in the office, and even matching superannuation contributions up to a certain amount are all things that small businesses can do.
Once you’ve attracted the talent, it doesn’t stop there. Many business owners agree that retaining employees is even harder than hiring them. However, with the right mix of benefits and perks, your employees will be healthier and happier at work.
Moreover, when the cost of hiring a new employee can be up to 2.5 times as high as the salary of the position itself, benefits or initiatives, such as learning and development resources, are invaluable. In fact, employees who feel they’re progressing in their careers are 20% more likely to stay in their roles.
Most of the time, though, employees just want some recogntion and validation, which is why positive workplace behaviours should be rewarded, or at the very least, acknowledged and appreciated. Sadly, one of the most common reasons employees give for leaving a role or organisation is a lack of recognition.
According to Tuckman’s Five Stages, all teams are constantly cycling through the stages: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. No matter the team, they’re all going through this cycle, and they will always restart it. Restarting the cycle could be triggered by a team member entering or leaving the team, the start or end of a project, unexpected obstacles, or a change in leadership.
In some stages, like performing and norming, where the team is stable, salary and positive team relationships may be enough to motivate employees. But that’s only 40% of the time. For the remaining stages, there’s instability and conflict. These stages can’t be skipped or avoided, but you can speed through them if you plan right.
During these unstable stages, positive reinforcement of attitudes, behaviours, and contributions will speed you through them. By focusing on what your employees are doing well, you can clearly set the direction of where you are and where you want to go. You can do this by using a strategic recognition program, and highlighting behaviours worthy of a reward, signaling to your team to never accept defeat or mediocrity.
For an employee reward to be effective, there are a three factors to consider:
The best rewards and benefits also tend to focus on perks, development, or wellbeing, so if you choose a reward that relates to one of these categories, in addition to following the advice in the bullets, your reward will be appreciated.
Recognition doesn't always come with a price tag. It's about acknowledging the efforts of your team. Even a small gesture, like buying a coffee for an employee, can go a long way.
Here at Perkbox Australia, we run weekly polls with different themes. The winner gets a coffee a day for the following week — that’s less than $25 a week, and spreading it out means the behaviour is reinforced each day.
Larger rewards, however, can be tailored to the employee’s current phase of life. For instance, if they’re renovating their home, a $50 hardware store gift card would be a thoughtful gesture. Other ideas include meal deliveries, event tickets, and even the basics like groceries.
There are also non-monetary rewards. These are far more meaningful than any other type of reward but can be difficult to think of. The exact reward really depends on what your business can offer, but some examples include:
Let's say an employee builds a process to prevent mistakes, which saves the business time and money. We think a reward is appropriate in this situation, as the employee has taken the initiative and time to solve a complex problem.
It’s up to you what constitutes that reward though — it could be a gift card to their favourite store, a mentoring session with your CEO, or an extra day off.
Remember, while our example focuses on an individual, it's equally important to recognise and reward teams for their collective achievements.
Group achievements, collaboration, cross-communication, and achieving targets are worth celebrating together.
Again, be explicit about why the reward is being given. Making the recognition and reward public helps to set expectations in other employees about what level they need to reach to earn rewards.
With Perkbox, you can tag recognition and rewards to company values so employees know how their exemplary behaviour aligns with your organisation.
Your recognition program should include a definition of what constitutes and deserves recognition.
For example, a team member quickly fixing a mistake is definitely deserving of a thank you and a good job.
However, a team member who spots a mistake and then documents a process on how to avoid making that mistake again deserves more formal recognition.
For recognition to be viewed as different from a straightforward thank you, it must have a different structure.
We recommend that recognition is recorded and easily accessible in a dedicated space, where everyone can view it.
This is why each recognition employees send using the Perkbox app is recorded in a real-time recognition feed, so that everyone can see and celebrate it.
Employees who report having a reward and recognition program at work have high employee experience scores.
High employee experience scores are linked to an increase in performance, improved mental resilience, and better financial outcomes.
However, the positive effects of receiving recognition last around one week, so it must be an ongoing effort.
Celebrate and motivate your employees no matter where they’re working — in one building, remotely or across multiple locations.
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