This article from Human Resources Executive showcases 5 ways to infuse some creativity into your company’s employee benefits package in order to stay ahead of the curve when it comes to attracting the best talent.
At the top of the list are Lifestyle Spending Accounts, which are non-ERISA post-tax accounts with budgets and coverage parameters set by the employer (e.g. child care, home office construction/renovation, commute expenses, etc.). Those parameters are essentially limited only by the employer's creativity, and once set, employers must simply review employee claims and distribute funds accordingly. The primary questions then become, what do most employees most need financial help with and how much help is the employer willing to provide? In effect, the customizability of these accounts make them a great way to show employees that your company is responsive to their feedback and in tune with their personal needs in a way that costs relatively little compared to the amount of loyalty and appreciation these arrangements can instill.
Tuition reimbursement is another, perhaps less intuitive, way to get creative in employee benefit package composition. While tuition assistance hit its high water mark back in the early 2000s in terms of its reach across US employers, these kinds of benefits have been making a major comeback in recent years. You can read more about additional options for providing education-related financial assistance to employees here, but one of the main vehicles for making available these kinds of contributions are educational assistance programs, which are tax deductible and don’t count towards an employee’s income, but are capped at $5250 per year per employee. Employers can also get creative in the tuition reimbursement space by offering funding only for particular areas of study that may be especially in-demand or particularly important to the employer or employees for whatever reason.
Reproductive benefits are increasingly becoming a staple of employee benefits packages among the most forward-looking companies as concerns about reproductive issues and the potential expense of addressing them have grown significantly among employees and people in general in recent years. While the spectrum of reproductive benefit offerings covered is usually fairly wide and inclusive already, one creative expansion of those offerings would be to also include adoption-related support, as well. By pairing adoption services with a suite of reproductive services from egg freezing through generous maternity and paternity leave, companies ensure that all employees with parenting aspirations can find the support they’re seeking regardless of their circumstances.
Emergency savings accounts, or ESAs, are another creative employee benefit package inclusion. From a practical standpoint, these kinds of accounts are essentially no different than an ordinary bank account that an employee could open and into which they could then deposit a small amount of money from each of their paychecks with the intention to only use that money in case of emergency. In reality, however, even though many employees recognize the need for an emergency fund, they simply neglect to create one using a traditional savings account for a variety of reasons. By providing ESAs as a voluntary benefit, companies can give their employees something they actively want already, and employers can even make the process all the easier by depositing a small amount of each paycheck directly into those accounts on the employees behalf, with very little effort and practically no expense required.
And lastly, matching employee contributions has become widely regarded as a wise investment that pays dividends in the long run by having employees that are better prepared to face the many unfortunate situations they may encounter throughout their careers, from accidents and/or health-related issues to retirement. One creative way to extend this principle further toward an even more equitable application while also maximizing the benefit of the employer contribution match at the same time is to correlate contribution matching to income tiers. Essentially, lower income families get the full employer seed amount, which progressively decreases at the upper employee income tiers. This kind of arrangement ensures that those who are most struggling to save for health and retirement are able to do so.
Ultimately, however, the best way to be creative isn’t simply to copy the other relatively novel approaches that companies on the avant garde are experimenting with and putting into practice - that’s just a good place to start. The best way to be creative is to embrace the spirit of those innovations and to apply that spirit to the particular problems that may be facing your employees.
Of course, in order to address the issues facing your employees, you must first be aware of what those issues are, which makes seeking and responding to feedback key. If you can find even one employee willing to share an issue that is significantly affecting their life and work, and your company has access to a tool that may help resolve their issue, it’s a good bet that there are other employees in a similar situation who would appreciate similar help, as well.
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