At the recently concluded SHRM conference at D.C., the group released a 20-year story of employee benefits-A RECAP! The study surveyed around 3490 HR professionals and reviewed 300 benefit offerings.
Here are the Key Highlights:
No doubt, desires, needs & technical innovations have changed the way benefits offerings are carried out in the corporate world. But, even then it’s very hard to find any changes in the core benefits such as health care, retirement planning & employee assistance programs but still they are worth mentioning here.
People Are More Career-Oriented Now
It’s not like employers were not concerned about the professional development of their employees 20 years ago, but the concept has grown with increased competition and the need to fill skills gap. As a result, employers are more willing to invest in and pay for professional membership dues and training opportunities to make the rising demand fulfilled. As per the findings, there’s an upswing of 23% in the number of employers employer-paid professional memberships as compared to two decades ago. And also, 11% increase in the number of employers who offer either onsite or offsite professional development opportunities (workshops, training, and seminars) than those in 1996.
Increased Support To Flexible Working Culture
20 years ago, only 20% of employers were open to flexible working hour or allowed their employees to opt for work from home. But with the advancements in technology (biometric access, automated time tracking and wide reach of the internet than ever before), there’s a major shift in the working ways. As a result, the figure has reached to 80 percent! Now, around 80% employers allow their workforce to work from home or away from office. Moreover, nowadays allowing employees to work during any time of the day is considered as one of the greatest motivation factors for employee engagement and higher productivity.
Companies Are Taking Care Of Their Employees’ Well-Being!
Healthy employee means enthusiastic and positive workplace. And with increasing workload, challenges and health problems, employers have become more concerned about their employee's healthcare. As a result, more and more companies are offering healthcare benefits to their workforce. According to SHRM survey, in 1996 only 54% of employers used to offer wellness resources or information, which has increased to 74% today!
Descending Financial and Compensation Benefits!
This category encompasses a variety of things from perks like employee discounts on company services to parking subsidies and much more. As the survey says, apart from transit subsidies all other benefits have fallen. For example, only 32% of employers offer discounts to their employees as compared to 43% in 1996. But on the positive side, a new financial & compensation benefits trend has emerged that resulted in significant increase in many monetary benefits over the last 5 years. These benefits include bonus awards, employee referral bonus, and sign-on bonuses to name a few.
No Change In Retirement Plans!
The only thing that has remained unchanged is retirement offering. But the survey did find some insights about the present retirement benefits offerings. Only 6% of employers offer cash balance pension plans to their employees whereas 25% prefer to pay employees a certain amount on retirement. 13% organization have now frozen their benefit pension plans making it unavailable for the new hires.
Summing Up All Together..
Although not much changes have been witnessed in the core benefits offerings such as health care, retirement planning, and employee assistance programs, but there are some high sides as well in terms of student loan reimbursement, increased flexible schedules and family leave, which plays a vital role in making the workforce satisfied and engaged. Above are the some generalized points of SHRM’s recently released survey that will help you understand the changing trends in benefit offerings.
