If you’re a growing company, offering benefits is an important step in increasing your ability to hire and retain talented employees. After all, a Glassdoor poll found that 57 percent of job candidates say that benefits and perks are among their top considerations before accepting a new role. And another Glassdoor survey showed that nearly 80 percent of workers would prefer new or additional benefits to a pay increase.Therefore, it’s worth investing the time it take to craft a strong benefits package.
Before you start looking at the swath of benefits options like paternity leave, life insurance and 401(k)s, you’ll want to know where you should start. To find out, we sifted through 470,000 benefits reviews for companies spanning 50 employees to more than 10,000. The research revealed that it’s important to get the essentials right in the beginning.
Out of a list of 54 benefits, these three basic benefits—health insurance, vacation/PTO and retirement planning options like 401(k)s and pensions—showed the highest correlation with employee satisfaction. Surprisingly, they even edged out things like maternity and paternity leave, free food, life insurance and dependent care.
To help you start crafting a benefits package that covers health care, paid time off and retirement planning, we teamed up with Gusto on a new eBook: The Benefits Package Your Employees Want (And How to Give It to Them)
In this ebook you’ll find out about the legalities, tax benefits and productivity benefits you’ll get when you let your employees sign up for health insurance, offer retirement planning, and develop a paid time off policy. In case there’s any doubt that these issues matter, here’s some research included in the eBook:
Healthy people are happier and more productive:
- Sixty percent of employers say offering health insurance has led to higher productivity levels, according to research from MetLife.
- Seventy-eight percent of employees who are in good health feel happy with their job, found Guardian Life.
- Guardian Life also discovered that 80 percent of people say an in-depth benefits offering is what determines whether they stay or leave their current job.
Time off increases creativity:
- A study from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) discovered that 63 percent of people see paid time off as one of the top three benefits that influences their job satisfaction. Seventy-eight percent of HR pros agree, and believe that teammates who take PTO are more delighted about going to work each day.
- A joint study from SHRM and Project Time Off found that 77 percent of HR managers feel that their vacation-taking employees get more done. Ninety-five percent also say that vacation is a crucial way to bump up the team’s creativity.
- A survey from Workplace Trends revealed that 65 percent of companies believe retaining talent is one of the top advantages they see from work flexibility and PTO programs.
Retirement planning is the right thing to do:
- According to SHRM, 94 percent of surveyed organizations offered some type of retirement plan in 2016. Seventy-four percent of companies provided an employer match on some or all of their employees’ contributions to traditional 401(k) or similar retirement plans.
- Today, the average Social Security benefit is $1,341 a month, which is simply not enough for the typical person to live on. When people pay into the future with additional pre-tax contributions beyond their Social Security deductions, they can turn their retirement into the meaningful gift that it’s promised to be: a relaxing payoff for all of their years of hard work.
To find out everything you need to get started on building a great benefits package, download our eBook The Benefits Package Your Employees Want (And How to Give It to Them).
