Employee benefits are not the responsibility of the employer. However, if we care about the loyalty of our employees – it is worth considering the introduction of non-wage supplements to their salary. What do employees care about? What benefits should be offered to meet their needs? You will find the answer in the article.
Employee benefits – what is it all about?
Employee benefits are nothing more than non-wage supplements to the employee’s fixed salary. Importantly, offering such benefits is not the responsibility of the employer! However, it allows him to build the image of a loyal employer, caring for people employed in his company. Offering additional non-wage benefits also has several other functions.
The first one is motivating employees and responding to their needs.
Benefits make employees feel appreciated and taken care of. Comfort at work, commitment and motivation of the employee translates into his productivity and efficiency. These are mutual benefits.
Secondly, employee benefits also affect the attractiveness of job offers. It has long been known that the employer’s market has ended and the employee’s market has begun. A candidate looking for a job is not guided only by the amount of salary. Considering two similar job offers, he will probably choose the one that offers additional benefits.
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Thirdly, offering non-wage supplements affects how outsiders perceive a given brand. Every employer should care about nurturing the company’s organizational culture. A loyal employee guarantees loyal and satisfied customers.
Who invests in employee benefits?
As a rule, large companies and corporations invest in employee benefits, with adequate financial resources. The first thing that may come to mind is the infamous “fruit Thursdays”. Indeed, you can find a dishonest employer who would like to compensate for the low salary with cheap benefits… However, one should not generalize. There are many companies on the market that often offer very ingenious and expensive supplements for their employees.
Smaller companies also opt for non-wage benefits. What’s more, they can be more valuable than those offered by large companies. Why? The smaller the team, the easier it is to match benefits to the needs of employees.
Employee benefits – how to respond to the needs of employees?
The staff is made up of people with different needs, characters and interests. There is no perfect offer of employee benefits. So how to respond to the needs of employees? The best solution will be to conduct surveys or interviews with employees, which will be aimed at finding out what motivates employees.
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What to pay attention to?
- It is important that the offer of benefits is varied. The more options you offer, the better! Get to know your employees better, their life situation and ways of spending free time.
- Follow current market trends. Check what benefits are offered by other respected companies, get inspired and suggest something similar in your company. It is worth taking care of employer branding! Satisfied employees are your business card – essential, if you want to encourage candidates to submit applications.
- Don’t forget about the basic criteria when choosing benefits for your team. Take into account years of work, work experience, work specifics.
Employee benefits during inflation – results of europa.jobs research
Inflation prevailing around the whole world has left its mark on individual sectors of the economy, including the labor market. Therefore, we decided to conduct research among employers registered on europa.jobs. The topic of the survey was employee benefits during inflation.
We wanted to check whether inflation affected the working conditions of employees, especially when we talk about non-wage benefits.
First of all, the results of the research once again proved that benefits are offered to both manual and office employees (over 80% of respondents employ the so-called blue collar employees).
What benefits does the company offer to employees?
As it can be seen in the attached infographic below, the list of benefits offered is quite extensive. Accommodation (80%) and transport advances (70%) appear in almost every statement of the respondents.
We remind that on europa.jobs we have the appropriate filters: work with accomodation and work with transport.
Various types of coupons and gift vouchers are becoming more and more popular (approx. 14%). Employers, as we can see, care not only about providing basic needs, but also supporting employees in developing their skills (co-financing foreign language courses – 28%, training / seminars – 20%).
Were employee benefits changed during inflation?
As it was mentioned at the beginning, we wanted to check whether and how inflation has affected the employment market. We were surprised by the fact that 100% of respondents answered ‘No’ to the question: Were the employee benefits changed during inflation?
For now, employers are fully prepared to offer the above-mentioned benefits. And this additionally confirms that currently the employee rules the employment market.
Employee benefits – a list
We already know what benefits are most often offered by employers. But the list of possible non-wage benefits is much longer, including:
- Insurance
- private healthcare
- foreign language course
- sports card (e.g. Multisport)
- funding for training and courses
- discounts and shopping vouchers
- Christmas packages for children
- co-financing of meals
- tickets to cultural events
- free parking
- additional paid leave
- flexible working hours
- possibility of remote work
Other interesting ideas for employee benefits:
- corporate chillout room
- garden with barbecue
- an extra day off work for a birthday 🙂
- office friendly to four-legged pets
- surprise gifts
- acupuncture at work
- using the services of a personal trainer
- game room
- nap room
- transportation allowance
- massage chairs
- free law advices
- fridge with soft drinks
- child daycare
- mental health time off
- discounts on company products
- flu vaccinations
- supplement to the purchase of fitness equipment for the home
- birthday parties
- use of company vehicles
- no official uniform
- identity theft protection
- Spotify or Netflix subscription
- gift cards
- free snacks
Benefits for advertisements on europa.jobs
Do you post job ads on europa.jobs? Don’t forget to inform candidates about the benefits! When posting an offer, you can easily select what else you offer to future employees.
Use filters:
Thanks to these filters, your offer will become even more attractive to candidates! Before you know it, new applications will flow into your email inbox.
