There’s been a huge amount of recent coverage about the challenges of not only recruiting in the current market, but also retaining staff and driving post-pandemic performance as businesses seek recovery.
Employee benefits have been a long-standing feature of most businesses’ reward packages, but recently the conversation has shifted to wellbeing and how businesses can utilise employee benefits to improve the wellbeing of their workforce – so much so, that it’s almost become fashionable! But beyond all the hype and headlines, what is it really about and to be brutally frank, why bother?
Adam Davey, Director at Petaurum HR commented
“In my HR career, I’ve long since held the view that if you look after your people (ensuring their physical, mental and financial wellbeing is all in good shape) and you provide them with meaningful work that they enjoy, there really is only one inevitable outcome and that’s better, sustained performance – which has to be good news for every business!”
In other words, looking after the wellbeing of your workforce (which is all about removing their barriers to sustained attendance, motivation and performance) is an investment, not just a ‘nice thing to do’.
Following this logic, the next question is how can you make this happen? Here we outline our thoughts and top tips:
Wellbeing
Physical: there are lots of highly effective and great value for money options from health club concessions, including access to a private Doctor line and online exercise classes.
Alternatives, depending on the nature of the business might be to encourage ‘walking meetings’, a ‘steps’ challenge, providing healthy eating options or a water cooler to maintain hydration.
If you have more budget, then Health Cash Plans are an excellent option or you may wish to consider private medical insurance. Some of these benefits are preventative – helping people stay healthy, and others are reactive – helping people recover as quickly as possible if they do become ill or sustain an injury.
Mental: mental health is on most people’s radars. But it’s as important (if not more important) to think about encouraging and maintaining good mental health within your whole workforce, not just helping those who might be struggling. There are some amazing online platforms full of rich content that will help people with relaxation, mindfulness and resilience.
There are also a range of advice lines from counselling support lines that help with issues people may be struggling to deal with such as bereavement, relationships or trauma, through to ‘elder care’ advice to help those with caring responsibilities navigate their way through the maze of the social care system. Might sound tenuous but with people living for longer, it’s an issue that causes more and more working families stress. The provision of a will writing service will help people get their affairs in order. This is gaining popularity and helps give people reassurance and comfort that they have sound plans in place for the future.
Quite often the root cause of a mental health issue is external to the workplace, but the impact can have such a significant effect on work so it’s unwise to ignore it.
Financial: There are many options to consider, from retail discounts to help save money (holidays, car leasing and many other retail purchases), HMRC approved salary sacrifice schemes on anything from bikes and electric cars to computers and pension contributions or the provision of access to independent financial advice, perhaps for an annual financial health check.
There are also benefits, such as cinema discounts that fit into more than one category as they not only help people save money on the price of a ticket, but also going to the cinema is a really nice, relaxing and enjoyable thing to do which will have a positive effect on mental wellbeing.
Unless you’re willing to scour the market searching the right content, the ideal solution is to find a platform that contains all of this in one place!
Providing a benefits scheme like this will undoubtedly help with attracting and retaining employees into your business. However, the real challenge is making sure it’s ‘the right’ people that you recruit and retain, those who are aligned to your values and culture and will add a significant contribution to your team. This is where our next tip comes in…..
Engagement
As a business, if someone asked “why do you do what you do?” would you be able to answer!
It’s a simple question but unless you’ve given your true purpose serious thought it’s not so easy to explain.
From a recruitment and retention perspective, letting people know what it is that makes your business so different will attract like-minded people who value the same things you do.
On top of this, give them interesting work to do. Ok, not every job requires creative genius and sometimes it can be a bit repetitive, but think about how you can mix things up to keep people interested and willing to go the extra mile.
On top of this, throw in some good leadership that inspires and motivates the team and focus on creating a positive culture.
And there you have it! Some tips for implementing the formula: Wellbeing + Engagement = Performance
Talk to Adam at Petaurum HR
to find out more 07809 672308 / adam@petaurumhr.co.uk