From free food to unmonitored flex time, employee incentives send out the right signals. They show that a company acknowledges and wants to reward people's contributions to the success of the business.
Here's a roundup of a few employee incentives and employee gift ideas that may brighten your team's day. Some of these benefits fall under the category of supporting an employee's life journey, and others are fun and quirky ways to make employees happy.
Physical and Emotional Well-Being: The Centerpiece of Employee Incentives
Most workers today place a strong emphasis on being healthy and fit. Giving people the gift of health may be one of the most caring initiatives as an employer. What's more, having a healthy and productive workforce may be a key component that leads to a healthy bottom line.
There are a variety of health and well-being employee incentives to choose from.
Programming and Incentives
- Provide a Quit Smoking resource.
- Start a weight loss challenge program with compelling prizes.
- Offer free, on-site flu shots.
- Offer a fitness allowance for employees to spend as they see fit on fitness-related items such as athletic shoes, sports club memberships or swimming lessons.
- Give employees access to life coaching to help manage stress, make better life decisions, improve their relationships and gain balance.
- A common feature of employee incentives packages is access to an Employee Assistance Program (EAP). Look for one that provides a mental health hotline for issues such as substance abuse, anxiety or grief counseling.
Screenings
- Arrange for on-site fitness appraisals or biometric screenings (e.g., aerobic fitness tests, blood pressure and cholesterol tests). According to the CDC, biometric screenings can be used as part of a workplace health assessment to benchmark and evaluate changes in employee health over time.
- Arrange for onsite screening for cancer, such as a mobile mammography screening service.
- Provide access to one or more health experts services such as a nutritionist, a dietitian, a health coach or a chiropractor. Consider a variety of other physical wellness programs such as on-site yoga classes, meditation classes, acupuncture training, pilates, golf or tennis lessons for beginners and even dance classes.
In-Office Perks
- Consider offering standing desks or treadmill desks to those whose jobs require long hours of sitting. As part of your employee incentives, institute a program that encourages periodic physical activity breaks during the workday such as standing stretches, stretching at your desk or walking.
- Surprise employees with refrigerated vending machines offering healthy choices such as yogurt and fruits.
- Consider establishing an on-site gardening program. Does empty land surround your corporate headquarters? Do you have an unused rooftop? Why not provide earth boxes and seeds to promote team gardening activities as part of your employee incentives program? Employees can use the produce or donate it to food banks.
- Make bicycle racks available at safe and accessible locations around the premises.
Financial Wellness: A Vital Component of Employee Incentives
A 2018 PwC Employee Financial Wellness Survey involving 1,600 full-time employed adults reveals that close to half are stressed about their finances.
Moreover, when asked to identify the top cause of stress in their lives, nearly twice as many respondents cited financial matters as compared to job stress. In fact, more employees chose financial stress over health concerns and relationships combined.
Helping employees manage their money better and feel happier about their finances may be an essential area to focus on when exploring employee incentives.
Free financial planning education may be a valuable employee perk. The PwC survey mentioned above shows that 25 percent of respondents consider financial advice and education as the most desired employer benefit they don't already have. Think about providing access to unbiased counselors to educate employees on financial matters and help them validate their decisions.
Do you offer contingent pay? Which payment plan works best as part of the employee incentives: performance-related pay, profit-related pay or employee share ownership?
Your employees are the heart of your business. When they perform well, what better way to thank them than with meaningful employee incentives?
A 2017 study involving 13,657 respondents in 1,293 private-sector workplaces across the UK reveals that of the three contingent pay choices, only performance-related pay had direct positive relationships with job satisfaction, employee commitment and trust in management.
A few other options?
- Offer group home and auto insurance coverage to help employees benefit from discounted rates.
- Can you afford to offer a small low-interest or no-interest employee loan to help with important life goals such as housing, home improvements, adoption and even weddings?
- Offer identity theft protection coverage and a credit monitoring service. With the increasing incidents of data breaches, this may become a valued employee incentives.
- Given that so many people have a pet, chances are many of your employees would enjoy receiving pet health insurance as part of their incentives package.
Work and Lifestyle Well-Being: A Key Aspect of Employee Incentives
The most precious commodity for employees today is time. There are a host of employee incentives you can provide that gives them back the gift of time in exchange for their hard work:
- How about offering a corporate concierge and an errands service to reward your high performers?
- You can help employees save personal time by picking up the tab for a cleaning service, or providing a weekly laundry service. You could even install a couple of onsite washing machines and dryers depending on your staff size.
- In addition to the customary vacation and sick leave, stand out by offering some additional paid time off. For example, time off for new pet owners, volunteering leave or "just because days" for employees to do whatever floats their boat.
- Create a room in some corner of the office that employees can use to seek some relaxation and quiet. You can make it a team activity to come up with decorating ideas. A hammock anyone?
Family Well-Being: A Thoughtful Part of Employee Incentives
Show that you're a family-friendly workplace with a variety of programs aimed to make life easier for working moms and dads.
Here are a few ideas to inspire you:
- Consider providing a cash allowance to handle newborn expenses, or reimbursement for daycare or babysitter services.
- Provide financial assistance for surrogacy programs or chip in on adoption fees.
- In addition to the usual parental leave, providing some unpaid time off for baby bonding is sure to please would-be parents.
- Offering a free work-life counseling program to help moms returning from maternity leave might be well received. The CDC Research reveals that 1 in 9 women nationally experience postpartum depression. By state, it can be as high as 1 in 5.
- What about access to lactation consultants? As a minimum, consider providing dedicated space for pumping and lactation. Help breastfeeding moms who travel on business to ship their milk by picking up the cost of shipping the milk. There are also a number of companies that provide this service.
- Do you have employees who are single parents? How about offering compressed work weeks to allow a single mom or dad to work more extended hours for a shorter number of days?
Quirky Perks: The Fun Part of an Employee Incentives Program
The boundary between work and personal life is increasingly blurred with employees spending a big chunk of their life at the office. Providing employee benefits that enhance the quality of life at work is a worthwhile initiative.
- An office barista: Surprise your employees some mornings by hiring a barista to prepare their cappuccinos or lattes for a couple of hours.
- A portable petting zoo: We've heard about the popularity of allowing employees to bring their dog to work. Here's a different twist: How about contracting with one of the portable petting zoo companies to bring pets to the office on a Friday afternoon? There's joy in being in the presence of a pet especially at work.
- Free or discounted merchandise and services: Sign up with companies such as The Work Perk (which distributes free promotional products to employees), Perks at Work or AnyPerk (which provides discounted prices for products and services that employees may enjoy).
- A fun room: How about offering a playroom with arcade machines, foosball, musical instruments and other fun items?
Your employees are the heart of your business. When they perform well, what better way to thank them than with meaningful employee incentives?
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