Employee benefits are an extremely expensive part of your compensation package, which is why many human resources and benefits professionals become quite frustrated when they learn that these benefits are not being fully utilized. It would be obvious if some benefits are only meant for a small portion of your population, such as onsite childcare but others may be more difficult to suss out the value that your employees are deriving from the benefit. Health and wellness programs are considered an excellent investment, with a recent 2-year study showing noticeable improvements in health that correspond to the introduction of wellness initiatives. Financial or mental health wellness programs can be a bit more challenging to analyze, particularly when you consider the need to maintain strict privacy. These suggestions will help you blend the ideal mix of employee benefits to boost efficiency and improve happiness at work.
Determine Current Utilization Rates
While you do need to tread carefully around utilization for employee benefits due to privacy laws, your provider should be able to offer clean, aggregated data that helps you make good decisions about benefits utilization. Even looking at how many people opted into specific healthcare plans can get you thinking about what employees want -- and what they're willing to accept.
Check the Competitive Environment
What types of benefits are your competitors offering? Speaking with your peers or even checking the job boards to see what type of benefits are mentioned may be a great way to do a little competitive research. Understanding what job seekers are looking for can help inform what to offer that will tempt current employees to stay -- and future prospects to take the plunge and join your organization. Healthcare benefits are often cited as one of the most important benefits for job seekers, making it vital to get the mix correct for your benefits.
Work with Your Benefits Broker
While you may not be seeing trends in your employee benefits usage, your broker might spot some areas for efficiency that can help balance your benefits. Your employee benefits broker is able to look across multiple organizations to see trends and might be able to provide innovative new ideas that other organizations have introduced. Leveraging that relationship helps ensure that you are getting the greatest contributions from your employee benefits dollars.
Poll Your Staff Members
While you can learn a great deal of information and start to understand the right questions to ask, ultimately your staff are the ones that need to weigh in on the benefits that are being offered. If an overwhelming percentage of individuals share that they are not particularly interested in a specific option, it might be time to shift those dollars into something that is perceived as more meaningful. Keeping an ongoing pulse on the needs of your employees creates a positive perception of the employer, too.
When you are ready to fine-tune your employee benefits offerings and boost the efficiency of your team, contact the professionals at Eureka at 916-742-7842 for more information. We work closely with organizations of all sizes to ensure that your healthcare benefits are well-fitted to the needs of your employees and stay within your overall budgetary requirements. You can always download our free tool 5 Strategies to Bring Clarity to Employee Benefits for more tips and ideas that will help boost productivity and effectiveness during this extremely busy season for your staff.
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