How can you design better employee benefits packages?

As for any project, it's good to have a base structure of how you're going to do things. Of course, you want your company to be 'the best workplace in the world' and the most 'desirable place for candidates to apply to', but unfortunately not all organisations have budget and attention allocated to the benefits package. It's incredibly important to get major stakeholders involved and interested from the start, to avoid obstacles along the way. A basic way to understand what other companies offer is by checking out your major competitors and the Top List of organisations to work for (in the world/in your country, should be on google) and scout their benefits on their career page and get inspired. Simple!

Start by getting feedback from the team using surveys, interviews, or just general tidbits of information you hear organically. Look at the data, understand your demographic groups and compare your current offering with companies in similar industries. You should never aim to carbon copy benefits offered by your competitors. Your offering should be a well-designed, and considered package that aligns with your team's needs at that moment and showcases the values of your organisation.

There's no point in overcomplicating benefits package as an organisation - the main reasons for doing it are; - Employee retention - Attract the best talent - Stay relevant and competitive in the market

A great and collaborative way to kick off this project, is to: - Involve your Talent team - create a spreadsheet, word document, Miro board, a collaborative platform where they can contribute ideas. This is a great way to involve the team, and see what vauable information and insights they might have about the topic - Polls on LinkedIn, to see what viewers would want to see as benefits, create a discussion board/platform and gather analytics - Get ideas from your competitors/other top businesses - Ask candidates during qualification calls what they've received in the past and what their expectations are - Ask current colleagues what they would like to see as benefits, can use an anonymous survey approach or a spreadsheet to collate data

It's also important to consider what type of funding arrangement makes the most sense for your organization. An employer's budget, risk tolerance, claims experience, demographics, and long-term goals are all important factors in evaluating and identifying a suitable funding arrangement for your health plan. While most are familiar with traditional fully-insured vs. self-insured (aka self-funded) benefit plans, there are also some good hybrid options available in the marketplace. If you are an employer that has interest in self-funding but are not quite ready to make the full leap, you should ask your broker whether or not a hybrid approach like minimum premium or level funding could be right for you. Each carrier has different products.

Employment laws and people's needs change frequently. It's important to have a Comp & Ben specialist or department monitoring this aspect and updating it every 6-12 months.

Employee Benefits are sometimes overlooked and companies think they 'sell themselves'. Employee retention and being a desirable place to work goes hand in hand with how successful the company becomes in the future. Colleagues are the most important aspect of any company.

The needs of employees are changing, you have to design a basket of benefits that enable employees to choose what best suites their individual needs. The traditional way of designing benefits with a 'one size fits all' approach is outdated and not competitive at all. You have to reimagine benefits with a forward thinking mindset. Employees are choosing where to work with a much more intuitive attitude 'what's in it for me' and so your offerings must be the best in market or you lose the talent.