Over the past 20 years, employers have increased and decreased benefits strategically in response to the needs of the workplace and employees as well as to economic and technological changes, according to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) 2016 Employee Benefits Survey report, released on June 20.
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Employers are responding to workers’—especially Millennials’—demands for better work/life balance with increased telecommuting, flextime and other accommodations. Since 1996, the percentage of organizations offering telecommuting has increased threefold (from 20 to 60%), and the percentage offering telecommuting on an ad hoc basis has increased from 45% in 2012 to 56% in 2016.
Additionally, while annual salary increases are a staple component of compensation plans, many employers have shifted toward monetary bonuses over the past five years to keep overall payroll costs stable. There have been increases for spot/bonus awards, sign-on bonuses for executives and non-executives and retention bonuses for nonexecutives. Also, more than one-half (56%) of organizations currently offer service anniversary awards, 51% offer nonexecutive bonus plans, and 44% offer executive incentive bonus plans.
As a possible solution to the skills gap and heightened recruiting difficulty, employers have also begun paying for more professional membership dues and opportunities. Currently, 88% of companies pay for professional membership dues compared to 65% in 1996.
“The biggest surprise was that, overall, while the number and types of benefits offerings that organizations offer has grown over the past 20 years, there have not been many major changes in terms of coverage of core employee benefits,” says Evren Esen, director of survey programs at SHRM. “Benefits such as health care, retirement planning and employee assistance programs are offered to employees at the same level as in 1996."
“The number of benefits employers are offering is consistent with recent years,” said Esen. “However, employers are always looking for new and innovative benefits that are cost-effective and best fit their workforce.”
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for an infographic that illustrates some of the survey findings.