We are currently in unprecedented times where the biggest concern of leadership is not being able to fill critical roles within the organization.
Top producers are fielding calls on a weekly, if not daily basis, and some are negotiating some crazy cool benefits on top of compensation.
One of the largest value-adds in working with an experienced recruiter is that she will be sharing a candidate’s primary motivators with you, so you can know what will make your candidates eyes light up when selling the role.
It may be career path opportunities, a fantastic company culture, or perhaps work from home options. In addition to addressing your candidates current pain points and how your opportunity is what they are looking for, hiring managers in today’s market would be wise to think out-of-the-box and to offer unique benefits that are guaranteed to provide a high ROI.
Besides the work-life balance that employees are currently ranking as their top priority, there are several other benefits that are highly sought after.
A great way of determining what benefits your particular work force would find of value, is to ask them! Create an anonymous survey, asking them to rank a list of benefits, along with room to provide additional suggestions.
Depending on the demographics of your employee base, chances are you will see work from home options in the highest spot, along with casual attire when working at the office, flexible hours, or perhaps premium seating at sporting events, concert tickets, or special parking spaces. Time savers such as a month of house cleaning, pool cleaning, lawn service, or meal delivery are also typically huge incentives for top performers.
By offering exceptional benefits, a company shows that it cares about their worker’s mental, physical, and financial well-being.
The ROI on offering additional benefits cannot be emphasized enough. Lower attrition, higher retention, less sick days, and higher reported job satisfaction are all serious benefits for companies that choose to provide additional incentives on top of salaries.
In addition to smaller incentives to entice lower-level employees to make the leap to your team, the following 6 benefits are heavily weighted in the decision-making process of high caliber candidates.
1) Financial Stake Within the Organization
Offering equity is probably the single biggest thing that a company can do to entice talented candidates to switch companies. Providing an opportunity to make serious money based on their performance is often the largest factor when landing high-level talent.
In addition to helping to hire the best and brightest, additional benefits when offering equity range from lowered attrition rates, increased retention, and higher morale.
It’s easy to see how equity inoculates companies from poaching by having their employees feel invested in the company, knowing they are vital part of the team, and won’t leave to explore a job change. They’ll work extra hard keeping the company’s future top of mind. Why? Because individuals who own stock in the firm have a financial stake in the company’s success.
2) Paid Time Off
A company that gives paid time off to their personnel shows that they truly care about the employee’s emotional, mental, and physical well-being. Employees will feel like they’re being seen and heard. This will motivate them to hone their skills, achieve their KPIs, and you will generally find they will happily put in the extra mile to achieve the desired results.
Also, money connected to an employee’s family’s well-being is far more heavily weighted than say a quarterly bonus. Consider being as generous as possible when offering paid time off for various scenarios. Chances are you will reap the rewards many times over.
Provide your team with paid vacation time, give personal days so they can spend time with their families during important events, and allow extra sick days so they can get a check-up without having to miss out on work. Being able to offer that is far more impactful than a slight increase in base salary.
For the same amount of money, you can tweak your budget to allow for more impactful spending!
Focus on having a culture based on performance. When you have that as your core, it is easy to be generous with time schedules.
Work Expands to Fill the Time Allotted to It!
3) Employee Growth Strategy / Career Path
Employees who don’t see a promising future within your team will likely become dissatisfied, underperform, or will leave sooner than anticipated.
In fact, lack of a clear career path is one of the very top reasons why successful people choose to look around and potentially make a change.
Every single company should offer a very clear, concise picture of what a high performing employee can aspire to.
4) Tuition Reimbursement
A useful perk that typically is of great interest to candidates is Tuition Reimbursement. Again, not only is it a nice benefit, but the perception with this is that the company is investing in an employee’s future, so you get a lot of bang for the buck.
What better way to increase your chances of having an employee consider your company as a true career as opposed to just a job, when you are investing in them as an individual?
By paying for continuing education, this also allows your staff to learn new skills and tools that will help them execute their jobs more effectively.
5) Extra Discounts & Rewards
This is an unusual but impactful way to sweeten the pot when it comes to joining and staying within your organization, without much of a cost.
Consider creating a coalition between your company and others, offering each other’s employees a discount for your services.
Not only is it perceived as something of value, but we have seen this turn into additional profits for the companies involved since it brings in new customers, looking to take advantage of their benefit. Win!
6) Stay Interviews!
Consistently holding one-on-one interviews with every member of your team pays off handsomely. Far better to learn of a problem when it is strictly an issue, and not the reason why someone is resigning.
Have a prepared list of open-ended questions and focus on actively listening. Repeat back your employees concerns and be clear on what they can expect from you in terms of rectifying the situation. Make a commitment to follow up with a solution within a specific amount of time and do what you say you are going to do. Nothing is worse than having someone open up to you about a specific concern and then not doing your best to fix it.
Stay Interviews are also a perfect place to discuss career path aspirations and clearly outline what they need to do to achieve their goals.
As the #1 most recommended recruiting agency in the entire US based on LinkedIn recommendations, International Search Consultants offers expert executive recruiting services to ensure your team is equipped with highly skilled and experienced professionals. By strategically targeting the top talent that matches your requirements, we will find the perfect fit for your company.
Our team of 15 experienced recruiters can provide talent for the majority of our Clients hiring needs, including banking and finance, human resources, and sales management.
Contact us today to learn more about our executive recruitment services!
Kara Onorato is Director of ISC’s award winning team of Executive Recruiters. You can reach Kara at 877-316-6249 or .
Ann Zaslow-Rethaber is President of International Search Consultants. You can reach Ann at 888-866-7276 or .
