Employee value
proposition
The evolution of flexible benefits
The new concept of flexible benefits is an exciting prospect for leaders of organisations. That’s because getting the employee value proposition (EVP) right fundamentally affects business performance.
RESOURCES
CONTACT
CONTACT
RESOURCES
READ ARTICLE
The EVP acts as a manifesto for an organisation’s relationships with its workers, replacing older models of employee management to refocus on the needs
of the employee.
Reimagine your EVP
Establishing a sustainable and resilient business requires a focus on everything from supply chains to the disruption from environmental and macroeconomic change. Critically, it also now includes an employer’s relationship with employees. This resilience needs to be addressed from the top down, from the impact of future regulation and employee
retention to public relations.
Just as environmental sustainability means treating the planet with respect, business sustainability in this context means treating employees with respect and developing them. For both, it’s considered the right thing to do and is becoming a business imperative for the C-suite, as others expect you to do it and will measure how you do so.
Let us help your business, contact us to start your journey.
CONTACT US
Latest expert insights
Business resilience
Workplace wellbeing
Knowledge hub
Business resilience
Creating the right culture for your workforce helps build resilience.
READ OUR ARTICLE
READ OUR ARTICLE
A focus on holistic, long-term plans for your company.
Workplace wellbeing
VISIT THE HUB
Explore our latest insights to help maximise competitive advantage.
Knowledge hub
RESOURCES
CONTACT
RESOURCES
CONTACT
LATEST NEWS
Read and watch our latest insights.
Discover your organisation’s DNA to maximise competitive advantage.
KNOWLEGE HUB
Take a deeper dive into our industry research.
EXPERT REPORTS
Explore our upcoming and on-demand webinars and events.
EVENTS
Partner, Head of Employer Consulting
NICK GRIGGS
Principal, Head of Management Analytics
ALLAN ENGELHARDT
Partner, Head of Platform
& Benefits
JULIA TURNEY
Partner, Head of Benefit Consulting
DAVID COLLINGTON
Partner, Head of Corporate Consulting Midlands
JANE RALPH
RESOURCES
CONTACT
Partner, Head of Employer Consulting
NICK GRIGGS
Partner, Head of Platform
& Benefits
JULIA TURNEY
Partner, Head of Corporate Consulting Midlands
JANE RALPH
Principal, Head of Management Analytics
ALLAN ENGELHARDT
Partner, Head of Benefit Consulting
DAVID COLLINGTON
RESOURCES
CONTACT
Read and watch our latest insights.
LATEST NEWS
Discover your organisation’s DNA to maximise competitive advantage.
KNOWLEGE HUB
Take a deeper dive into our industry research.
EXPERT REPORTS
Explore our upcoming and on-demand webinars and events.
EVENTS
EVP is the holistic way to view employee interactions by collecting them on a cloud server and using the resulting data to further improve interactions. Of course, flexible benefits are important to employees, but the EVP is more about building a workplace community.
For management it is also about measuring the quality of interactions and aligning objectives with outputs to improve the overall company experience. This enables the critical ability to show external stakeholders that they behave ethically – critical to customers.
What’s in it for the business?
The pandemic changed things
On the one hand, employees enjoy unparalleled freedom and
the benefits of reduced commuting time. On the other, it can be
a challenge building a collaborative community when employees are physically separated. In some cases, this has resulted in silos between employees.
Business leaders and HR directors should be working together.
After all, if people are your most important assets, everyone
has a responsibility to ensure they are managed properly
and sustainably.
For businesses, hybrid working is something of a curate’s egg – good in parts and not so good in others.
While remote working may increase siloed thinking, a good EVP platform that offers employees a positive user experience can break those siloes down. But employers must invest in that platform and take its usage seriously to achieve this. Tangible experiences, often non-work activities like book or cooking clubs, in addition to training and ‘lunchtime learning’ sessions, will help generate management information to support broader sustainability objectives.
Remote working, where employees feel isolated, may also be detrimental for mental and physical health. Both of these may be ‘secret stressors’, factors that have moved up the management agenda and should be a focus under the EVP.
The term 'flexible benefits’ is seen as an outmoded title for employee benefit delivery today primarily because, in the past, most of the flexibility was rigidly geared to suit the employer rather than the employee.
Flexible benefits are evolving, as part of the employee value proposition (EVP), to meet the changing needs of modern organisations and their employees. They are no longer viewed as simply a delivery mechanism to give people their computer loans or cycle to work benefits. Employers who take a more strategic view of flexible benefits are increasingly seeing them as a core part of the EVP.
The Covid-19 pandemic acted as a catalyst for change, prompting a large part of the working population to re-evaluate their relationship with work and their employers. For example, as part of the effort to retain talent, organisations needed to adapt and refocus their training and development activity. And many people changed jobs or refused to go back into roles they used to occupy on the same terms.
In the UK, this resulted in widespread wage inflation in the private sector. In parallel, the war in Ukraine and greater demand for goods as the pandemic eased, has resulted in very high rates of inflation throughout the economy, particularly for essentials like food. This has added pressure from the public sector to increase wages, something the UK Government
is reluctant to do fearing it could fuel further inflation. The result has been widespread industrial action.
Elsewhere in the economy, those who enjoyed working remotely sought to retain a
hybrid work life. Some employers have accommodated more flexible approaches. Others, including a number of businesses that engaged in a four-day week pilot, have committed
to maintaining, or in some cases even extending, these hyper-flexible arrangements.
The power of positive resilience
RESEARCH
Our latest wellbeing research focusses on the resilience of the UK workforce, illustrating the role employers have in ensuring their employees are ready for any challenge.
In short, what used to be a purely HR concern has now been elevated to a C-suite issue because getting the EVP right is a core contributor to business success. Today, true flexible benefits are a management tool which helps to build sustainable and resilient businesses.
Every employer’s DNA is different, depending on the sector, location, workforce, what they want to achieve and plans for growth.
One-size-fits-all models will fail.
Research by Barnett Waddingham on employee resilience showed a third of workers have changed jobs once or more in the past two years.
The cost-of-living crisis may have forced some people into jobs they didn’t want. For each age group we surveyed, at least 25% of men and 31% of women said the cost-of-living crisis affected them. But money and rewards, while helpful, are not the things that retain good staff longer term. The reasons for this are fascinating – and instructive.
Uncovering secret stressors
Top three reasons for changing jobs
Men
Women
Better pay
Change career
Better prospects
19%
17%
17%
Women
Men
29%
Unhappy in role
21%
Better pay
20%
Better line management
During a cost-of-living crisis, stopping employees from leaving to seek higher pay elsewhere may be an insoluble problem. But the other reasons outlined above are management issues that can be addressed.
While these are the tangible reasons why people left a job, we also learn a great deal from the intangible reasons. For instance, 82% said they understood their purpose at work. But that means a fifth do not. Why is that and can that group be supported?
We live in a rapidly changing world, yet the research discovered that men under the age of 35 consider themselves able to embrace change without losing too much focus. Although women of the same age consider themselves between a quarter and a third less able to do so, the ability to embrace change drops for both men and women to comparable levels over the age of 35, with those over the age of 55 the least able to adapt to change.
The data showed there are clear gaps in the way individuals view their role in an organisation. And those are risks. Not just that stress may mean the business loses good workers, but that these stressors could, in turn, trigger illness — particularly mental health issues.
These numbers can be used as a guide – they are the things that three in five employees are actively seeking. For many (but not all) organisations these challenges are not insurmountable, but the solutions must be driven from board level.
Aligning corporate outputs and objectives within your workplace community will create a better culture for your people, underpinned by technology that allows your community of colleagues, currently distanced by remote or hybrid working, to thrive.
Putting the data to work
From our survey, employees are clear about what they need
57%
Employers to take an interest in them
58%
Career development
59%
Good wellbeing support
57%
Inclusive working environment
57%
Engaging communications
The data captured by an employer on its workforce is not much use unless it is put to work. The EVP in a truly diverse and inclusive employer will seek to address these potential differences and deliver equitably to all members of the workforce.
The EVP is the management tool that can be used to
build a better culture in an organisation – one in which everyone knows their purpose; where support for development and wellbeing is offered openly when they need it; which builds a community among workers; and encourages personal and career growth and fulfilment.
Support does not just mean offering services that your employees need and value but facilitating ‘employee owned’ networks and support services that complement
those offered by the employer.
There are a growing number of work-based interest groups that cover specific interests, for example, for women, the LGBTQ+ community, carers, or those experiencing – or about to experience – the menopause, and many more. They can all be supported by the EVP, which can provide access to resources, whether in-person or virtually.
An efficient, well-functioning EVP programme should deliver more in cost savings and risk mitigation than it costs. It can also be a key part of a ‘virtuous circle’ where incremental improvements to staff morale and cohesion have wider productivity and efficiency benefits.
None of this can happen without board level support. Business leaders need to own this project and demonstrate to all their employees, with actions as well as words, that they’re all in it together. Not only will this generate better buy-in across the organisation, but it will encourage a more open and inclusive approach to managing and supporting the workforce.
Resilience is a win-win
For management it is also about measuring the quality of interactions and aligning objectives with outputs to improve the overall company experience. This enables the critical ability to show external stakeholders that they behave ethically – critical to customers.
EVP is the holistic way to view employee interactions by collecting them on a cloud server and using the resulting data to further improve interactions. Of course, flexible benefits are important to employees, but the EVP is more about building a workplace community.
Every employer’s DNA is different, depending on the sector, location, workforce, what they want to achieve and plans for growth.
One-size-fits-all models will fail.
RESOURCES
CONTACT
RESOURCES
CONTACT
Principal, Head of Benefit Consulting
DAVID COLLINGTON
Principal, Head of Management Analytics
ALLAN ENGELHARDT
Partner, Head of Corporate Consulting Midlands
JANE RALPH
Partner, Platform & Benefits
JULIA TURNEY
Partner, Head of Employer Consulting
NICK GRIGGS
Ut aliquet tristique nisl vitae volutpat. Nulla aliquet porttitor venenatis.
EVENTS
Ut aliquet tristique nisl vitae volutpat. Nulla aliquet porttitor venenatis.
EXPERT REPORTS
Ut aliquet tristique nisl vitae volutpat. Nulla aliquet porttitor venenatis.
KNOWLEGE HUB
Ut aliquet tristique nisl vitae volutpat. Nulla aliquet porttitor venenatis.
LATEST NEWS
Our latest wellbeing research focusses on the resilience of the UK workforce, illustrating the role employers have in ensuring their employees are ready for any challenge.
The power of positive resilience
RESEARCH
CONTACT US
Let us help your business, contact us to start your journey.
FIND OUT MORE
Why companies are evolving to meet workforce challenges.
Flexible benefits
Wellbeing
FIND OUT MORE
A focus on holistic, long-term plans for your company.
Wellbeing
Upcoming events
FIND OUT MORE
Event description to be inserted here
Event title
Latest expert insights
Return to top
Copyright © Barnett Waddingham 2023
SIGN UP
For our latest commentary, expert insight and event notifications
SIGN UP
FOLLOW US
Your organisation’s data is its DNA and the information it contains can transform the way you operate. We can help you unlock these insights to maximise your competitive advantage so your business evolves and thrives.
Unlock your Employer DNA
EXPERT GUIDANCE
Your organisation’s data is its DNA and the information it contains can transform the way you operate. We can help you unlock these insights to maximise your competitive advantage so your business evolves and thrives.
Unlock your Employer DNA
EXPERT GUIDANCE
To thrive long term, businesses need an organisational culture or mindset that reflects this - and potentially a remapping of your business DNA as an employer - in order
to create a compelling EVP.
And it is not just about benefit; the EVP will not only reward your employees but keep
them connected. A better-connected workforce that communicates, even in a
world of hybrid working, is going to feel more engaged with the business
than one that is not.
The EVP acts as a manifesto for an organisation’s relationships with its workers, replacing older models of employee management to refocus on the needs
of the employee.
Establishing a sustainable and resilient business requires a
focus on everything from supply chains to the disruption from environmental and macroeconomic change. Critically, it also now includes an employer’s relationship with employees. This resilience needs to be addressed from the top down, from the impact of future regulation and employee retention to public relations.
Just as environmental sustainability means treating the planet with respect, business sustainability in this context means treating employees with respect and developing them. For both, it’s considered the right thing to do and is becoming a business imperative for the C-suite, as others expect you to do it and will measure how you do so.
To thrive over the long term, businesses need an organisational culture or mindset that reflects this - and potentially a remapping of your business DNA as an employer - in order to create a compelling EVP. And it is not just about benefit; the EVP will
not only reward your employees but keep them connected.
A better-connected workforce that communicates, even in a world of hybrid working, is going to feel more engaged with the business than one that is not.
Return to top
Copyright © Barnett Waddingham 2024
SIGN UP
For our latest commentary, expert insight and event notifications
SIGN UP
FOLLOW US