The Underrated Employee Benefits You Should Keep An Eye Out For
Whether you’re starting to make your way up the ladder and find yourself able to set better terms for yourself, or you’re getting yourself back into the career game for the first time in a while, it’s easy to miss some elements. Often, professionals get so focused on take-home pay that they neglect to consider how valuable some benefits can really be. Here are some that you should maybe pay a little more attention to and how, sometimes, they can be worth more than a bigger salary bump.
Flexible Hours
While they might often get overshadowed by other perks, some flexibility with when you work can have the biggest impact on your work-life balance. Control over your working hours can help you manage your job around your peak productive times during the day, caregiving responsibilities, or even plan out long commutes with ease. A lot more companies are offering this flexibility to combat rising rates of burnout.
Learning Budgets
Any perk that offers access to further career development can be very valuable, indeed. Learning budgets can do that, but it’s important that employers provide easy ways to make use of any annual allowance they have, as well. For instance, they may help employees find courses, coaching, and certification opportunities, and play an active role in helping their employees put their learning budgets into practice. Others may have it in place, but rarely see their team make use of it.
Company Cars
For many employees, the ability to manage the costs and ease of the commute can be a huge help in fitting a job to their lifestyle. Nowadays, companies even offer a new car with insurance included through salary sacrifice schemes. This can reduce the overall expenses associated with a car by taking taxes out of the equation, and also consolidating maintenance into the same package.
Wellness Perks
Given how much time work can take up in your day, getting a little help maintaining a healthy lifestyle should definitely be appreciated, too. Discounted gym memberships are the most common wellness perk, but they can go a lot further, too, with access to therapy, mental health days, and support with things like dental cover or preventative health checkups to ensure that you’re able to take care of yourself as best as possible. Workplaces that offer wellness perks signal that they’re also more likely to care about employee wellbeing in daily operations, too.
Remote Working
Although it has become a lot more popular as of late, it’s still important that you don’t underestimate the lifestyle improvement that can come with remote working. Reducing commuting stress, improving your personal autonomy, and allowing you to work anywhere can drastically improve your quality of life and help you access opportunities that might otherwise be out of your reach. It’s important, however, to ensure that you’re able to meet the productivity challenges that come with it, such as being able to work from home without distraction.
Compensation matters, no matter what kind of compensation that it is, and sometimes, the right benefits can be more meaningful. Consider your needs, your priorities, and factor in benefits when comparing different potential employers.
Featured Photo by Sora Shimazaki: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-filling-job-application-form-in-office-with-boss-5668858/
