Perquisites no longer a prerequisite?

Corporate perks have taken a beating, but many companies are offering new and innovative programs to keep staff happy

Outlandish perks have taken a beating in the court of public opinion. Whether it’s the $23 million condo given to Jack Welsh, former head of General Electric, or the $23 in Smarties an Ontario cabinet minister gobbled up, perks are the focal point for a lot of anger from employees and shareholders alike.

Because of this, the days of luring top executives and talented individuals with lavish perks are, for the most part, over, said John Challenger, CEO of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, a Chicago-based international outplacement firm.

“It’s a much harder negotiation today, because shareholders continue to beat the drum of cutting costs,” said Challenger. “They continue to be more and more suspicious of executives in the wake of ethics scandals and the sense that many were enriching themselves.”

But that doesn’t mean it’s time to start digging a grave for the corporate perk. Many organizations are simply turning away from the headline-grabbing excesses and investing in programs that have a positive impact on morale for all employees and, in turn, produce a healthier bottom line for shareholders. For example, providing tuition assistance remains a popular benefit, Challenger said. Or it could take the form of extra vacation time to get away from the stress.

Elizabeth Weinstein, of Cypress, Calif.-based Work-Life Benefits, said companies are increasingly looking at programs to help staff deal with the stress of day-to-day life so they can leave their problems at home. This has led to the creation of innovative new programs such as a hotline children of employees can call to get help with their homework.

It’s a valuable benefit for parents who work shifts and might not be at home in the evenings to help out with the homework, and it also gives parents who are home a resource to turn to if the schoolwork is a bit over their heads, she said.

“A lot of parents have found they don’t even understand the homework sometimes and need to be walked through how it works before they can help their kids,” she said.

Another program is geriatric care assessment, which Weinstein said is “off the beaten track a little bit” but will likely become the norm as the population ages and more employees find themselves responsible for elder care. Employees who have to care for elderly or sick relatives are often stressing about it at work, she said.

“They’ll say, ‘I’m not feeling good about what I’m seeing at home, then I come back to work and I’m fretting about it. Gosh, there were a pile of unopened bills sitting on dad’s desk, his hearing doesn’t seem to be what it should be, he was always meticulous about how he kept the yard and the walk wasn’t even shoveled.’”

A geriatric care assessment program brings someone, either by telephone or in person, to the home to talk with the employee and the person being cared for to determine specific needs and how they can best be addressed. For example, just putting a list together of all the medications needed, where they are, who the doctors are and all pertinent insurance information can reduce stress on an employee.

Intuit Canada, an Edmonton-based software developer, and the consulting firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers are two companies offering innovative perks and benefits to staff.

Cast study: Intuit Canada

The dotcom meltdown hasn’t thawed out Intuit Canada’s Edmonton offices, said Glenn McGillivray, the firm’s senior human resources specialist.

The company, which develops finance, small business, accounting and tax software, still offers its 375 employees everything high-tech employers used to be famous for. It’s a formula that’s worked since day one, he said, and has helped propel the company into the number eight spot in Report on Business magazine’s list of top employers in Canada for 2003.

“We’ve always really embraced this stuff and we’ve attributed a lot of this to our success and why we continue to grow and prosper,” said McGillivray. “We figured this out early, and it’s helped us a lot.”

Employees notice the difference on day one. At a special first-day lunch, new staff are given a jar of candy. It’s an unusual perk, to be sure, but one with a not-so obvious benefit. The idea came from an interesting insight — employees with candy on their desk seemed to have a lot of people stopping by to chat and eat.

“By giving new employees candy, that encourages other employees to come by and take their candy, so to speak, and it gets conversations going and it gets them involved in the team,” said McGillivray.

In addition to a benefits plan that sees Intuit picking up 100 per cent of the premiums for staff, the company’s offices has what McGillivray calls “wonderful amenities.”

Start with the basics: a staff lounge complete with pool table, foozball, ping pong, big screen television and a gas fireplace.

“It’s kind of like a big lounge area,” he said. “Employees like spending time in there, whether it’s their breaks, after work, lunchtime, whatever.”

Move on down the hallway and you’ll run into the company’s gymnasium, which is often filled with the sounds of volleyball, basketball and floor hockey as employees take part in intramural sports. (It also doubles as a hall for quarterly meetings).

Then there’s the fitness centre, complete with lockers, change rooms and showers. Intuit even offers employees a towel service so they don’t need to bother carting dirty towels back and forth to work.

And when the stresses of work and long hours hit, employees can head to the one of three nap rooms to take a snooze.

“Right before we release our products, we’re putting in significant amounts of hours to try to finish those products so our development staff is putting in late nights,” said McGillivray. “So what they said is ‘I would just like to have a place that I could crash for an hour, just kind of a powernap or two.’”

Employees can also relax and unwind on the annual corporate retreat to Alberta’s Jasper Park Lodge — even bringing their spouses and children along — all on the corporate tab. And when they come back from the retreat, employees can check the ticker to see how the company’s stock is doing because every single employee — from the CEO right down to the call centre representative — has equity in the company in the form of stock options.

The company loathes the Big Brother approach in monitoring staff’s working hours and its flex-time program reflects that.

“Our philosophy is that we pay you to do a job,” said McGillivray. “As long as you’re getting that job done, we’re not going to worry about when you come in and when you leave and when you’re going to play pool.”

Measuring return-on-investment isn’t a major concern either because the benefits are so obvious, he said.

“You treat your employees well, and in turn they produce great products. If people are happy and motivated, they’ll support our customers and once you have happy customers they buy more products and services. Then in turn our shareholders are happy, and if shareholders are happy our stock increases and then because everyone has equity in the organization they in turn make more money. So it’s just a circle.”

The bottom line for McGillivray is attracting and retaining the best people. And anything Intuit can do to ensure they accomplish this will be done.

“Top notch people in any specific field have a lot of choices,” he said. “So we want to make sure we are the choice they’re going to make and this is the type of place they want to work.”

McGillivray said turnover at Intuit is very low, fluctuating between three and six per cent.

PricewaterhouseCoopers

At PricewaterhouseCoopers, the consulting giant has turned its attention to providing more options for vacation time for its 4,400 strong Canadian workforce.

“We’re finding that the non-cash perks are quite important,” said Wayne McFarlane, human capital leader at PwC.

On the executive front, PwC has launched a program to give partners extra time away from work every five years. Partners, or owners, are normally entitled to five weeks vacation but every fifth year will be given eight weeks.

“It’s to provide them extra time and an opportunity to devote time toward professional or personal development or pure relaxation with their families,” said McFarlane.

The company has always offered sabbaticals to partners, but it found many were reluctant to take a full year off.

“Now, with the extended vacation program, the early feedback from our partner group is very positive,” he said.

All employees can also take part in STOP — summer time off program — which works like many school board’s “four over five” programs, where teachers can take less pay for four years and then take the fifth year off paid. At PwC, staff can take a little less salary from January to May and take extra paid time off in the summer.

“It’s kind of like extra vacation, but at the staff level we had required these people to finance it,” he said.

McFarlane said staff appreciate the extras, and doesn’t think many would trade in the perks for more cash.

“There’s a certain baseline of cash that everyone needs, and I think once you get above a certain level in the firm the non-cash perks starts to become more important,” he said.

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