How Boasting Benefits Can Win You Top Talent

Finding talented people for your team is critical to the success of your organization.  In this tough labor market, how do you stand out from the crowd of competitors vying for the candidate you want?

One easy way is to promote the employee benefits you provide.

In the race to post and fill an open position, most companies use the phrase, “We offer competitive benefits.”  I’ve seen this description used with a start-up company’s bare-bones benefits package that doesn’t offer health insurance or a 401k match (benefits that many potential employees consider standard), a well-established organization’s package that includes every insurance imaginable including pet insurance, and every other benefit package in between.

The statement only tells the candidates that there are some benefits offered but leaves them guessing what those benefits are and if the ones most important to them are offered.

Luckily, you can set your organization apart and snatch up more of the best performers by promoting your benefits in a completely different way.

Ask Your Team

Step one is super simple: ask employees what benefits drew them to and/or keep them at your organization.  You can do this via an email or at your next meeting.

Let them know that you’re putting together a list of the benefits you provide so you can use them to recruit awesome people to work with them; they’ll be more eager to chime in when it directly benefits them.

Don’t limit their answers to only insurance benefits.  Let them speak to things such as paid time off, flexible schedules, paid education seminars, and casual Fridays.  For candidates who get great benefits through a spouse, these things can be extremely attractive and important.

Put it on Paper

Next, create a one-sheet summary of your benefit offerings.  This helps you get clear on everything you provide and is also a great tool for communicating the details to candidates.

Feel free to have your marketing guru make it look good, but it really doesn’t have to be flashy.  A simple Word document with your logo is all that’s needed to get the message across.

Promote, Promote, Promote!

Look at each step of your recruiting and selection process and see where you can boast about the benefits and perks of the job.  Here are just a few ideas:

• Add language to your careers page or job postings describing the benefits in detail.
• Post tidbits about the perks that come with working at your company on social media.
• Talk to candidates about your benefits early in the hiring process, and continue to sprinkle in more details as the candidate makes it to subsequent rounds in the process.

Start Today

The most important thing you can do is to keep this simple.  If you make it into a full-on project, it may never get done because there are always more urgent things to do.

Stop right now, open a Word document, list your benefits.  Good job!  You’re more than halfway there!  Keep the momentum going by getting input from your staff to finish off the list.

Next time you have a job opening, rather than using the blanket phrase “competitive benefits,” you’ll be ready to get specific and see how it changes the volume and quality of candidates you receive.

What Can You Brag About?

What benefits do you provide that employees tell you they really love or appreciate?

You can leave your answer in a comment below.

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If you have a burning HR question or if there are topics you’d like to read more about in the blog, please email me directly at jodi@people-mattershr.com.

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People Matters supports business owners and leaders in all areas of human resources management including the topics in this article: creating competitive benefit packages and hiring top performers.

You are busy running your organization, let us take some of the load off your shoulders.  HR is what we at People Matters love to do!  We help our clients create great workplaces that engage employees and produce better business results.

Please give me a call at 517-925-8257 or visit our website at www.people-mattershr.com for more information.