Question

Research online and find information about company benefit plans or talk with your own HR department and discuss the benefits provided as part of your overall compensation plan. Tell us what you found. Below are some items to think about:

From what you can find, what do you see changing in the mix between Pay and Benefits?

As how we work and how long people stay with companies changes, are people placing more emphasis on cash or non-cash benefits?

How can small organizations provide benefits for their employees?

Do people from different generations or cultural backgrounds value benefits in their compensation plan differently? How does this affect total compensation plan design?

How can an organization ensure that benefits are considered equitable?

Answer 1

The company benefit plans are the extra payments paid by the company along with the wages. Some of these payments are mandatorily paid by the government like that of health insurance benefits, paid leave, bonus, paid leave, work from home facility, education facility, and loan, over time, paid sick leave, pension, e.t.c.These benefits are provided along with the wages. These are the company benefits provided by my company along with the minimum wage.

From the above result, I observe that there is a change in the benefit plan in the total compensation package. Earlier, people were happy with the wages as well as bonus, paid vacation, pension, they mainly concentrate on the wage part. But nowadays, the mix between pay and benefits have changed to a great extent. People now are emphasizing more on benefits than on cash and the want some special benefits such as work from home, flexible timings, education and stock holding facilities e.t.c.They want a proper mix of pay and benefits and for this part, employee turnover has increased nowadays.

With the changing times, people are getting more interested in noncash benefits than that of cash benefits. People have a general psychology, that the cash will be spent on various household expenses whereas, they enjoy the noncash benefits like a paid vacation or paid time off, education facility more than that of cash benefits. These noncash benefits only attracted people to other jobs, rather than the monetary benefits.

Smaller organizations can provide benefits to their employees in the form of small axes on behalf of the employees, care for children's education or medical benefit to an ailing spouse or dependent family members,e.t.c.

Yes, people from different generations or cultural backgrounds value the benefits differently. The aged people emphasized more on monetary benefits like bonuses or pension, whereas the young generation valued noncash incentives as work from home, stock option, education facility more than other monetary benefits. The people from higher social backgrounds value noncash incentives more than that of lower social backgrounds. These people emphasized more on cash benefits as they have a huge family to support or many loans to be repaid. Thus, compensation varied widely according to these factors. The compensation plan design should be designed according to the age and the social status of the employees employed. The company should decide on the benefits accordingly.

Benefits are considered equitable by

1. considering the current wage rate prevailing in the market

2.payment should be done considering the performance

3.Regular hike as per the market rate

4.extra benefit during difficult financial times

5.Increase in salary with promotion at par with the other companies.

6. Sharing Bonus on company's profit

These are some of the ways of paying equitable benefits.