shrm survey findings_strategic-benefits-leveraging-benefits-to-recruit-employees

March 17, 2015

SHRM Survey Findings: 2014 Strategic Benefits—

Leveraging Benefits to Recruit Employees

2

Introduction

The 2014 Strategic Benefits Survey, administered annually since 2012 by the Society for

Human Resource Management (SHRM), is used to determine whether various employee

benefits are leveraged to recruit and retain top talent. This research study, split into a six-

part series, features the following topics:

Part 1: Wellness Initiatives

Part 2: Flexible Work Arrangements

Part 3: Health Care

Part 4: Leveraging Benefits to Retain Employees

Part 5: Leveraging Benefits to Recruit Employees

Part 6: Communicating Benefits

Definitions

For the purpose of this survey, a highly skilled employee was defined as any employee

with skills that are critical to the short- and long-term success of his or her operating unit

or organization.

2014 Strategic Benefits Survey—Leveraging Benefits to Recruit Employees ©SHRM 2015

Introduction and Definitions

Employees at All Levels of the Organization

• Leveraging benefits to recruit employees at all levels of the organization: More

than one-quarter (29%) of respondents indicated their organization leveraged their

benefits program to recruit employees at all levels of the organization in the past 12

months.

• Benefits leveraged to recruit employees at all levels of the organization: The

majority of respondents reported their organization leveraged health care (85%) and

retirement savings and planning (72%) to recruit employees at all levels of the

organization.

• Change in importance of benefits to recruit employees at all levels of the

organization in the next three to five years: About two-thirds of respondents

thought professional and career development benefits (67%), health care (66%),

retirement savings and planning (63%), preventive health and wellness (63%), and

flexible working benefits (62%) would increase in importance in their organization’s

efforts to recruit employees at all levels of the organization in the next three to five

years.

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Key Findings


Highly Skilled Employees

• Leveraging benefits to recruit highly skilled employees: About one-third (32%) of

respondents indicated their organization leveraged their benefits program to recruit

highly skilled employees in the past 12 months.

• Benefits leveraged to recruit highly skilled employees: More than three-quarters

(77%) of respondents indicated their organization leveraged health care to recruit

highly skilled employees; one-half or more reported their organization leveraged

retirement savings and planning (57%), professional and career development benefits

(51%), and leave benefits (49%).

• Change in importance of benefits to recruit highly skilled employees in the next

three to five years: More than three-fifths of respondents believed professional and

career development benefits (65%), flexible working benefits (63%), and retirement

savings and planning (61%) would increase in importance when recruiting highly skills

employees in the future; more than one-half reported the same for health care (57%)

and preventive health and wellness (52%).

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Key Findings (Continued)


• Benefits offerings may begin to diverge depending on the job type(s) being recruited for.

Although organizations use benefits programs in their recruitment efforts at about the

same rate for employees at all levels of the organization and for highly skilled

employees, some organizations are somewhat more focused on leveraging specific

benefits to recruit employees at all levels of the organization compared with recruiting

highly skilled employees. This difference may reverse in the future, with benefits being

leveraged more often to recruit highly skilled employees if skills shortages create an

especially competitive market for high-skilled talent.

• The range and complexity of benefits could expand for hard-to-recruit job families. In

organizations where benefits budgets are stretched, a wider range of available options

and greater investment in benefits could be reserved for those in the most difficult-to-fill

roles. These job seekers may be best positioned to negotiate much more comprehensive

benefits packages.

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What Do These Findings Mean for the HR Profession?


• Generally, the benefits that HR professionals believe will be valued by employees at all

levels are also those that they believe their highly skilled employees value most. This

suggests that, rather than coming up with new and unique benefits and perks aimed at a

particular kind of worker, building a strong overall benefits package that all employees

can access—emphasizing health care, retirement savings and planning, and

professional development—will remain the main task of HR professionals in the near to

medium term.

• Employers are likely to continue to concentrate on providing the benefits they think are

important in recruiting employees at all levels. Because the benefits valued are so similar

between both highly skilled and general employee populations, emphasis will continue to

be on providing benefits that are most meaningful to employees, such as professional

and career development, health care, retirement savings and planning, preventive health

and wellness, and flexible working benefits.

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What Do These Findings Mean for the HR Profession?

(Continued)


7

Key Findings

Leveraging Benefits to Recruit Employees

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What do these findings mean for the HR profession?Comparison of Difficulty Recruiting and Leveraging of Benefits to Recruit

Employees at All Levels of the Organization in the Past 12 Months


33%

26%

23%

2014 (n = 306)

2013 (n = 351)

2012 (n = 394)

Note: Response options provided for both items were “yes/no/not sure.” Respondents who indicated they were “not sure” were

excluded from the analyses. Only “yes” responses are shown.

29%

26%

29%

2014 (n = 305)

2013 (n = 341)

2012 (n = 377)

Organizations That Leveraged Their Benefits

Program to Recruit Employees at All Levels of

the Organization in the Past 12 Months

Organizations That Reported Difficulty

Recruiting Employees at All Levels of

the Organization in the Past 12 Months

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What do these findings mean for the HR profession?Benefits Positively Leveraged to Recruit Employees at All Levels of the

Organization


85%

72%

45%

43%

42%

36%

34%

21%

81%

70%

45%

33%

50%

43%

33%

24%

80%

63%

31%

29%

36%

30%

27%

19%

Health care

Retirement savings and planning

Professional and career developmentbenefits

Preventive health and wellness

Leave benefits

Flexible working benefits

Family-friendly benefits

Housing and relocation benefits

2014 (n = 86)

2013 (n = 88)

2012 (n = 108)

Note: Respondents whose organizations leveraged their benefits program to recruit employees at all levels of the organization

were asked this question. Respondents who answered “not sure” were excluded from this analysis.

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What do these findings mean for the HR profession?Change in Importance of Benefits in the Next Three to Five Years to

Recruit Employees at All Levels of the Organization


Note: 2014 n = 58-79; 2013 n = 65-88. Respondents whose organizations leveraged their benefits program to recruit employees at all levels of the

organization were asked this question. Respondents who answered “not sure” were excluded from this analysis. Percentages may not total 100% due to

rounding.


Leave benefits


Professional and career

development benefits



Health care


11%16%

30%30%

50%47%

56%62%

59%63%

64%63%

63%66%

52%67%

71%69%

67%70%

49%52%

40%37%

39%37%

35%35%

37%32%

47%32%

18%16%

4%0%

1%1%

4%1%

2%0%

1%1%

0%1%

1%1%

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

Increase in importance Remain the same Decrease in importance

32%

30%

31%

2014 (n = 302)

2013 (n = 343)

2012 (n = 379)

56%

50%

49%

2014 (n = 305)

2013 (n = 353)

2012 (n = 400)

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What do these findings mean for the HR profession?Comparison of Difficulty Recruiting and Leveraging of Benefits to Recruit

Highly Skilled Employees in the Past 12 Months


Organizations That Leveraged Their Benefits

Program to Recruit Highly Skilled Employees in

the Past 12 Months

Organizations That Reported Difficulty

Recruiting Highly Skilled Employees in

the Past 12 Months

Note: Response options provided for both items were “yes/no/not sure.” Respondents who indicated they were “not sure” were

excluded from the analyses. Only “yes” responses are shown.

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What do these findings mean for the HR profession?Benefits Positively Leveraged to Recruit Highly Skilled Employees


Note: Respondents whose organizations leveraged their benefits program to recruit employees at all levels of the organization

were asked this question. Respondents who answered “not sure” were excluded from this analysis.

77%

57%

51%

49%

36%

32%

26%

25%

70%

61%

41%

46%

55%

25%

33%

35%

75%

58%

41%

34%

33%

24%

23%

28%

Health care


Professional and career developmentbenefits

Leave benefits





2014 (n = 91)

2013 (n = 104)

2012 (n = 116)

Professional and career

development benefits

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What do these findings mean for the HR profession?Change in Importance of Benefits in the Next Three to Five Years to Recruit

Highly Skilled Employees


Note: 2014 n = 65-88; 2013 n = 77-100. Respondents whose organizations leveraged their benefits program to recruit employees at all levels of the

organization were asked this question. Respondents who answered “not sure” were excluded from this analysis. Percentages may not total 100% due to

rounding.




Leave benefits



Health care

12%20%

38%38%

55%47%

47%52%

66%57%

70%61%

65%63%

56%65%

75%66%

61%60%

45%52%

51%48%

33%41%

30%37%

33%37%

43%34%

13%14%

1%2%

0%1%

2%0%

1%2%

0%2%

2%0%

1%1%

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

20132014

Increase in importance Remain the same Decrease in importance

2014 Strategic Benefits Survey—Leveraging Benefits to Retain Employees ©SHRM 2015 14

Key Findings

Demographics

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Note: n = 320. Percentages do not total 100% due to multiple response options.

Percentage

Manufacturing 27%

Professional, scientific and technical services 14%

Health care and social assistance 14%

Finance and insurance 12%

Government agencies 9%

Educational services 7%

Transportation and warehousing 5%

Construction 5%

Real estate and rental and leasing 5%

Retail trade 4%

Utilities 3%

Demographics: Organization Industry


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Key FinDemographics: Organization Industry (Continued)

Note: n = 320. Percentages do not total 100% due to multiple response options.

Percentage

Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction 3%

Arts, entertainment and recreation 3%

Wholesale trade 3%

Repair and maintenance 3%

Accommodation and food services 2%

Administrative and support, and waste management and remediation services 2%

Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting 2%

Information 2%

Religious, grant-making, civic, professional and similar organizations 2%

Personal and laundry services 0%

Other industry 8%


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Key FinDemographics: Organization Sector

53%

23%

13%

9%

2%

Privately owned for-profit

Nonprofit

Publicly owned for-profit

Government

Other

n = 317


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Key FinDemographics: Organization Staff Size

n = 304


26%

39%

19%

12%

4%

1 to 99 employees

100 to 499 employees

500 to 2,499 employees

2,500 to 24,999 employees

25,000 or more employees

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Key FinDemographics: Other


n = 319

U.S.-based operations only 75%

Multinational operations 25%

Does your organization have U.S.-

based operations (business units) only,

or does it operate multinationally?

n = 320

n = 207

n = 208

Single-unit organization: An organization in

which the location and the organization are

one and the same.

38%

Multi-unit organization: An organization that

has more than one location.62%

Is your organization a single-unit organization or

a multi-unit organization?

For multi-unit organizations, are HR policies and

practices determined by the multi-unit headquarters,

by each work location or by both?

Multi-unit headquarters determines HR

policies and practices.58%

Each work location determines HR policies

and practices.3%

A combination of both the work location and

the multi-unit headquarters determines HR

policies and practices.

39%

Corporate (companywide) 79%

Business unit/division 12%

Facility/location 9%

What is the HR department/function for

which you responded throughout this

survey?

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SHRM Survey Findings:

Survey Methodology

• Response rate = 10%

• 380 HR professionals from a randomly selected sample of SHRM’s membership participated in this

survey

• Margin of error +/- 5%

• Survey fielded April-May 2014

Survey Methodology


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For more survey/poll findings, visit shrm.org/surveys

For more information about SHRM’s Customized Research Services, visit

shrm.org/customizedresearch

Follow us on Twitter @SHRM_Research

Project lead:

Karen Wessels, researcher, SHRM Research

Project contributors:

Evren Esen, director, SHRM-SCP, Survey Programs, SHRM Research

Alexander Alonso, Ph.D., SHRM-SCP, vice president, SHRM Research

Jennifer Schramm, manager, SHRM-SCP, Workforce Trends and Forecasting, SHRM Research


About SHRM Research

http://www.shrm.org/surveys

http://www.shrm.org/customizedresearch

http://twitter.com/SHRM_Research

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Founded in 1948, the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is the

world’s largest HR membership organization devoted to human resource management.

Representing more than 275,000 members in over 160 countries, the Society is the

leading provider of resources to serve the needs of HR professionals and advance the

professional practice of human resource management. SHRM has more than 575

affiliated chapters within the United States and subsidiary offices in China, India and

United Arab Emirates. Visit us at shrm.org.


About SHRM

http://www.shrm.org/

shrm survey findings_strategic-benefits-leveraging-benefits-to-recruit-employees

Recruiting & HR

importance of benefits

benefits program

recruit employees shrm

career development benefits

flexible working benefits

various employee benefits

recruit employeespart

skills employees