One of the biggest trends in reward strategy over recent years has been the drive to understand the needs of different workforce generations – and how to define a reward strategy that suits their individual requirements.

We’ve learnt that Generation Y, the children of the late 80s and 90’=s, want a more flexible work schedule, crave recognition and demand instant gratification. With Generation Y set to make up more than 50% of the workforce by 2020, it’s clear that a business’ long-term reward strategy will need to take these needs into account.

Not generations – individuals

But can you really decipher an employee’s needs from the year they were born in? The answer is of course no. There are numerous factors that will influence their benefits preferences, including their gender, location and hobbies. By analysing our clients’ benefits take-up data, we can see that everybody actually wants a bit of everything – and at different times. You need to provide benefits that really mean something to employees as individuals.

Staff expectations of their companies are also changing. When it comes to finance, health and protection, employees expect their employer to provide a level of cover. But, when it comes to lifestyle benefits or discount schemes, people do not expect company funding – they only want the means to pick and choose what suits them best.

This is not to say that demographic data is not important. Identifying your average employee and different demographic groups is vital to setting out your reward strategy – but it doesn’t tell you exactly what they want, or even expect from their benefits.

Get the message out

Effective and timely communication is key to delivering a successful benefits package. But how do you strike the balance between making employees aware of your offering, and spamming them with unwanted e-mails? Personalised recommendations are a great way to alert your employees to benefits that are relevant to their situation, increasing uptake of benefits and boosting engagement.

Some benefits platforms have introduced benefits recommendations similar to those issued by online shopping sites like Amazon and Spotify. While this works for recommendations of books and DVDs, it’s considerably less appropriate for employee benefits such as lifestyle and insurance schemes.

The next step – and one that some forward-thinking providers are now taking – is to develop a recommendation system that uses a consultative online conversation approach to understand each employee’s individual goals, lifestyle and priorities. Such software offers employees a number of highly personalised options to select from. A portal will then intuitively provide information based on that conversation.

Matching this level of personal conversation with a strategic consulting approach will be instrumental in getting the benefits mix right for all employees, regardless of their generation. This is why we’re seeing increasing interest among clients in transitioning towards a spending account system. This allows employees to spend their benefits funding on anything (subject to company approval) they require – providing the ultimate level of flexibility and the level of personalisation they require.