The director of human resources at Ventacare, Allison, is looking for various ways to cut down costs related to employee benefits programs. The move comes from reduced federal funding, which has made the firm experience financial difficulties. Ventacare enjoys a good reputation in its three locations and is constantly increasing the number of people seeking to get their services. The secret behind this has been the firm’s good and willing employees employed and retained. The employees at vintage are motivated by the good salary they get and the good package of other benefits they get from the firm. The various employee benefits received by the employees include; paid time off, a health insurance plan, which provides for paying the whole premium for both short-term and long-term life insurance and disability insurance, a 401k plan, a full-service employee assistance program, and programs to promote wellness of employees. Therefore, this paper will aim to provide recommendations to the director of human resources in reducing the cost of the benefit to meet the budget downfall while still being able to employ and retain highly skilled employees.
The first recommendation for the director of human resources is to continue providing the employees with the health insurance plan since it is legally required but can decide to reduce the other additional benefit on health benefits like paying the total premium on short-term and long-term life insurance and disability insurance. The director should decide to pay half the premium on disability and life insurance while the other half is a deduction from the employee’s income. This is possible since disability and life insurance are discretional to employers in some states.
In addition, the director of human resources should also reduce the number of paid days for employees, like the number of paid off vacation and sick days. The paid vacation time is at the company’s discretion; hence the firm can reduce the number of paid vacations not to hurt the employees. The wellness program of providing the employees with lunch to discuss their health concerns should also be done away with by the firm since it is not a legal requirement and can be done away with without affecting the employees’ morale. Moreover, the benefit of tuition reimbursement, the company can set the maximum amount in a year that an employee is entitled to get for educational assistance. This can also help them meet the budget downfall since any benefit will have to be budgeted for every financial year.
To make the employees understand and adopt the cost-saving approach of the firm. The director of human resources can ensure proper and clear communication with the employees to make them aware of the situation. One of the non-monetary ways of compensating the employees would be through appreciation and recognition. When one is appreciated and recognized for performing well in a particular area, they are likely to feel motivated and continue doing the same or even better in the coming days. Furthermore, employees can be compensated by giving them job enrichment (Mokhniuk & Yushchyshyna, 2018). Job enrichment makes employees’ daily tasks more interesting since they will have all the freedom and even develop new skills as they work.
References
Mokhniuk, A., & Yushchyshyna, L. (2018). The impact of monetary and non-monetary factors of motivation on employee productivity. Economic journal of Lesya Ukrainka Volyn National University, 1(13), 94-101.
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