Ways to Give Back to Employees

During the 1990s, employers complained that they had trouble finding good employees. At the same time, many employers eliminated a traditional way to give back to employees. They did away with pensions. Now many retiring workers find themselves without a pension. The news media highlights the great need for employers with a willingness to give back to employees.

Using stock options to give back to employees

Some firms have used stock options as a way to give back to employees. The success of this approach depends largely on the ethics of the company administrators. The Enron case shows that some administrators take advantage of the stock options, and they use the stock options to defraud the employees. In other words, the options do not give back to the employees the sort of return that those employees are expecting.

Amgen has used stock options as a way to give back to employees. Yet not all of the company employees can take advantage of the stock options. Only the permanent employees can get the stock options. There are no stock options for the temporary employees. This distinction underlines one of the challenges of deciding how to give back to employees.

Using medical benefits to give back to employees

Large firms are required by law to contribute towards the health insurance of their employees. Some firms seek to get by with a bare minimum; they offer their employees a cheap and often unsatisfactory medical insurance plan. Other firms might expand the services covered by such a plan. Some companies give back to their employees in the form of added medical benefits.

One way that a company can give back to its employees calls for the coverage of alternative health procedures. Some companies offer medical plans that cover the cost of procedures such as acupuncture and aromatherapy. Some companies provide their employees with a chance to purchase dental insurance. This can be seen as a way to give back to employees.

Meeting transportation needs to give back to employees

Because the government has sought to encourage the use of public transportation, some companies are able to help their employers get a discount on bus or railway tickets. They use this discount to emphasize the value of using public transportation. They may also offer some sort of reward to those employees who participate in a car pool. Both car- poolers and bike riders share with the riders of public transportation the compensation that is used as a way to give back to employees.

Meeting child care needs to give back to employees

As more and more women have entered the job market, their child care needs have become an added item for use in the search for tokens to give to employees. Most women's groups heap praise on any company that offers its female employees free or low cost child care. Some institutions do not offer child care services, but they provide free consultation to women in search of such services. Either approach can be seen as a way to give back to employees.

As children get older, some of them think about getting a summer joy. Some companies encourage the children of their employees to work at the parents' company. Such encouragement could well be likened to a way to give back to employees. Companies that offer an outreach in the schools expand on this focus on the youth of the employees.

Such an outreach helps to prepare the youth for future employment. In that sense, such outreach can give back to employees by helping them to ready their children for entrance into the work world.