5 Job Benefits That Sound Better Than They Really Are
Alison Green
More and more often, companies are getting creative with what kind of benefits they offer to attract and retain employees, offering perks like free lunches and dinner, gym memberships and even unlimited vacation time. But while most of these sound great in theory, some of them don't quite deliver when you look at how they play out in practice.
Here are five benefits that might sound fantastic but don't always deliver in the way you might expect.
1. Unlimited vacation time. You might have read about companies like Netflix offering employees unlimited vacation time. The idea is that instead of getting a set number of paid days off each year, you're allowed to take as much time off as you want, as long as your work gets done. Sounds great, right? It often can be.
However, in some cases, it can result in employees taking less vacation time than they took under more traditional policies. That's because without guidelines, some people become unsure about how much time off is really OK to take. When you don't want your manager and co-workers to think you're a slacker, and you don't have any hard and fast rules about how much time away is appropriate and how much might be frowned upon, it can get a lot harder to feel comfortable using this benefit. Of course, these policies can be managed well, but it takes commitment on the part of the company and its managers to ensure that people really understand what's expected of them.
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Another drawback of unlimited vacation time is that it means you won't formally accrue paid leave, which means there's nothing for your employer to pay out to you when you leave your job. With more traditional vacation policies, you might receive a cash payout if you leave your job with accrued vacation time remaining. Some states require such payouts.
2. Combined sick and vacation leave into one overall paid-time-off bucket. This often sounds great at first -- after all, if you don't get sick, you can use that time for vacation instead. But what often happens in reality is that it creates an incentive for people to come to work when they're sick so that they can keep their PTO for vacations. That means you might end up with lots of sick and contagious co-workers spreading their germs around your office.
3. Egg freezing. Apple and Facebook made headlines recently when they announced they'd offer coverage for female employees to freeze their eggs. But it's not hard to imagine that the companies' desire to keep women at the office (and not out on leave) played a role in the decision, particularly when the tech industry is known for demanding hours and work cultures that aren't always family-friendly.
Egg-freezing can certainly make sense for some women, but the offer raises questions for women about how their employers might be subtly nudging them to put off parenthood in favor of work.
4. Four-day work weeks or other part-time arrangements. When carefully negotiated and managed well, these arrangements can often work out to everyone's benefit. But all too often, workers take a salary cut in exchange for a part-time schedule and then find themselves working on their days off anyway, in order to get their work done and seem responsive to colleagues. If you're considering one of these arrangements, it's crucial to hash out ahead of time what your hours will really look like, how you'll handle it when last-minute work comes up and whether you'll be expected to respond to email on your days away. Get all this in writing in case there are questions later about what was agreed upon.
5. Tuition reimbursement. Tuition reimbursement can be a great benefit, but it's important to read all the fine print before signing up for classes. Many companies that offer this have clauses that require you to stay with the company for a certain amount of time afterward (often several years), or else you'll have to pay back the tuition money. That means your earning potential could be significantly stymied or that you may find yourself locked into a job or company that you no longer want to be at, long after you've earned that degree.
Alison Green writes the popular Ask a Manager blog, where she dispenses advice on career, job search and management issues. She's the author of "How to Get a Job: Secrets of a Hiring Manager," co-author of "Managing to Change the World: The Nonprofit Manager's Guide to Getting Results" and the former chief of staff of a successful nonprofit organization, where she oversaw day-to-day staff management.
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