There is no shortage of data illustrating that a company’s focus on employee financial wellness is essential amidst today’s war for talent. It can help fight attrition and bolster recruiting potential. While improving employee wellbeing with access to hardship relief funds make tremendous business sense (did you know: it costs at least $6,000 to replace a worker who quits due to a financial crisis?), it makes even greater people sense.
As we know, 60% of Americans experience a financial shock each year and half still struggle six months later. When employers realize this means people in their workforce are likely struggling it becomes much easier to invest in tools designed to catch them when they fall.
But how do businesses better understand if their employees are struggling financially?
The answer: look to HR. After two+ years of living and working (both within the same four walls and often unable to separate the two) through a global pandemic, people’s wellbeing has taken a hit on many fronts—mental, physical, financial, or a combination of all three. Luckily, innovative HR leaders know the value of building a people first culture and the importance of surrounding employees with the support they need, when they need it.
“Given today’s talent shortage, the challenges of Covid-19, and a wealth of online financial wellness tools and products, companies are in position to focus more on the financial wellness of employees.”
Inc. article, “Want Engaged Employees? Invest in Their Financial Wellness”
HR departments are uniquely positioned to understand employees and influence business decisions that impact their day-to-day. But first, here are three signs help them recognize colleagues are struggling financially.
1. Employees turn to HR or organizational leadership with informal requests for financial help
It’s no surprise that when 42% of Americans admit that financial stress “makes it difficult to concentrate at work”, employees turn to their company for support.
In a recent interview with Drew Edwards, CEO of Ingo Money, he shared that he has “had at least three employees over the last couple of years come to me asking for help, and that’s a really awkward situation for a CEO, a founder or even a company to be in, because you just can’t get in the business of loaning your employees money.”
Ingo Money’s Emergency Relief Fund: Building Work Community Through a Culture of Giving
It is difficult to turn these requests away, but impossible to say yes without a formal program and consistent guidelines to ensure the same resources are available to all.
2. Employees circulate fundraising campaigns amongst colleagues
GoFundMe fundraisers have become the obvious place to turn when facing financial hardship. As a platform to raise emergency funds, it is wildly successful (the GoFundMe community has raised $15B [for people in need] since 2010”). If a company is successful in building a compassionate workplace, it’s likely that colleagues are sharing personal GoFundMe’s amongst themselves. The problem is not with the platform or sharing amongst colleagues, rather with the inequity of a system that too often relies on popularity and a campaign going viral to be successful.
“Search the GoFundMe site for cancer or bills or tuition or accident or operation and you’ll find pages of campaigns with a couple thousand, or a couple hundred, or zero dollars in contributions. While the platform can be a stopgap solution for families on the financial brink […] the average campaign earns less than $2,000 from a couple dozen donors; the majority don’t meet their stated goal.” The Atlantic’s “When GoFundMe Gets Ugly”
3. Employees are often late, distracted, or taking off more time than expected
Employees have always brought their home stresses into the workplace. There is no easy “off switch” that activates at the start of a daily commute. But everyone can agree, it is much harder to separate home stress from work stress when, for many of us, the two are so inextricably linked. HR can easily track trends in increased time off but monitoring tardiness or decreased focus is impractical with many employees putting in most of their hours from home.
That’s why, in this modern, evolving work world, it is crucial to lead with people-first HR teams. People leaders who focus on the human connection and encourage open dialogue with their colleagues have a pulse on when employees are struggling and need help.
“Employees are signaling that they’re not just receptive to receiving financial support from their employers, but they’re also actively demanding it.”
Forbes, “How Employers Can Support The Financial Wellness Of Their Employees”
Ultimately, people want their workplace to be another community that cares about their emotional, physical, and financial wellbeing. The first step to becoming a company that prioritizes employee financial wellness is recognizing that workers balance complex, stressful lives outside of work. Then it only makes sense to proactively commit to more equitable wellness solutions for every employee, whenever life dictates they need it.
Canary believes that employee assistance grants should be a ubiquitous part of the employee financial health package. We’re proud to work with innovative organizations at the forefront of the movement to take better care of their employees.
You can learn more about Grant Circle here. And if you’d like to talk about partnering with Canary to build a giving platform for your employees, we invite you to talk to our team and get started.
