Healthcare organizations operate from a unique space. As entities that are strictly focused on health, there is perhaps more pressure than in other types of industries to establish employee benefits packages that enhance well-being.
Of course, health and well-being extend beyond the homes and doctors’ offices of individual employees. Workplaces can have a significant effect on health and work-life balance can take its toll if the scale is tipped in the wrong direction. How can healthcare organizations, from their position as leaders on health and well-being, design paid-time off (PTO) policies that enrich their employees lives?
Offering flexibility through PTO policy
For the past six years or so, Humana has been given significant attention to the well-being of its employees, according to Tim State, VP of human resources at Humana. Recent changes to employee benefits packages, including its PTO policy, were implemented as decision-makers put more thought into “our purpose as a company and how we bring it to life from inside out,” he said.
The payer has adopted a straightforward PTO policy. Full time employees with less than 10 years at the company are allotted 23 paid days off to use as they see fit. Employees with more than 10 years at the company are allotted 28 paid days off. Humana also offers volunteer paid time off. Employees can use this time to volunteer for a cause aligned with Humana’s stated corporate goals and values.
Before Humana offered integrated PTO, it offered a more traditional policy with a certain number of paid days off for sick time and another set of paid days for vacation time. However, it moved to an integrated PTO system because employees “wanted choice and simplicity to fit their needs,” State said.
Humana isn’t the only company trying to create flexibility and simplicity through a PTO policy. Around one-half of companies responding to a 2014 WorldatWork survey said they were considering an integrated PTO policy to grant employees more flexibility.
Humana employees seem happy with the switch. The payer was one of only three healthcare organizations to appear on Glassdoor’s list of the 25 highest-rated companies for vacation and paid time off. Employees gave the company an average rating of 4.2 on a 5-point scale when it came to its PTO policy.
A flexible PTO policy may also be contributing to improved well-being among Humana employees. The company began tracking well-being according to an index built around four dimensions: Health, sense of purpose, belonging, and security. Over the past five years, Humana employees have consistently reported improvements in all four dimensions, State said.
Improve well-being by offering volunteer paid time off
In addition to normal PTO, Humana employees receive a paid day off each year for volunteerism. This component of the PTO program is intended to support Humana’s goals to improve well-being among its own employees and in the communities it serves. In 2015, more than 13,000 Humana employees used the opportunity to volunteer, according to the company’s 2014-2015 corporate social responsibility report.
Volunteer time off was established because Humana employees reported they wanted to spend more time volunteering. “It boosts their sense of purpose, but they have trouble finding time to do it,” State said. Now that a paid day off is available for volunteerism, those employees who use it actually report higher levels of well-being on average than employees who don’t.
Designing employee-friendly PTO policies
Although Humana has had comprehensive employee benefits packages for some time, it began to redesign benefits around the same time it launched its “Bold Goal” initiative to improve health in the communities it serves by 20% by 2020. The first step was to engage employees to see what they wanted and needed out of their benefits. “It’s about knowing your population,” State said.
Implementing change at a large corporation can be difficult. State said that he and his team knew that certain changes to PTO would be met with some resistance. However, it was possible to push these changes through because they had done their homework and taken the time to understand the needs of workers.
Other organizations, both large and small, can make employee-friendly changes to benefits packages and PTO policies by following a similar process. However, these changes need to be driven by the unmet needs and preferences of workplace communities. “Pay attention to that and make sure it’s a factor when you design benefits,” State said.