What Workers Want the Most From a New Role in 2021…

Drewberry’s 2021 Employee Benefits Survey questioned 2,000 workers at UK SMEs. The new statistics show a notable fall in the percentage of staff seeking a new job in the next 12 months compared to our previous survey.

Just 28.2% of workers were in the market for a new role over the next year, down from 47.7% of employees previously. The deteriorating economic backdrop due to COVID-19 has likely had a major negative impact in the proportion of workers seeking a new role.

However, for those workers who were seeking a new role, what was it they wanted to see from a new employer?

Hiring in 2021? Here’s What Job Seekers Want to See…

If you’re looking to fill vacancies in 2021, here’s what workers said was most important when seeking a new job:

• Salary (61.7%)
• Working hours (54.9%)
• Location (54.4%)
• Work environment (40.2%)
• Job security (35.8%).

We’ve compared this with what employees were looking for in a new role when we conducted our last survey. Note that opportunities for home working was a new option added for 2021, so we don’t have data for this previously.

Our comparison revealed that, of the top five factors employees wanted from a new employer, four had become less important over time. Salary in particular, while still the most important factor, had declined in importance by 5.3 percentage points.

It was only job security that had increased in importance, rising by 6.8 percentage points compared with our previous survey. Indeed, job security rose from the seventh-most important factor last time to the fifth-most important in 2021.

This shows the considerable impact coronavirus-related economic uncertainty has had on job seekers. Many would appear to be willing to sacrifice factors such as salary, working hours and location for knowledge their job is secure.

What Else Do Employees Want From Employers?

We also asked employees what benefits they’d like to see from their employers. At the top of the list is flexible hours, with 50.8% of workers wanting this from their employer.

Other top benefits to consider introducing given employee demand include:

• Group Health Insurance (35.3%)
• Work from home options (33.6%)
• Group Life Insurance (33%)
• Group Critical Illness Cover (30.7%)
• Additional employer pension contributions (28.3%)
• Group Income Protection (27%).

Considering Employee Benefits for Your Staff? Get Expert Advice…

Implementing a competitive employee benefits package can be a key way to attract workers. These, combined with the additional benefits insurers usually offer alongside employee benefits, can go a significant way towards attracting new workers and retaining existing ones.

While the labour market has more slack in it today than in our last survey, it remains important to stand out from the crowd when trying to attract the best talent.

If you’re considering introducing employee benefits, Drewberry has a team of experts at hand. We help companies across the UK of all sizes arrange benefits for their workers, from Group Life Insurance for financial services firms to Group Health Insurance for mobile gaming startups.

If you need help we are here to provide independent fee free advice. You can call us on 02084327333 or email help@drewberry.co.uk.

Our experts are here to do all the heavy lifting involved with setting up and maintaining a competitive employee benefits package for your business.

Nadeem Farid
Head of Employee Benefits at Drewberry