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Posted By Julanne Rutten,
Friday, April 17, 2015
Updated: Friday, April 17, 2015
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| This Workplace Wisdom article featuring Pam Cavedo, Long and Foster Mobility ran in the Richmond Times Dispatch March 16, 2015 |  |
 | Pam Cavedo
Business Development
Manager
Long and Foster Mobility |
Q. What is the core/flex relocation policy program and should I consider it for my business??
A. With the demographics of the mobile workforce changing and business objectives evolving faster, companies are seeking alternatives to traditional corporate relocation policies. Upside down mortgages, diverse family needs, bidding wars in some markets and a stricter mortgage process are just some of the obstacles for an employee considering relocation. One increasingly popular option for relocation is the core/flex policy, which according to Worldwide Employee Relocation Council® (ERC) currently represents 25% of all domestic relocations.
These menu-driven relocation benefits emerged following the housing bubble and recession as a way for companies to attract and move talent while limiting expenses and eliminating a "one-size-fits-all” costly program. However, the advantages go beyond just cost savings. Instead of structured tiered policies, which may include benefits a particular employee might not need and excluding ones they do, flex policies allow companies to build customized relocation packages around a set of core benefits. As a result, they are both flexible and aligned to the employee’s needs contributing to employee satisfaction and fairness. With a core/flex relocation policy, managers can rearrange individual benefits that meet employee needs within the budget. By clearly outlining the core benefits and menu of options within expense constraints, companies enable employees to see the rationale behind decisions and have them participate in their own relocation policy execution. This approach especially resounds with Millennials, who expect customization. Flex Policy OverviewAdvantages of core/flex programs: - Relocation benefits tailored more closely to individual employee needs
- Empowers hiring managers and relocation program managers
- Provides a candidate recruiting edge
- Employees feel more participatory and invested in the process
- Costs are controlled by offering only those benefits that are needed by the employee
- Eliminates or significantly reduces policy exceptions
Disadvantages of core/flex programs: - Program and policy administration is more complex than for strictly defined, tiered policies
- Budgeting is more challenging due to variable policy elements
- Continued management involvement is crucial to ensure that the package includes all of the elements essential to a successful relocation or assignment
- Because employees communicate with each other, there is the possibility that an employee will feel entitled to a benefit another employee has received
How to design a Core/Flex Policy - First determine which benefits make up the core of its policies. These are benefits that most of its relocations would include, such as a household goods shipment or a home finding trip. It would then assemble a list of optional benefits, such as a rental car and destination services, which employees could choose as part of their packages.
- Next determine which additional benefits will be offered and allocated. This aspect will vary by company, industry and global talent need. In some companies, each business unit is responsible for developing policies that work best for it.
- Use core/flex policies to help employees efficiently use and manage their lump sums.
- Use the core/flex approach to create policy tiers with distinctive types of benefits.
For example, a tier for a homeowner could include home sale assistance as a core benefit, with temporary housing as a flex option. A tier for a renter could include a paid lease cancellation as a core benefit, with extended temporary housing as a flex option. - Typical core benefits might include:
- Shipment of household goods
- Relocation and policy counseling
- Travel to the destination
- Rental or home finding assistance
- Flexible benefits might include:
- Home finding trips
- Home sale and home purchase assistance
- Mortgage assistance
- Spouse or partner career assistance
- Child or elder care assistance
- Miscellaneous allowance or lump sum assistance
While economic recovery is helping to overcome some of the obstacles to relocation, incorporating a flex element to an existing relocation policy will allow a more direct and personalized alignment of benefits and needs and in some cases, it allow relocations and international assignments that otherwise might not proceed.
Long and Foster Mobility
Corporate relocations are an important part of the company's overall benefits policy. Long and Foster Mobility provides policy consultation and implementation to its clients. By aligning the company's culture, goals and cost consideration, they can assist in designating a core and optional benefits program which will be fair to transferring employees and help control overall program costs.
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Core/Flex Relocation Policy Program
Workplace Wisdom
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Posted By Administration,
Monday, February 23, 2015
Updated: Friday, April 17, 2015
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| This Workplace Wisdom article featuring Sean Conrad, Halogen Software ran in the Richmond Times Dispatch February 23, 2015 |  |
 | Sean Conrad
Halogen Software |
Q. How can I answer my CEO’s most pressing questions about talent management?
A. Smart CEOs know the biggest competitive edge for any organization is its people. Companies invest a lot of time and money to attract the best talent — and CEOs want to make the most of that investment.
There are compelling reasons CEOs should be concerned about talent management. A Gallup report on The State of the American Workplace found that nearly 70% of the workforce is not achieving their full potential.
In addition, the Corporate Executive Board found that two-thirds of employees don’t understand how their work relates to overall organizational performance . These statistics raise red flags for CEOs and HR managers. Your C-suite has questions about talent retention, succession planning, and learning and development – but do you have the answers they need? In order to have an accurate picture of your workforce, you need to be able to compile and compare data from job descriptions to performance review details to succession planning. That’s not easy if you’re working with a manual talent management process or a system of spreadsheets. Yet without this data, you don’t have the insight into your company that you need in order to ensure its success. Let’s look at some of questions CEOs are most concerned about and the information HR leaders need in order to provide answers. - Can our business achieve its goals with our current staff?
You need to be able to provide your C-suite with details on how your current talent base is performing against key competencies and goals. With this performance data, you can identify where the skill gaps are within your workforce and help realign objectives to ensure that all employees are helping your organization move forward on its objectives.
- Are we retaining top talent?
A recent PWC report found that voluntary turnover among high performers is on the rise. You need to be able to identify your top performers and find out if there is a retention risk. A critical part to doing this is being able to compare data from across multiple platforms, from performance management to succession planning. Those details will help you determine a strategy and a learning and development program that will engage your top performers and mitigate retention risks.
- Is our investment in learning and development paying off?
A Gartner CEO and Executive Survey found that CEOs see talent as the number one constraint to growth. Many organizations are investing in learning and development to improve organizational performance and support growth plans. With that said, you should be able to measure whether your organization’s investment in learning and development is actually helping to close skill gaps or develop a critical competence that is critical to your business success. And provide your CEO with hard data. With these measurable results, you’ll know if your learning programs are yielding the results your organization needs to compete and grow.
- Is our existing talent base ready to become the leaders of tomorrow?
You need to know how deep your talent pool is. The ability to track and report on your employees’ performance and potential means you can easily see who have, or could be developed to have, the skills needed step into leadership positions down the road. Having a talent pool based leadership succession plan rather than a mere replacement plan makes your organization proactive rather than reactive — and that gives it a competitive edge over the long term.
If, like many others, your CEO is already asking, or starting to ask these questions, consider it a good thing. C-level leaders need the right information about human capital and talent management in order to understand the impact of its people on the company’s strategy and to guide business decisions.
As a strong business partner, you’re tasked with not only helping answer those fundamental questions about your talent, but with aligning your talent programs to your organization’s business strategy. Ultimately, even more than better insights, your executive team wants better outcomes. Aligning your talent programs to address the company’s business strategy will not only help you better report on news about your talent, but will help you ensure that it’s good news.
Author Bio
As a senior product analyst at Halogen Software, Sean Conrad helps HR teams improve their organization's performance management processes, so everyone gets more out of them. He's a regular contributor to the Halogen TalentSpace blog, often writing about talent management trends and best practices.
Halogen software offers an organically built cloud-based talent management suite that reinforces and drives higher employee performance across all talent programs – whether that is recruiting, performance management, learning and development, succession planning or compensation.
i O’Boyle, Ed; Harter, Jim. "State of the American Workplace”, Gallup, 2013 ii Engler, Scott, "Stop Cascading Strategy”, Corporate Executive Board, 2014 iii Shah, Nik; Pollack, Scott; Dutta, Ranjan and Burton, Jon, "PWC Saratoga 2012/13 US Human Capital Effectiveness Report,” PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2012iv Raskino, Mark, "Gartner CEO and Senior Executive Survey,” Gartner, Inc., 2014
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Workplace Wisdom
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