Total Rewards Briefs

At the outset of the pandemic, employees were the top priority of boards, second only to continued liquidity. That focus intensified during the social unrest following the death of George Floyd. Now, the SEC’s new disclosure rules on human capital management (HCM) could further reinforce the focus on workers — at least temporarily.

Of the nearly 24 million U.S. children under the age of six, 15 million kids have parents who are participating in the labor force. This begs the question: Do working parents have access to affordable, high-quality child care?

The current reality is that many organisations have moved ahead with well-being programs but are much more hesitant about developing their response to serious mental health issues. Ignoring this issue is no longer a viable option in a world of talent shortages and will only result in a waste or dismissal of the valuable talent provided by potentially up to a third of possible candidates for promotion and professional development. By engaging with this issue and believing they can make a positive

Monthly reports on the number of new jobs and the unemployment rate can drown out important trends like these two: After four decades of worsening, wage inequality has started shrinking. And in a twist, America’s blue-collar workers are playing the biggest role in driving that reversal.

Research indicates that there are huge gaps in long-term care planning. The need for help, and possibly a lot of help, later in life, has a huge impact on multiple generations of many American families. Society of Actuaries’ research studies show that while many people are aware of the risk, few do advance planning for managing it.

Employees are struggling to select their benefits. Jargon, lack of communication and poor understanding are some of the issues that plague workers when deciding on 401(k)s, health plans and other benefits, says Rebecca Ray, executive vice president of human capital at the Conference Board.

Recent developments concerning corporate sustainability suggest that compensation committees of public company boards of directors, as well as human resources executives, should consider the use of metrics developed to measure sustainability in incentive compensation plans.

Care should be taken to avoid enrichment of executive pay packages as a result of a stock buyback. The selection of performance measures and corresponding performance levels can be one of the most difficult aspects of designing an incentive compensation program for executives.