Payroll can provide a platform for enhanced employee wellbeing and performance.
The fact that over three quarters of all employees have experienced financial stress and worry this year brings into sharp focus the need for effective tools and support to combat that stress. While it’s encouraging that employees are becoming more engaged with their pay statements, too many are still left without the information or support they need to gain control over their personal finances.
Despite the work of the payroll industry to simplify and digitise payslips, they remain full of acronyms and complex, inaccessible detail. Where people lack confidence with numbers or are experiencing anxiety about their financial situation, this presents a huge missed opportunity for employers to engage and offer meaningful help.
The rising cost of living has dramatically raised the stakes for payroll. Errors can have a hugely detrimental effect on the lives of employees and their families. It should be profoundly worrying to any employer if their people lack confidence in spotting issues, hesitate to raise questions with managers, or are unsure how to get corrections or support.
The research reinforces the argument that the payroll process should be the fulcrum for effective financial wellbeing initiatives. If employers are serious about helping their people to navigate through the worst cost-of-living crisis for a generation, then they have to engage with the challenge of modernising and enhancing their tools to offer people more effective, easier-to-access support without any stigma.
By creating an environment in which employees feel more financially empowered, employers can build a happier, healthier, and more motivated workforce. They can encourage higher performance, reduce turnover, and increase a sense of belonging, in turn leading to better outcomes and organisational success.
Perhaps more than anything, therefore, employers (as well as the financial services industry) need to find a way to remove the stigma attached to talking about money.
They need to work to create an environment where people are more open to discussing their financial circumstances, and where somebody worried about money can go to their manager for help.
Employers mustn’t shy away from these conversations. While they may not be able to stop people getting into financial difficulties or fix problems when they arise, they can play a critical role in helping people to manage these situations and find a way forward. Where people are feeling stressed and anxious, employers can direct them to the right support for dealing with the emotional impact of financial troubles. It’s often simply about providing people with ways to cope with the worry caused by money, rather than necessarily trying to solve the financial problem itself.
This is Part 1 of Zellis’ 2023 research on financial wellbeing.
Our 2022 financial wellbeing research is available in two parts:
Part 1: Learn how numeracy skills and money worries affect UK and Ireland employees.
Part 2: Key actions and strategies to change behaviour and improve financial wellbeing
zellis.com
