The mind boggles at some of the innovations emanating from Google – and now the internet search giant is offering to pay the spouse or partner of an employee for 10 years after their death.
The generous benefit is for half pay with no length of service requirement, so the promise is rolled out to all the firm’s 34,000 employees.
Google don’t stop their death in service benefits there – the spouse or partner of the deceased also picks up any vested stock and any children are paid $1,000 a month until age 19 – and can apply for an extension if they are in full time education after that age.
Google explains that the benefits are not to attract new staff, but to care for current employees with no cost to them. Google foots the bill without any salary deduction or other pay adjustment.
Rocking with the Clif Bar
You don’t have to be dead to benefit from Google’s generosity to employees – while at work you can dine lavishly on gourmet food, exercise in fitness classes, have your laundry done and even get your car washed. And that’s all for free.
Google is not the only company offering outstanding benefits to employees.
Performance food and drink maker Clif Bar has 300 staff and offers top perks, from workplace design to cash incentives.
The US head office has four atrium gardens, a 40-foot bouldering wall and a fitness center with a yoga room, dance studio, massage rooms with specialist trainers and nutritionists.
Everyone gets 2.5 hours paid gym time each week, plus a $350 grant to help cover the entry costs for races, events and competitions.
Green with envy
The list goes on – free haircuts, laundry and dry cleaning, cash incentives for green transport initiatives and a $1,000 a year grant for green home improvements.
Shades of Green gives peer group recognition for workers at Sweetgreen, a food brand in Washington DC.
The longer you work for Sweetgreen, the darker your free T-shirt, but besides the free T-shirt the gifts keep coming every year – with trainers, a green iPod Touch and a bike up for grabs in the first three years.
The firm also encourages new music by hosting free in-store concerts of up and coming bands.
Sloping off in the winter
Snowboard giant Burton offers some cool perks as well – the main one being if more than two feet of snow falls, the office shuts to let the staff take to the slopes on their boards.
Gaming and media firm RockYou hosts the YouRock Awards for employees every six weeks – which depending on your stance could be a cringing horror or a great way of celebrating success with your peers.
Staff vote for their co-workers and the winner picks up free gifts that vary from an iPad to cash or time off.
All the winners are awarded a golden cow trophy.
These employee benefit perks make a big difference from staff discounts, employer contributions in to pensions offered by many firms.
