NEW DELHI: A chopper ride or a gourmet testing session on a helipad or a tree-house stay instead of the usual pack of sweets are among a number of innovative gifts that could come your way this Diwali.
Moving away from traditional sweets and gift vouchers, companies, including Flipkart, Larsen & Toubro, Procter & Gamble, InMobi and Amazon, among others, are looking at unique gifting experiences to retain talent.
A dinner on yacht with family, pizza making session in a luxury hotel for kids, exclusive movie screening for the entire family or the opportunity to record your own song are also on the cards.
According to Chennai-based employee engagement firm BI Worldwide, the approach towards rewards is based on the science of behavioural economics, which shows that 70% of decisions taken by humans are driven by emotions. “Companies have understood that the rewards efficacy is measured by creating lifetime memories, which have a high re-consumption value,” CEO Siddharth Reddy said.
“The idea is to gift memories to good performers as part of a long-term retention strategy,” said Manoj Biswas, HR head at Larsen & Toubro, which plans to offer vineyard tours, treehouse stays, sky diving and gourmet testing sessions to employees in the coming festival season. “The average budget does not exceed Rs 8,000-10,000. In turn, we receive calls and letters to show gratitude from spouses and kids of our employees!”
{{/usCountry}}“The idea is to gift memories to good performers as part of a long-term retention strategy,” said Manoj Biswas, HR head at Larsen & Toubro, which plans to offer vineyard tours, treehouse stays, sky diving and gourmet testing sessions to employees in the coming festival season. “The average budget does not exceed Rs 8,000-10,000. In turn, we receive calls and letters to show gratitude from spouses and kids of our employees!”
{{/usCountry}}InMobi, a mobile advertising and discovery platform backed by Japan’s Soft Bank, plans to reward employee referrals with a maximum budget of $20,000, and a minimum of $500. “Gifting a movie ticket or cash is passé. The new way to reward employees is to surprise them by gifting customised vacations, including beer festival in Berlin, trip to Bali, Mongolia or Europe,” said Kevin Freitas, HR leader at InMobi. Several gifting solution providers, such as Giftxoxo, WittyGift and Gifting Happiness, work with companies to provide customised gifting options at lowest possible prices. “The average spending of an employer does not exceed Rs 7,500, but the value of the gift looks nothing less than ₹25,000,” said Sumit Khandelwal, co-founder, Giftxoxo. It offers experiential gifting solutions to almost 500 companies, including P&G, Flipkart and BCG, among others. Companies, including Flipkart, BCG, Microsoft and P&G, did not respond to mails sent by HT.