Recognition and reward advisory

EY’s Recognition and Reward professionals help companies articulate and implement strategic, financially optimized, sustainable, competitive and results-driven total reward philosophies and programs that reflect each organization’s purpose, vision, culture and values.

Related topics Workforce Consulting

What we can do for you

Rewards Reimagined: As companies shape their Future of Work agendas to accommodate how, when and where employees are working, it will be imperative for legacy Total Reward structures to be contemporized to provide consumer grade reward experiences that support the often divergent needs of both companies and their employee populations.

EY Sustainable Remuneration Guidelines (SRGs)

EY, along with Reward Value and leading CSOs, have developed and launched global SRGs at the 2023 World Economic Forum in Davos.

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Holistic total reward framework chart

Company expectations

Companies anticipate that their evolving Total Reward experience will:

  • Be financially efficient
  • Be aligned with market practices and company performance
  • Attract, retain and engage the best talent
  • Be structured to accommodate future organizational changes
  • Be regulatorily compliant
  • Be easy to administer

Employee expectations

Employees expect a Total Reward experience will:

  • Be market competitive
  • Be digitally accessible 24/7 – convenient access, easy to understand and use 
  • Offer opportunities for personalization/ flexibility
  • Be fair, inclusive, and transparent 
  • Be relevant to each employee’s career path, life stage and personal needs

Future Total Reward strategies will be challenged to harmonize the expectations of employers and employees into cohesive total reward (TR) frameworks that simultaneously support employee engagement and wellbeing, business results, and long-term value creation.

EY’s global Recognition and Reward professionals believe that future TR frameworks (including individual program components, delivery platforms and supporting processes) will impact organizations well beyond basic employee pay and benefits programs by serving as strategic levers that foster and reinforce each of the following cultural elements:

1. Employer brand and Employee Value Proposition (EVP): TR frameworks serve as barometers for the value and importance companies place on their employees, their EVPs, employer brands and company cultures; 

2. Performance and business results: TR frameworks incentivize employees to embrace change and align their incentives with strategic priorities/ KPIs (e.g., annual and long-term incentives, etc.);

3. Employee engagement and connection: TR frameworks will encourage employee engagement, teaming, sponsorship and affinity group networks (e.g., paid time off to volunteer, employee affinity networks etc.);

4. Employee well-being and safety: TR frameworks holistically support employee well-being by providing reward programs that align with our four well-being pillars (emotional, financial, physical and social);

5. Employee choice and personalization: TR frameworks empower each employee to select total reward elements that best resonate with their needs and current situation each year; and

6. Sustainability, diversity, inclusion, fairness and transparency: TR frameworks support diversity, inclusion and equality objectives while incorporating “green” reward programs and metrics that align with ESG/ sustainability goals.

Our Total Reward (TR) focus areas:

EY’s Recognition & Reward professionals provide integrated and end-to-end TR advisory support in each of the following areas

  • Total reward strategy advisory

    Advisory support spans the following areas: 

    • TR framework composition, reward cultural beacons, holistic wellbeing, TR mix
    • People Agenda, EVP, employer brand, remote/ hybrid/ agile structures
    • Competitive market/ peer group definition, benchmarks, positioning
    • Employee choice, employee personas/ segmentation
    • Sustainability, D&I, HR ROI and dashboard monitoring and reporting
  • Global workforce renumeration

    Competitive market intelligence, market benchmarking, plan design, eligibility, governance, and analytic support provided in the following areas:

    • Executive and broad-based pay
    • Incentive plan design (annual, short, and long-term plans, share and phantom unit plans)
    • KPIs, performance metrics, pay for performance, calibration
    • TR cost optimization, valuation, and economic modelling
    • Pay equality/ gender pay gap/ D&I analytics
  • Global benefits advisory

    Competitive market intelligence, market benchmarking, plan design, eligibility, governance, and analytic support in the following areas:

    • Benefits, pensions and wellbeing plan design and modifications/ re-alignment
    • TR cost optimization, actuarial valuation, and economic modelling
    • Provider/ vendor, service level agreement (SLA) assessments
    • Flexible reward strategies (statutory, core, voluntary, flexible)
  • Reward structure and technology advisory

    Advisory support spans the following areas: 

    • Job Family Architecture, job, role, competency evaluation frameworks
    • Pay grade realignment/ optimization
    • Reward eligibility planning, utilization, rationalization and economic modelling
    • Reward provider/ technology platform/ service level agreement assessments
    • Change management and communication
  • Reward financial implications, compliance and reporting/ disclosure and regulatory compliance

    Advisory support spans the following areas: 

    • Employment taxation (corporate and employee), reward valuation and audit/ tax provision support
    • Regulatory compliance, reporting and disclosures
    • Valuation, financial projections, ROI analytics
    • Internal controls
    • Implementation and change management services
Man presenting to group of people in office

Executive and board remuneration in Nordic countries, 2022

Explore how executive remuneration is managed in organizations to optimize the impact on the business by incentivizing growth, innovation and success in the near and long-term future.

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Why the future of work will depend on the future of total rewards

Prioritizing employee wellbeing and reward choice translates into a distinct competitive advantage.

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