PEER PERSPECTIVE
Beyond Paychecks: Unique Benefits To Offer Your Team
By Jill Odom
EMPLOYEES HAVE LOTS OF OPTIONS WHEN IT COMES TO CHOOSING A landscape company to work for. Aside from competitive wages, one of the ways to stand out is to provide unique benefits that are less common in the industry.
“In our world, finding employees is so
hard that your benefit package can be the difference,” says Mark Ables, president and CEO of Ables Landscapes, based in Hollywood, South Carolina. “We really stress that when we interview people. We have to say it’s more than just com- paring dollar per hour with our company versus another because these benefits really have a lot of value.” Some of the possible areas to explore include offering more education and training opportunities and taking a more holistic approach by providing mental health support and flexible schedules. “I feel years ago, if you offered health insurance, 401(k) and paid time off, you were in the top 60%,” says Chris Ahlum, president of Ahlum and Arbor, based in Columbus, Ohio. “Now employees want different things. They want flexibility and purpose. Employees don’t come to work anymore just for a paycheck, and quite honestly, we don’t want just ‘paycheck employees.’ Managing multi-generations really requires us to think outside the box to be able to cover what everyone wants.”
Check out these three companies and
how they go above and beyond with the benefits they award their teams.
CASE STUDY: ABLES LANDSCAPES One of the most unique benefits that Ables Landscapes offers their employees is access to their dream manager. The company employs a full-time
dream manager, Morgan Behrens, who essentially serves as a life coach for their team members. “The dream manager really gets to
know our people, and the way it works is she meets with them once every four to six weeks,” Ables says. “They have a dream session, and they talk about their goals in life. It’s not just at work; it’s the whole person. So it might be a physical goal, it might be personal, might be spiritual, and Morgan hears them out and puts some steps in place to say, ‘All right, next time you meet, what do we need to do to get one step closer to this goal?’” For example, they have a lot of non-English speakers on staff, and the DMV is a real challenge for them. Ables’ dream manager will set up an appointment and go with them to help them get a driver’s license, which is
life-changing for them. “She’s got little mini-plans for all of our
employees that she’s working and keeps up with,” Ables says. “Some people are all in with it, and they love it. Some people keep things close to the vest, and it takes a while to pry goals out, but eventually, they do.” Ables says having a dream manager helps them better support their employ- ees emotionally, physically and financial- ly. It has also provided more accountabil- ity and boosted employee morale. “I think the dream manager program has definitely created a culture here that is hard to beat,” Ables says. “It’s not an instant, you flip a switch, and our culture got great because we hired Morgan. It’s taken a few years of building trust and for that turnover rate to go way down and retention rate to stay high, and for people just to see that their lives are getting better through their own work.” Ables says they’ve recently added a
workplace chaplain as well, who is on-call for big life-impacting events like a tragic loss or if a loved one is in the hospital. “Whatever it is, they’re there for a call,”
Ables says. “They’ll go visit, and they also come out to our shop and meet with our people. They build some relationship capital.” He says his employees also really
appreciate their profit sharing and their PTO policy. After conducting a compa- ny survey, he realized that PTO is more important to the team so they’ve been more generous with it. The company conducts profit sharing twice a year, so employees understand it
“We just increased our gear stipend this past year based on employee feedback. I know this significantly increased their morale and it helped with production! Anytime you have a happy employee production is better than an unhappy employee!” - Chris Ahlum, president of Ahlum and Arbor
18 The Edge //March/April 2025
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