Optimising benefits has become a top priority for HR leaders. With shrinking budgets, rising employee expectations, and fierce competition for talent, HR must deliver benefits that genuinely support wellbeing, boost productivity, and improve recruitment and retention.

Just “doing what you’ve always done” or “jumping on the next fad” simply doesn’t cut it anymore.

Today’s workforce is more diverse than ever—spanning five generations, a range of working patterns, income levels, health needs, and personal circumstances. Employees expect benefits that reflect this complexity and deliver real value to their individual lives. Without data to understand their needs, employers risk offering one-size-fits-all solutions that fail to engage, support, or retain talent.

This is where the role of HR and Reward professionals is changing – having a better understanding of data and how it is used to monitor programmes and make informed decisions is a must-have skill. Despite having access to vast amounts of information, many HR teams struggle to translate data into meaningful insight and action.

According to  Research[i] 2025, conducted in partnership with REBA, one-third of proposed benefit changes are rejected at board level due to insufficient data. HR teams may be collecting plenty of data, but it is often not the right kind of data or not interpreted the right way. This means ideas fail to gain traction, and organisations are missing opportunities to improve employee wellbeing and engagement.

The data disconnect.

The research shows that while 67% of employers track benefit costs and 62% monitor satisfaction, far fewer examine deeper indicators such as absence rates (42%), health claims data (35%), or wellbeing scores (23%). When we consider that wellbeing has been very high on the corporate agenda for the last five years, there is clearly a disconnect between the message and approach.

The result of an immature data strategy is that organisations don’t understand the specific problems they need to solve or opportunities to grasp, and decisions to improve benefits are delayed or investment decisions rejected.

Similarly, programmes are often launched without clear objectives or metrics that can be evaluated to judge their success. When challenged on the value or effectiveness of programmes, HR teams often struggle to respond with impact.

Collecting data is different from using it. There is a focus on the use of external benchmarking to make benefits decisions, but this does not answer essential questions such as “are our interventions working?” “Are they reducing absence, improving wellbeing, or meeting the needs of employees?”

To obtain these answers, organisations must diversify their data collection and focus on outcome-driven data, identifying metrics that link the investment in benefits to their business goals. This can be a big ask, but, importantly, it is a journey that should be iterated and improved over time.

Also, a patient approach is needed – 60% of HR and reward professionals say they struggle with data availability or usability, and over half lack access to reliable benchmarks or the tools to interpret their data. This is not a failure – it reflects the growing complexity of modern benefits. With the pressure for more, however, teams cannot hide behind these barriers for lack of progress.

Data-driven personalisation at scale

Talent shortages remain a pressing recruitment challenge, with 53% of employers struggling to find suitable candidates, according to Total Jobs[ii]. A strong Employer Value Proposition (EVP) can help a business stand-out, and personalised, compelling benefits are part of that solution.

But personalisation requires using data to understand your audience and to design programmes that meet their needs and communicate with them effectively to create action. Anther critical data point is demographic analysis, to understand the shape and needs of the workforce and how they engage with different benefits and initiatives.

That said, personalisation often introduces operational complexity. The key is to find the right balance – enough flexibility to create value, without overwhelming HR teams. Modern benefits platforms help by segmenting audiences, filtering irrelevant options, and guiding users through intuitive, intelligent journeys. And they will often provide the insights needed to judge success.

With the rise of AI and predictive analytics, the future promises hyper-personalisation, where benefits are tailored in real time to employee behaviours, preferences, and life stages. For many, that is a long way off, but each journey starts with a first step of deciding the goals and metrics to put in place processes to gather data.

Five ways to personalise benefits using data.

Translating benefit strategy into action requires a clear roadmap. Here are five ways HR leaders can apply a data-driven approach to make benefits more personalised and impactful:

• Use employee insight to shape design – Run surveys and focus groups to understand changing needs. This input is essential for shaping benefits that feel relevant and valued.
• Offer flexible benefit options – Flexibility allows employees to build a package that suits their lifestyle, life stage, and personal priorities – a powerful engagement driver.
• Give choice through wellbeing allowances – Increase impact and engagement by giving employees control over wellbeing spending, from gym memberships to financial tools.
• Support decisions with personalised tools – Help employees make smarter choices with resources like pension modellers or health risk assessments tailored to their circumstances.
• Tailor communications for relevance – Use data to segment messaging and improve clarity. Personalised, timely communications boost engagement and benefit usage.

Optimising benefits is not about chasing trends or offering the widest menu, it is about understanding what matters most to your people and using the right data to measure and improve impact. A data-driven approach is the only reliable way to ensure benefits are aligned with employee needs and business objectives. From governance to personalisation, data provides the clarity, accountability, and agility needed to design benefits that support people and deliver tangible results.

[i] https://reba.global/resource-report/benefits-design-research-2025.html#:~:text=Design%20Research%202025-,The%20use%20of%20data%20to%20support%20benefits%20decisions%20is%20becoming,health%2C%20protection%2C%20and%20wellbeing.

[ii] https://www.totaljobs.com/recruiter-advice/recruitment-challenges

[i] https://reba.global/resource-report/benefits-design-research-2025.html#:~:text=Design%20Research%202025-,The%20use%20of%20data%20to%20support%20benefits%20decisions%20is%20becoming,health%2C%20protection%2C%20and%20wellbeing.

[ii] https://www.totaljobs.com/recruiter-advice/recruitment-challenges