How to Use Employee Benefits to Boost Your Recruitment
One of Hong Kong’s biggest banks, HSBC Holdings Plc, updated its hybrid working approach in April to require customer-facing staff in Hong Kong, including traders and salespeople, to be either with clients or in the office five days a week.
Our 2026 Workplace Trends Report shows that Hong Kong stands out as one of the most office-centric markets in the global survey of seven countries. Employees in Hong Kong are significantly more likely to work five days per week in the office than the global average (60% versus 17%).
To understand what shapes this mindset and how employers can boost recruitment in such a market, we spoke to Ivy Kwan, Operations Director at Morgan McKinley Hong Kong.
Here are her insights:
1. Embed Flexibility Into Your Work Culture
Hong Kong’s unique infrastructure, density, and sector mix, particularly in relation to the reliance on retail banking, operations, and trading, mean that working from the office is often unavoidable.
“If you legally or operationally cannot offer remote work, find other ways to alleviate the daily grind. It comes down to tackling three core pain points: time, stress, and rigidity,” says Ivy. She outlines four practical approaches to reduce that daily friction.
Enable Employees to Choose Their ‘Window’ Policy
Rather than forcing everyone into the traditional 9-to-6 rhythm, Ivy recommends implementing a “choose your window” policy, allowing employees to start work anytime between 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM. “This allows staff to bypass peak mass transit railway (MTR) rushes and gives them a sense of control over their morning without reducing their actual desk time,” she explains.
Introduce Early-Release Fridays
Another popular flexibility lever in Hong Kong is offering a half-day on alternate Fridays, or letting employees log off an hour early if their weekly targets are met. “This builds immense goodwill, rewards efficiency, and does not sacrifice output,” says Ivy.
Consider Trying Compressed Work Weeks
For specific operational or back-office roles, Ivy encourages exploring a 4.5-day work week or a compressed four-day schedule. “This shifts the conversation away from a rigid office culture to a more progressive employer brand,” she says.
Make the Office a Place People Want to Be
“If employees have to be at their desks, make the office a place they actually want to spend time,” says Ivy. Her suggestions of how to do this include corporate wellness app partnerships, subsidised gym memberships near the office, or fully catered team lunches once a week to build culture and social connection.
2. Ensure Your Employee Benefits Are Competitive
When benefits are outdated or minimal, organisations risk a costly domino effect that impacts retention, recruitment costs, and brand reputation.
“Without competitive benefits, employees view their relationship with you as purely financial. There’s no loyalty buffer,” says Ivy. “The moment a competitor comes along with a 5% or 10% base salary bump, your talent will jump ship because nothing else was keeping them tied to the business.”
On top of this, weak benefits packages lead to a benefits deficit for new hires. “When your package is weak, candidates will demand an inflated base salary to offset what they’re losing,” she explains. “They will essentially charge you a premium to compensate for poor medical coverage or a lack of allowances. This inflates your fixed payroll costs unsustainably.”
In Hong Kong’s tightly knit job market, word travels fast. “A company known for offering bare-minimum benefits quickly gets branded as short-sighted and unsupportive. Once that label sticks, you become a second-choice employer on platforms like Glassdoor and LinkedIn.”
3. Prioritise Your Health Insurance Offering
Candidates are scrutinising the health insurance details more than ever. “They want a holistic plan that reflects how people actually live and take care of themselves today”, says Ivy. Here’s where you should focus your offering:
- Dependents and families first: For married candidates or those with families, comprehensive coverage for spouses and children is a non-negotiable priority.
- Go beyond the GP: Traditional medical plans that only cover GP clinics don't cut it anymore. Hong Kong professionals heavily prioritise dental care, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), physiotherapy, and chiropractic care.
4. Provide Low-Cost, High-Impact Employee Benefits
Our report highlights that 77% of Hong Kong professionals reported flat salaries over the last six months. For employers without the budget for large increases, Ivy suggests pivoting toward lifestyle perks and career capital. “When macroeconomic pressures freeze your salary budgets, you have to pivot toward lifestyle perks and career capital,” she says. She suggests the following:
Provide Professional Development and Licence Sponsorship
Offering to cover professional certifications, annual accounting, legal or compliance association fees, or technical upskilling courses adds significant value to the employee’s long-term career. “This doesn’t hit your books as a recurring fixed salary cost, but it adds massive, tangible value to the employee’s long-term career,” Ivy explains.
Offer Purchasable or Earned Extra Leave
Personal time is a highly valuable currency for employees and Ivy suggests ways to maximise its value. “Offer an extra three to five days of annual leave above your standard allocation. It costs very little upfront, but it’s a brilliant hook for professionals looking to manage burnout”, she shares.
Consider Wellness and Lifestyle Stipends
Gestures providing support for wellness and lifestyle can be very impactful. “Providing a modest allowance for wellness apps, physiotherapy sessions, or mental health resources signals an empathetic culture while keeping your workforce healthy and productive.”
5. Re-Engineer Your Bonus Schemes
Globally, only 45% of employees currently receive a bonus. For businesses trying to close a crucial role, Ivy advises caution with guaranteed sign-on bonuses. “I would generally advise against relying heavily on guaranteed sign-on bonuses, unless you are strictly buying out unvested stock or a confirmed bonus a candidate is walking away from,” she says.
“A sign-on bonus is a one-time transaction. It solves a short-term hurdle, but it doesn’t drive long-term engagement. Once that money is spent, the candidate is back to facing their day-to-day reality.” Her recommended approach is to re-engineer performance bonuses into clearer, more frequent milestones.
“In a flat-salary market, candidates are deeply sceptical of vague, discretionary year-end bonuses. Move toward structured, quarterly, or biannual performance payouts backed by clear, quantifiable metrics. If a candidate knows exactly what milestones they need to hit to unlock an extra 15% to 20%, they will frequently choose that transparency over a slightly higher base salary elsewhere.”
6. Showcase Development During Recruitment
If you want a candidate to choose long-term career growth over a short-term cash premium, Ivy stresses that generic bullets about “training opportunities” in a job description are not enough. “You have to showcase it tangibly during the interview process”, she explains. Here’s her advice on how to do this:
Introduce Them to Internal Success Stories
Have the candidate meet a peer who has been promoted internally or successfully pivoted roles using the company’s upskilling programmes. “Real-life proof destroys scepticism,” says Ivy.
Map Out a Learning Roadmap
At the offer stage, present the candidate with a clear development plan. “Show them exactly what budgets, technical training, or mentorship milestones will open up for them at the six, 12, and 18-month marks”, she suggests.
Tie People Management to Development
Make it clear that managers are actively evaluated on how well they develop their teams. “When a candidate sees that learning is woven into the actual corporate culture (rather than treated as a ‘marketing brochure tagline’), they will often choose long-term career growth over a short-term cash premium,” Ivy says.
7. Address Everyday Costs With Empathy
Cost-of-living expenses are a major factor in Hong Kong, and addressing them is one of the fastest ways an employer can show real local market empathy. Here is how organisations can take care of this.
Maximise Rental Reimbursement Schemes
Roughly 30% of Hong Kong’s population live in rental housing, and private market rents remain a massive financial burden. “By structuring a portion of an employee's existing gross salary as a designated ‘Housing Allowance’ under the Inland Revenue Ordinance, you grant them significant tax savings. It effectively gives them a raise without costing your company an extra dime.”
Solve the Commute Burden for Remote Hubs
If the office is located outside prime commercial districts like Central or Quarry Bay, such as Kowloon East, Cyberport, or parts of the New Territories, travel time and costs become a major hiring hurdle.
“Savvy companies offset this by offering direct shuttle buses from major MTR hubs or providing a monthly Octopus card stipend. Alleviating the friction of the daily commute can instantly turn a geographically challenging role into an attractive option.”
Want to learn more about what’s really important to Hong Kong employees? Download our 2026 Workplace Trends Report below – or speak to one of our consultants about your hiring.
