10 Surprising Statistics About Paid Time Off and Flexible Work

What benefit would your employees like even more than a raise? And how much do employers actually feel paid time off helps their companies?

Justworks and SquareFoot surveyed a total of 314 US small business employees and 47 small business owners in order to shed light on shifts occurring in the workplace, specifically shifts related to paid time off and workplace flexibility preferences. (You can read all of the data here.)

What we found was sometimes surprising. Take, for example, that most employees actually valued flexible work schedules over the option of unlimited paid time off.

We also dug through Justworks’ customer data, which houses information on the HR activities of thousands of employees in small- to medium-sized businesses in the U.S., and discovered some interesting trends around their vacationing habits.

Read below to find out what employees are hoping for most when it comes to paid time off and flexible work policies.

Ten Statistics on Paid Time Off

These statistics come from Justworks’ and SquareFoot’s joint survey of 314 small business employees and 47 small business owners throughout the U.S. You can learn more about the survey methodology here.

1. 70% of employees ranked flexible work hours as very important. (Click to Tweet)

2. 68% of employees believe flexible hours have a positive impact on their teams.

3. 57% of employees feel remote capabilities are very important.

4. 60% of employees believe remote work has a positive impact on their teams. (Click to Tweet)

5. 42% of employees would take a lower-paying job if it offered a greater degree of workplace flexibility.

6. 76% of employers believe flexible work hours have a big impact on their ability to hire. (Click to Tweet)

7. 63% of employees surveyed work at companies that offer flexible work hours.

8. Only 35.5% of employees surveyed work at companies that offer paid parental leave, even though 49% believe it’s very important.

9. While 44% of employers believe unlimited PTO if important, only 21% believe it has a positive impact on their team’s performance.

10. According to Justworks customer data, which largely represents small businesses, workers typically take long weekends — an average PTO request of one to two days at a time — far more often than larger trips.

Choosing a Vacation Policy That Works For Your Company

Keeping in mind the importance of paid time off to employees, make sure to build a flexible vacation policy that keeps your team’s needs in mind.

Depending on the size of your company, needs of your employees, and state in which your company resides, your vacation policy may differ radically from others across the U.S.

It’s not always easy to decide which policy is best, but we have a lot of content to help you inform yourself and make a decision. We’ve pulled together a roundup of many of the paid time off policy posts from the blog, including topics like:

• Fostering workplace diversity with the right perks and benefits - Boosting office morale with Summer Fridays - Tips for creating a family-friendly workplace - Why you should track paid time off, even with unlimited vacation

How Justworks Can Help

Justworks is a PEO, or Professional Employer Organization. We enable small- and medium-sized businesses get enterprise-level benefits packages and other competitive perks, as well as administer payroll taxes and help with government paperwork.

Justworks also has features on our software platform that help you set vacation policies and have your employees request paid time off with ease. For example, people can grant vacation days upfront, and admins can create and assign paid time off policies to specific groups of full-time and part-time employees. You can learn more about Justworks here.