Breaking Down Benefits: Employee Understanding of Benefits and Readability Levels of University Benefits Handbooks

Benefits are often cited as one of the most important factors to hiring and retaining employees. One of the key ways employees learn about benefits is through communications provided by their human resources departments. However, little research has been dedicated to how effective employees perceive human resources communication about benefits to be. Universities offer a unique environment to study benefits communication due to employees’ diverse educational backgrounds. Employees’ perceived ease of understanding benefits information was investigated. Guided by a universal precautions approach to health literacy, this study also examined readability levels of benefits handbooks from more than two dozen large U.S. universities. Surprisingly, results revealed that faculty, and those with graduate degrees, had the lowest perceptions that they received easily understandable benefits information from their employer. Additionally, average benefits handbook readability levels are approximately twice the recommended level for a typical adult to adequately comprehend. Suggestions for improving benefits handbooks are discussed.