Top 5 Weirdest Perks Offered by the Biggest Tech Companies

When you speak of companies and job perks you often think about 401k plans or fat bonuses tied to relatively easy performance metrics, or perhaps new cars and new houses.

IT companies are not immune to offering perks, but because they have a very crowded industry where top talent is hard to come by and harder to keep, a lot are coming up with unusual perks that go beyond the traditional bonuses and retirement plans. These unusual perks serve as a way to attract and retain IT talents to their fold, but these perks can also help in differentiating their companies from others and strengthening their brand.

It could even land them on the list of the best companies to work for!

So what are the most unusual perks that are being doled out to employees at the world’s top IT companies? Read on!

Cisco, the worldwide leader in networking, has come up with a pretty basic and simple plan to help out its busy workforce: free tune-ups for their cars.

The networking giant brings in a car care provider two times a week so that their employees can have their cars looked at or perhaps receive of an oil change.

The maker of Microsoft Office, Windows operating system, and the force behind Bing, Hotmail and MSN offers its workers something that no other company has ever given: their own shopping mall.

In 2009, Microsoft unveiled “The Commons,” which is a complex that has different shops, a pub, a soccer field and 14 restaurants.

The company’s general manager for worldwide real estate, Chris Owens, explained that the move was a way for the company to help its employees take care of the “things they need” daily.

And that makes sense, too. With more than 50,000 people around Microsoft’s corporate campus during the day, The Commons will never run out of customers.

Wouldn’t it be nice to actually pursue something that you think is worth your assistance and time? Like teach a child to read or build a house for the poor? Or you could also volunteer at the local hospital or help rebuild the public library. Volunteer charity work is a great way to give back to society, and if you think doing volunteer work and getting paid for it is just wishful then you should hear from NetApp employees.

The Data storage and management company encourages its employees to take some time off work and volunteer for their chosen charities and get paid in the process. This benefit is immediately available to everyone in the company, including new hires!

In the eight months ending April 2008, more than 750 employees in the United States volunteered close to 10,000 hours at their favorite charities. The cost? More than half a million dollars!

But that’s not the only unusual benefit that NetApp employees get to enjoy. When you enter the headquarters, you would find a fitness complex that has facilities like massage rooms, a basketball court and exercise rooms among others.

NetApp is the second largest data storage company when it comes to market capitalization, second only to EMC Corporation.

Bullhorn is the global online recruitment software leader and they go the extra mile in making sure that employees who just had babies do not get overwhelmed. They give them $500 for takeout meals during the first month.

This perk comes as a result of a lot of Bullhorn employees starting their own families and the company realized it would be too much for the new parents to prepare a meal after a hard day at work.

It seems that Google wrote the book when it comes to outlandish perks that make employees at other companies drool with envy.

Here is a bucket list of some of the cool benefits that every Google staff member enjoys:

• Free haircut: If you want to look like Captain Spock while doing a particularly challenging round of programming, you can just schedule a haircut and get it for free.

• Fitness facilities: They say that programmers tend to become overweight or out-of-shape because of the long hours they put in and because of all the sitting they do in front of their computers. Google provides employees with a gym that has all the equipment one needs to get buff. There are also swimming pools where you get to “swim against the current.”

• Ping pong, billiards and other games: Want to bond with your colleagues? Why not do it over a round of billiards or an intense game of ping pong at the Googleplex? There are also video game consoles available for those who don’t want to get very physical.

• Massage: Is stress getting you down? You can schedule an inexpensive full body rub with a licensed therapist. All on Google.

• Laundry and dry cleaning facilities

• Gourmet food

• Personal projects: Google encourages their employees to spend a fifth of their workweek to pursue their own projects. So even if you are a part of the search team, you can spend a day each week to work on something that might be used for, say, Google Docs. The payoff has been tremendous, as Google itself says that this is how many of the products featured in Google Labs started out.

There is a lot to be said about the benefits and advantages of unusual perks. Aside from attracting and retaining talents, you also get to see increased productivity and loyalty among your workers. What’s more, these perks do not have to be very expensive. A haircut costs $4, while game tables can last for years for a measly initial investment.

There are simply a lot of ways to reward your employees through an unusual perk or two and it will not cost you a dime. 

Some examples not found here:

• Offering zero-interest computer loans that have easy repayment plans.
• All-out recognition for outstanding work, much like what Zappos.com does for its employees of the month whom they treat to a mini-parade.
• Being pet-friendly. Mashable and Google share one thing: being a dog-friendly office.
• Work from home days. After a particularly tiring project, you might want to give your employees the chance to just sit back and work at home.