A Polish start-up company has made their employees dreams come true by adding a workation to their job perks.
The workation experimental idea – in which the company, PhotoAiD, pays for their employees’ stay, provides an office and reimburses 50% of airfares – proved highly successful in maintaining employee satisfaction and low turnover rates.
The company believes that job perks should answer employees’ needs. So before implementing the idea, the founders wanted to gauge how their people would feel about it.
In April this year, they did a survey, asking employees how likely they would be to go to Tenerife for a workation if the company arranged an office there and reimbursed 50% of airfares.
As many as 50 of 56 respondents (among 80 employees) rated the idea positively, or very positively, giving the founders the green light. They went ahead and in July, Santa Cruz de Tenerife became PhotoAiD’s new office location.
Why Tenerife? The sun never hides behind the clouds there and the weather is close to perfect all year round. It’s an excellent alternative to Poland, especially during its dark and gloomy winter.
Tenerife is the largest of Spain’s Canary Islands and has much to offer: mountains, beaches, forests, canyons and waves. After a day at the office, workcationers can jump into the sea, soak up the sun, climb, hike, surf and much more.
Rafał Młodzki, a co-founder of PhotoAiD, is the mastermind behind the Tenerife workation idea.
“We thought about the Tenerife office as the ‘company charger’, whose goal was to re-energise employees and boost the team spirit, somewhat depleted by remote work,” Mlodzki explains.
The company made every effort to create the perfect work setting. Based on a post-workation survey, spacious office rooms and a balcony with fantastic ocean and mountain views are just a few perks that helped employees to enjoy their working time.
Dominika Stasiecka, senior customer support, said it was "easier to get up to work in a place like that".
Other pros that employees mentioned were office location, big kitchen and home facilities. Thanks to all those conveniences, employees could draw on workation benefits while taking a break from the stresses of everyday life.
The company saw significant results between April and August this year.
The eNPS (employee net promoter score) went from 58 to 65. In regular employee satisfaction surveys, employees often point to “Tenerife workation” as the thing that the company does well, proving its impact. Of 24 employees who've visited the Tenerife office so far, 20 rated their experience as very positive, and they all wished to return.
So what is the most motivating factor in workation? All the exciting adventures that are waiting on the doorstep.
We all know work-life balance matters and workations are more than office hours. So, besides having an excellent work set-up, the Tenerife office lets employees have fun. There are board games and a bicycle, and it is located close to the city's attractions.
Młodzki mentioned that their primary concern was whether people would work effectively when spending time together in such a lovely place.
“Tenerife's charms didn't distract employees. On the contrary, they made people happy, and happy people performed better. Noteworthy, this energy has lasted long after their return.”
He added that the ever-growing eNPS and record-low turnover rates proved that workations are great both for employees and the entire company.
Overall, the Tenerife office fits the fast-growing technology startup’s experimental culture and mission statement: "To create with exceptional people a super company that will globally dominate the ID photo industry."
Would you seize the opportunity if it was presented to you?
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