SHRM’s June 2025 employee-benefits analysis offers a benchmark for healthcare priorities and benefit design. It also illustrates why employers need to read survey questions and sample descriptions before turning a headline percentage into a market trend or a recommendation to change their own programme.

Read the dated development

The survey covered 3,969 HR professionals. Healthcare benefits were rated very or extremely important by 88%, and 97% reported organisational health coverage. A new question found that 23% offered GLP-1 coverage for diabetes and/or weight management. That first-year result does not establish year-on-year growth.

The findings give employers a useful discussion point, but they do not answer every plan-design question. A broad coverage percentage does not describe the eligibility criteria, clinical requirements or funding approach of a particular plan. Those details matter when employees compare their own arrangements with what they believe other organisations provide.

Apply it to employer decisions

This editor recommends using the public results as a discussion benchmark rather than a coverage mandate. Compare the workforce and survey definitions with the employer’s own population, then review its objectives and plan conditions. Keep any claim about adoption separate from assumptions about cost, outcomes or employee access.

A multinational benefits or mobility programme needs an accountable owner for this review. The local team should explain how the development affects its own arrangements, while the group team checks that its policy summary uses the same assumptions. A dated record makes future corrections easier and helps employees understand which information applies to their situation.

Keep a usable implementation record

Record the sample, question wording and observation year with any presentation of these findings. Public survey analysis can support a benefits review, while detailed plan decisions require further evidence. Explain the limits of the benchmark so employees and decision makers can distinguish reported practice from a promised benefit.