Perks over pay trend

Canadian employers trying to hire tech workers are leaning harder on flexibility, stock options and benefits, not just bigger salaries. (finance.yahoo.com) A Financial Post item, republished by Yahoo Finance on April 22, said 55% of businesses see attracting top tech talent as a major priority this year and 70% said it is harder than ever. The same report said 34% use hybrid work and 28% use stock option plans to attract candidates. (finance.yahoo.com) The hiring pressure is tied to a wider skills shortage. ManpowerGroup’s February survey of more than 39,000 employers in 41 countries found 72% had trouble filling tech roles, up from 40% in 2016, and the Financial Post report said artificial-intelligence skills have overtaken traditional tech skills in demand. (finance.yahoo.com) Canadian recruiting data points the same way on work arrangements. Robert Half said on Jan. 30 that 28% of new Canadian job postings in the third quarter of 2025 were hybrid and 11% were fully remote, while only 14% of surveyed professionals said an in-office job was their top choice. (roberthalf.com) Hybrid work now sits inside compensation talks, not beside them. Robert Half said 56% of professionals ranked hybrid as their top work model, and 38% of workers not planning a job search said they were staying put because they did not want to lose their current flexibility. (roberthalf.com) Salary still matters, especially with inflation. Robert Half’s 2025 Canada Salary Guide said 92% of professionals were concerned inflation would outpace salary growth, 51% felt underpaid, and 60% named salary as the top thing they want in a new job. (press.roberthalf.ca) But employers are increasingly treating perks as the tie-breaker. Robert Half said 46% of Canadian hiring managers expect adding new benefits and perks to be their most effective recruiting move in 2026, even as 71% worry about keeping up with compensation expectations. (roberthalf.com) In tech specifically, companies are still keeping remote and hybrid options alive despite headline return-to-office orders. TAP Network and Mercer said in September 2025 that 71.4% of Canadian tech companies were hybrid, 26% were fully remote and 2.6% were fully onsite, with median salary increases of 3.5%. (businesswire.com) That puts employers in a split market. Amazon ended hybrid work for its corporate workforce, including in Canada, with a five-day office mandate that took effect Jan. 2, 2025, while Royal Bank of Canada told hybrid employees to come in four days a week starting in September 2025. (cbc.ca) (marketscreener.com) Across Canadian workplaces, remote work is still being used as a retention tool even where it is more structured than before. A 2025 survey by the Work and Career Business Council found 91% of organizations offer hybrid work, 71% support formal remote arrangements, and 89% cited retention as a reason for offering remote work. (wcbc.ca) For candidates, that means the real negotiation is often over the whole package: how many days in the office, whether equity is included, what benefits are covered and how fast advancement happens. For employers, it means the posted salary is increasingly just the opening number. (finance.yahoo.com) (press.roberthalf.ca)