When flying the Pride flag isn't enough - what inclusive benefits actually look like

Pride month is a moment of genuine celebration that also asks whether your benefits package actually reflects the people you employ.

Most benefits packages were originally designed around a fairly narrow idea of the "typical employee": married, heterosexual, able-bodied, neurotypical and following a conventional life path. That template shaped everything from parental leave and private medical insurance (PMI) policies to employee assistance programmes (EAPs) and financial wellbeing support.

But today's workforce looks very different. In fact, the conventional employee no longer exists.

It includes single parents and sandwich carers, employees managing chronic illness or neurodivergence, people navigating fertility treatment, bereavement, financial pressure or non-traditional family structures. LGBTQ+ employees are among those most visibly underserved, but they are far from alone.

The data tells the same story. Nearly 40% of LGBTQ+ employees still hide their identity at work, while more than a third have heard discriminatory comments about LGBTQ+ colleagues. Research from the CIPD also found that one in five neurodivergent employees has experienced harassment or discrimination linked to their neurodivergence.

Why LGBTQ+ inclusion is a useful tool

This is why LGBTQ+ inclusion can be such a useful diagnostic lens for HR and reward leaders. The gaps that affect LGBTQ+ employees often reveal wider patterns of exclusion across the workforce.

If your fertility support assumes a heterosexual couple experiencing infertility, it is also failing single parents, same-sex couples and transgender employees pursuing parenthood through different routes.

If your bereavement policy only recognises biological or legally registered relationships, it is also failing the employee whose closest family member is a lifelong friend.

If your EAP offers only a generic counselling line, it may not work for a transgender employee navigating transition-related distress, a neurodiverse employee who struggles with phone communication or an employee seeking culturally informed support.

The goal is not to create separate benefits for every group. It is to recognise that employees do not experience life, health, family or financial pressure in the same way and benefits design needs to catch up with that reality.

Where standard packages most commonly fall short

Some of the biggest gaps appear in family formation, mental health and financial wellbeing support.

Parental leave and fertility benefits often default to outdated assumptions about gender and parenthood. Truly inclusive policies recognise all routes to becoming a parent, whether through adoption, surrogacy, IVF or co-parenting arrangements, and offer equal support regardless of gender or family structure.

Mental health provision is another common blind spot. Access alone is not enough. Employees need care that feels relevant, culturally competent and genuinely accessible. This matters at a time when mental ill health is now the leading cause of long-term absence in UK workplaces.

Financial wellbeing support can also miss the mark when it focuses solely on pensions and savings while overlooking the realities many employees face: debt, caring responsibilities, fertility costs or the financial strain associated with chronic illness or transition-related care.

Asking better questions

The employers making the biggest progress are not necessarily those with the most extensive benefits packages. They are the ones who ask better questions.

Instead of ‘what are other organisations offering?’ maybe ask 'what do our employees actually need?’

That requires listening properly through employee networks, surveys and health needs assessments, then using those insights to shape benefits strategy rather than simply validate existing decisions. It also means pushing providers harder on accessibility, inclusivity and real-world relevance.

Inclusive benefits design does not require rebuilding everything overnight. Often, relatively small changes, such as broadening bereavement definitions, reviewing parental leave language or improving access to culturally competent mental health support can have a significant impact on how valued employees feel.

What HR and reward leaders can do now

Review parental leave, fertility and bereavement policies for inclusive language ensuring they recognise adoption, surrogacy, same-sex parents, non-traditional family structures and chosen family equally.
Audit mental health and EAP provision for genuine accessibility asking providers directly about LGBTQ+ expertise, cultural competency and whether employees can access support in different formats, not just by phone.
Go beyond utilisation data. Ask which groups are not engaging with support and why, then use employee networks and anonymous surveys as genuine inputs into benefits design, not just to validate decisions already made.
Challenge what financial wellbeing actually means for your workforce moving beyond pensions and savings to address the realities employees face, including debt, caring responsibilities, fertility costs and transition-related expenses.
Make inclusion a year-round discipline, not an awareness month exercise ensuring benefits communications reflect the diversity of your workforce in every piece of content, every conversation and every provider relationship.

Pride is the prompt – inclusion is the practice

Pride month is a useful prompt for reflection. But inclusive benefits should never be confined to a single awareness month.

The question is not whether your workforce is diverse. It is whether your benefits package knows that yet.

If this piece has prompted you to think about where your own benefits package stands, Avantus’ parent company CIPHR is hosting a webinar on Flexible benefits and inclusion: How to build a package that works for everyone, on Thursday, 11 June, at 11am. Register here.