TripAdvisor, a leading travel website that offers trusted advice from real travelers, is considered a go-to site for those wanting to take a trip or getaway. The company is also known for offering employees special perks to reward them for their hard work.
By offering employees monthly chair massages, TripAdvisor offers another kind of "get away" for those sitting at a desk all day. The company extends opportunities like the massages to help workers de-stress and unwind. Says TripAdvisor Benefits Specialist Shawn Rauhala, "TripAdvisor wants to have the best benefits to help attract and keep the best talent. So having chair massages is just one of the perks, among many, that we have for employees. Employees, it seems, are often rewarded with food and the chair massages are a relaxing, stress-relieving perk that is outside the norm. Not only do you not gain weight, but it is also healthy to relieve some stress that people often carry around as tension in their bodies!"
With close to 500 employees to inform about the opportunity, in addition to scheduling and managing the changes to the schedule, Rauhala notes it was far too difficult with an old-fashioned paper sign up sheet. "I took over organizing chair massages on a monthly basis back in October 2012," shares Rauhala. "I had asked my Director if he knew of an electronic scheduling tool we could use to cut out the manual work. He had used SignUpGenius when his kid's school had Parent/Teacher meetings, so he suggested I check it out. I did and it was EXACTLY what I was looking for. We have used it since."
Rauhala has found that using SignUpGenius for his scheduling has offered more freedom, allowing employees to book the first come, first serve chair massages as soon as possible. The online sign up saves him time by taking him out as the middle man. The system handles changes and cancellations for him. "This is an extremely popular activity. Once I send out the e-mail the two days of slots fill up in less than 10 minutes. If it weren't for this site, I would have to have people manually sign up and then manage it from there," says Rauhala. "I would have to maintain a waitlist in case someone cancels, which would then involve contacting the people on the list. By using the site, I pretty much just send the link out and everything with cancellations is handled within the site. Employees can then check on their own if slots open up without me being involved."
Rauhala is impressed by how quickly he was able to get started with his first SignUpGenius sign up and also how easily he can create a new monthly sign up. "If there is one thing I can say about [SignUpGenius], it is really intuitive. I went on the site and got what I needed setup in no time without any instruction. The site has a lot of great features but I think the 'copy signup' helps me the most. We have the massages once a month and being able to copy over the previous event and just change a couple small pieces is a big time saver for me."
TripAdvisor plans to increase the days and times they offer chair massage perks to their employees, and they have found that SignUpGenius will allow them to do this without requiring the use of additional admin support in scheduling.
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