Utilization shows whether employees are using a caregiving support benefit. To understand its impact, Hylant looked at employee needs, what the support changed, and the return on investment. Its direct experience shows how those measures can work together.
Utilization tells you whether employees are accessing a caregiving support benefit. What it doesn’t tell you is whether they found care, spent less time managing a difficult situation, or felt more supported at work.
At Hylant, a family-owned insurance brokerage, employee comments about managing childcare and elder care in a benefits and wellbeing survey pointed to a need for more support. Similar concerns came up in conversations with HR, managers, and senior leaders. Some employees said care responsibilities were affecting their ability to bring their best to work.
The company provided employees access to Cariloop’s Caregiver Support Platform® to support needs across childcare, adult and elder care, and education. Hylant’s experience offers a useful example of what you can learn by looking beyond utilization to measure a benefit’s impact.
Why utilization isn’t a full measure of a caregiving support benefit
One measure alone can’t show the value of support for a complex care situation. It can take weeks or months for an employee to find a provider, understand care options, or plan for a parent who lives in another state. Utilization doesn’t capture important measures, such as how much time was saved, or what the support meant to the employee.
For a better picture, Hylant looked at several other measures of its program:
| Measure | Hylant result | What it shows |
| Program activity | 193 cases created | How often employees reached out for support |
| Needs supported | 548 unique needs | The range of support employees sought |
| Employee-reported time saved | 100% of surveyed members | Whether the benefit saved employees work time |
| Member experience | 87 NPS | How members rated their experience |
| Return on investment | 2x | The financial return Hylant experienced |
When reviewing benefit data, consider what each measure counts and what period it covers before comparing results.
Look at what employees needed
The types of needs employees bring to a benefit can show whether it addresses the challenges they’re facing.
At Hylant, 74% of cases involved adult and elder care, 23% involved pediatric care and childcare, and 3% involved education and college support. That mix reflected the same concerns employees had raised in surveys and conversations with HR, managers, and senior leaders.
Hylant’s cases remained open for an average of 69 days. That context shows caregiving support may involve multiple questions and decisions over time, rather than a single request.
Pair the numbers with employees’ experiences
Employee feedback can help explain what a metric looks like in someone’s day-to-day life.
One Hylant employee sought help after her brother, who lived in another state, began experiencing symptoms that resembled Parkinson’s disease. Her Coach, a registered nurse, helped her understand possible next steps and available resources. She could return with new questions without having to explain the situation from the beginning.
Another employee used Cariloop while searching for childcare. She described the relief of explaining what her family needed and having a Coach take on the research.
Stories like this give life to survey results. They show how guidance and continued support can ease the time and effort involved in navigating care.
Include financial return, but keep it in context
Return on investment (ROI) helps you explain the financial case for a benefit. It doesn’t replace what you learn from employee feedback, the needs supported, and the experience of using the program.
For Hylant, the reported 2x return was one part of a broader picture that included program activity and relevance, employee-reported time saved, and member experience.
For a framework on assessing caregiving benefit ROI, see Three Ways to Measure the ROI of Family Caregiving Benefits.
Pay attention to how employees find the benefit
Hylant featured Cariloop in its monthly well-being newsletter and across internal channels. Regular communication helped employees understand that the benefit could support more than one kind of care. Over time, employees began recommending it to coworkers.
Alongside a 15% year-over-year increase in employees creating cases and a 10% increase in new cases, these peer recommendations suggest growing awareness of and confidence in the benefit.
That alone doesn’t prove the benefit changed workplace culture. But it can help you understand whether employees know where to turn and feel comfortable telling others about the support.
How can employers measure caregiving benefits beyond utilization?
To understand the full impact of a caregiver support benefit, pair utilization with measures of what employees sought, what changed, and how the investment performed. Hylant’s experience shows how program activity, the mix of needs, feedback, and financial return add context. Be clear about what each measure represents so you can see not only whether employees used the benefit, but what the support helped them do.
Read more about how Hylant turned a family-first value into measurable caregiver support.
Want to understand how caregiving support could fit your workforce? Talk with the Cariloop team.