Welfare: flexibility is the most hotly debated issue within the company

Whilst the development of corporate welfare is one of the main ways of restoring workers’ purchasing power – the latest Istat figures show a 0.9 per cent decline in the second quarter compared with the previous one – and providing them with social protection, it must be said that, in nearly seven out of ten cases, these measures are not yet part of a structured system. Initiatives are being implemented on an ad hoc basis, focusing only on specific areas, without an overarching strategy. The positive aspect is that nearly six in ten company agreements mention welfare; the less positive aspect is that only 10 per cent of these agreements achieve a level of integrated welfare across all areas – ranging from employment-related benefits such as welfare credits, vouchers and recreational activities, to company-provided facilities such as canteens, transport, flexibility, training, and staff-related aspects such as health, pensions, care, and education. Among the measures, those relating to work-life balance predominate, featuring in over 40 per cent of agreements, whilst those concerning the care and support of family members, such as elderly parents, remain scarce, appearing in just over 5 per cent of agreements. However, demographic ageing and profound social changes require an effort to adapt the agreements to new needs, as revealed by these figures contained in the ninth Adapt-Intesa Sanpaolo report, which will be presented on 27 October in Milan and of which we are providing a preview. Produced under the scientific coordination of Professor Michele Tiraboschi, the report analysed 428 company agreements signed in 2025, which are included in the FareContrattazione database and were assessed using a new indicator: the Adapt Welfare Index for Intesa Sanpaolo.

The outlook set out in the Report is to move beyond a view of welfare as merely the distribution of benefits or a tool for tax optimisation. According to Adapt’s president, Francesco Seghezzi, ‘corporate welfare is now an established part of our industrial relations, but the findings of this Report show us that its widespread adoption does not necessarily mean it is able to meet workers’ needs. Demographic, social and organisational changes in the world of work pose new challenges, ranging from work-life balance to caring for family members, right through to housing difficulties’. Tiziana Lamberti, Head of Sales & Marketing for Wealth Management & Protection at Banca dei Territori Intesa Sanpaolo, adds that the report forms part of a series of initiatives by the Intesa Sanpaolo Group to “promote supplementary welfare as a driver of well-being and social inclusion. Through Welfare Hub, the digital platform for designing corporate welfare programmes, the group has already supported around 6,000 corporate clients in implementing services dedicated to their employees. The offering includes solutions ranging from healthcare to wellbeing and leisure initiatives, helping to improve people’s quality of life’.

This report comes 10 years on from the 2016 Stability Law, which strengthened tax and social security incentives for workplace welfare schemes. In taking stock of this decade, it is certainly worth highlighting the cost-effectiveness brought about by these incentives, which has accelerated the wider uptake of workplace welfare schemes. Already well-established, particularly in national collective bargaining, bilateral agreements and health and pension funds – especially in larger companies and more structured manufacturing sectors – employee welfare programmes have suffered, and continue to suffer, from a certain lack of uptake in small businesses and sectors characterised by irregular employment relationships. The risk identified by the Report is that, rather than helping to reduce inequalities, it may end up exacerbating those that already exist between workers in different companies, sectors and regions.

Of the 428 agreements, 253 – or 59.1 per cent – contain at least one provision relating to welfare. There are 219 agreements containing specific measures that can be effectively assessed using the Index created by Adapt for Intesa Sanpaolo: these agreements contain a total of 718 instances of benefits. There is a significant gap between the prevalence of welfare provisions and their integration into the system. More than half of the assessable agreements (51.1 per cent) fall into the category of unstructured welfare, and 13.2 per cent into that of minimal welfare. 15.1 per cent feature developed or structured welfare, and only 10 per cent reach the highest level, that of integrated welfare. An analysis of goods and services also confirms this fragmentation: in 63.5 per cent of the agreements, the measures are concentrated in one of the three areas considered by the research, namely occupational welfare, corporate welfare and personal welfare. Only 17.4 per cent cover all three. Statistically, the survey cannot be considered representative of the entire field of company-level collective bargaining; however, the 428 agreements constitute a highly significant sample, constructed in a manner representative of the sectors and company sizes involved.

An analysis of the agreements reveals that work-life balance is undoubtedly the priority in company agreements: measures relating to this area, such as flexible working arrangements, are in fact included in 41.1 per cent of cases. This is followed by supplementary pension schemes (36.5 per cent), canteens and meal vouchers (29.2 per cent), time off (28.8 per cent), welfare credits (28.3 per cent), supplementary healthcare (26.9 per cent) and leave and sabbaticals (26.5 per cent). The aim is not merely to increase the number of benefits on offer, but to ‘build welfare systems that are more integrated, accessible and capable of supporting people through the different stages of life. From this perspective, collective bargaining, bilateralism and collaboration between businesses and local institutions can play a fundamental role, helping to improve the quality of work and reduce inequalities between workers and regions’, adds Seghezzi