How much is one day of vacation worth to you?

More companies are asking workers to make that calculation with programs that allow them to cash in paid time off (PTO) for other types of benefits, such as a contribution to a retirement or education savings plan. In some cases, employees can donate their PTO to a colleague who needs it.

The popularity of so-called PTO “conversion” or “purchase” programs is growing, according to a recent report, but experts said HR teams should be thoughtful about how they implement such offerings. Employers typically put guardrails in place to ensure workers still continue to take some PTO, even if they decide not to use all of the time they’re offered.

Favoring flexibility. Ayco, a financial planning and wealth management arm of Goldman Sachs, reports that just over one-quarter of its corporate partners have a PTO purchase program allowing workers to buy and sell vacation days. The prevalence of PTO purchase programs is higher than 2021, when 21% of Ayco’s corporate partners surveyed offered this benefit. Such programs are also more popular than unlimited PTO, which is offered by 15% of Ayco’s corporate partners.

For more on PTO purchase plans and how employers are using these programs, keep reading here.—CV

Negative stereotypes about HR pros—that they’re not workers’ friends, and only exist to protect the company—seem to transcend cultures.

Those assumptions were present in India, where Siya Thakkar grew up and attended university studying psychology. While Thakkar was interested in pursuing industrial organizational psychology and studying human behavior in the workplace, she still didn’t want to go into HR. “I remember saying it to my classmates and my professors: ‘No, I don’t think HR is for me. This is not something that I want to do,’” she recalled.

It wasn’t until she was studying for her master’s degree in IO psychology at the University of Nottingham in the UK, when her professor told her she’d fit well in HR, that she thought about the function differently.

“As my degree progressed, I started to see that there’s so much more to HR, the psychological safety part of it, improving the employee experience, the culture,” she said. “And I realized that HR is not what they make it look like on the outside, and how they talk about it.”

For more on Thakkar’s path and key trends she sees affecting HR, keep reading here.—PM

While major retailers like Target and Walmart have scaled back on their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), cosmetics brand Lush temporarily renamed three of its bath bombs as “Diversity,” “Equity,” and “Inclusion,” doubling down its own commitment.

“A lot of us had a reaction, especially leading up to the executive order, where, at first it felt like it’s a shame to see, especially when we look at the power and the ability and the influence that corporations have to not just on their customers’ lives, but their staff’s lives, and the benefits that come from having an intentional, allocated DEI program on the staff experience,” Amanda Lee Sipenock Fisher, lead of Lush’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging program, told Retail Brew. “It was a really crucial moment to just reconfirm, especially in a moment of uncertainty and change to say, ‘Oh no…we’re staying the course,’ especially as those [others] are rolling back.”

She added that for the British retailer known for its handmade and cruelty-free range of bath, hair, and skin care products, diversity is part of the brand’s DNA and if anything, the executive order only encouraged the company to amp up its efforts.

For more on this company’s decision to build on its existing DEI programming, keep reading on Retail Brew.—JS