Tech loves a perk, but few go this far. Rilla, an AI startup that makes coaching software for sales teams, spends about $1.7m a year on housing stipends so staff can live near its New York office, Fortune reports. The trade-off is a 72-hour week.
Employees who live within a 10-minute bike ride of the Williamsburg office get an $18,000 annual housing stipend. About 80% take it. That helps in a neighbourhood where a studio rents for around $4,000 a month.
Flow, not comfort
Chief executive Sebastian Jimenez frames the spending as focus, not indulgence. “We’re not trying to coddle people,” he told Business Insider. “A lot of companies offer perks that end up distracting employees. We ask ourselves, ‘Can this help someone get into the flow?'”
That logic runs through the rest of the package. Rilla pays for three meals a day and is building a gym with a sauna and cold plunge. It even hired a Harvard healthy-buildings expert to pick an office with ventilation that aids concentration.
