I’ll let you in on a little secret: I’ve always been a bit of a rebel at heart. So when I met Debra Corey — consultant speaker, bestselling author, and people leader — I was thrilled to find out she feels the same way.

“I’ve been in HR my entire career,” Corey says, summarizing her past 20+ years.

“I was an HR leader in lots of different organizations. And then I moved into my rebellious phase, where I started really trying to challenge and do things differently. And that moved me into my pay-it-forward phase where I’m still doing that. I’m still shaking things up, but I’m doing it in a more intentional and proactive way.”

For Corey, HR is second nature. She provides consulting services, is a frequent keynote speaker, and has published six books on industry topics. And on the latest episode of our monthly podcast ‘Getting Personal,’ she gave me an inside look at how HR teams can stay flexible to take care of their people in the best way possible. 

Walk through Corey’s career milestones where she’s taken risks to provide her people with better benefits — and learn how you can, too. 

Making an impact with flexible benefits

We all have our own story of our ‘rebellious’ moment (think: sneaking out of the house in high school). I wanted to hear from Corey an experiment she risked because she thought it could positively change company culture. 

“I was doing a review of our global benefit programs at a company [via] focus groups. Every single focus group talked about wellbeing — but everybody had a different thing written on their card. That’s where we came up with the idea of a wellbeing allowance.” 

The wellbeing allowance was a specific sum of money (around $500 annually) based on employees’ locations that could be used on ‘anything’ that could improve overall wellbeing. Employees simply had to provide their goal, how they would reach it, and the cost of the chosen activity or equipment.

Corey was nervous to let employees use their allowance on whatever they wanted. But after all, she had just co-written a book called ‘The Rebel Playbook.’ So, she decided: “I’m going to be a real rebel. I’m going to say, you know what, you can do whatever you want to do.”

Corey did put up some guardrails by having all employee requests come through her for approval. And in the end, her gamble panned out. In fact, the impact lasted well after she was gone. 

By listening to people and implementing a scalable, supportive program, Corey is still making a major impact in this company, even long after she’s left. The wellbeing allowance supports employees on whatever unique journey they’re on. And we’re not surprised: Health and wellness stipends continue to be one of our most popular employee stipend categories among our Compt customers, offering employees ultimate flexibility in how they live their best lives.

A small ‘rebellious’ choice for a major positive impact.

Flipping the script on employee recognition 

Is recognition a form of rebellion? At first glance, you might not think so. But so many companies are slacking with employee recognition — often without even realizing it — that it could take a little rebellion to get there.

Many times, recognition in the workplace takes a top-down approach. 

“Why are we spending all of our recognition money on the top 3-5% of our people?” asks Corey, who has written two books on employee recognition. “Why can’t I spread it like peanut butter across all the other people who are doing great things?”

Debra’s recognition pyramid does exactly this, with four levels to show the different types of employee recognition employers can offer at their organization.

Psst: We have more employee recognition ideas in our blog post with 9+ examples to create a culture of appreciation. 

65% of employees say they haven’t received any form of recognition from their employer within the past year. And it’s just common sense that if people don’t feel appreciated, they aren’t going to stick around. I clearly remember my college job at a shoe store, where my manager saddled me with the type of responsibilities that would be handled by an assistant manager — but when someone new started, she gave them the assistant manager position instead. I quit a couple of days later. 

Corey believes the informal side of recognition (what is often called peer-to-peer recognition) is more important than we know. Formal recognition programs created by HR are great. But often, the informal things — “how you develop your people, how you promote your people” — are what stick with us long into the future (for better or for worse, like my shoe-shelving fail).

Start with these simple free or low-cost ideas for recognition:

• Create a dedicated Slack channel for shout-outs 
• Highlight employees on social media
• Allow employees to give each other a small monetary peer bonus 

(Even better: Let us work with you to create a turnkey, tax-compliant rewards and recognition program for your people!)

Providing personalized flexibility 

As Corey and I wrapped up our conversation, I asked her about what she’d learned about trust and flexibility in the workplace and how she’d seen these ideals evolve over time.

“How critical they are,” was her immediate answer. Years ago, Corey found herself stuck in a situation where she wanted to run focus groups about benefit programs. 

“That’s what I pay you to do,” her boss said to her. Corey’s leadership team didn’t think that employees ever needed to be involved in benefit planning.

That voice stuck in Corey’s head for a long time. But now she counters: Why wouldn’t you do this? We need to leverage employees’ fresh ideas and thoughts. As HR, our employees are our ‘customers,’ and they’re going to help make our ‘product’ better.

This is especially true, Corey says, when it comes to flexibility. For employees, flexibility drives engagement. But flexibility also means something different for everyone — the ability to work from home because of chronic illness for one person, the ability to come into the office to escape a challenging home situation for someone else. The solution? Once again, listening to your employees. 

Throughout her career, Corey has been a rebel for a cause: making a difference in people’s lives. And she’s succeeded. A few months ago, someone commented on her social media, saying they remembered Corey — that she’d encouraged them to join the company’s 401K back when they were 21 years old. And they were so thankful she had done that.

“We have ripple effects that we don’t even know we’re causing in HR. And that’s what makes it such a gratifying field to be in,” Corey says. And since I’ve started speaking with HR leaders all over the world, I just have to say: We see you, and we truly appreciate you.  

Take care of your people with Compt

Data from our 2025 Annual Benchmark Report backs up Corey’s emphasis on flexibility. For example, employees love the broad choices they get from Lifestyle Spending Accounts (LSAs): All-inclusive LSAs have the highest utilization rate among stipend programs at 85%. That’s almost 15% higher than programs that don’t include an LSA.

At Compt, we’re here to help you design programs that make your people feel recognized, valued, and supported, both at work and in their personal lives. And if that takes a little rebellion, well… so be it. 

Compt’s employee stipend software equips your HR team with everything you need to support your employees. Enjoy a flexible reimbursement system, low-effort employee recognition features, streamlined expenses management, and other valuable features. Learn more by scheduling a demo today.