Employees are skimping on supplemental health benefits. Here’s what employers can do

As healthcare has evolved, so have supplemental health benefit offerings.

While traditional supplemental benefits — dental, group term life insurance and short-term disability — serve a critical role in helping attract and retain top talent, additional health-related benefits, such as accidental injury, critical-illness and hospital care, can be a unique differentiator in employer benefit plans.

Increasingly, employers are finding ways to pair these benefits with a medical plan, which can offer out-of-pocket protection for employees.

But a recent Cigna study found that employees may not understand the value of supplemental health coverage. Many don’t know they can use added insurance protection to cover both medical and non-medical costs, such as childcare, transportation and other out-of-pocket and living expenses. In fact, the study found just 34% of individuals enrolled in employer-offered benefits say they would call on these offerings to cover non-medical expenses due to a serious injury or illness, compared with 49% who would use their savings, 32% who would use a credit card and 22% who would borrow from retirement savings.

The good news is that roughly half of employees who aren’t currently enrolled in critical illness, hospital indemnity or accidental injury coverage say they would do so after learning more about their benefits from their employer. More than one-third say they would spend time understanding these coverage options during this enrollment season.

So, what can employers do to prepare for open enrollment in the not-too-distant future? How can they equip their employees with the resources they need to understand the full value of their supplemental health benefits? Below are three critical steps to ensure enrollment success.

Ensure an active annual enrollment. Encouraging employees to consider a new benefit offering is best when the enrollment period is active. Active enrollment requires workers to select or decline coverage, regardless of their benefits from the previous year. Requiring the employee to make a proactive decision is a catalyst for the worker to seek information about the benefit before making a decision.

Conducting an active annual enrollment is also beneficial, as people’s lives change from year to year. For example, if an employee has a child who plays sports, it might be wise to enroll in an accidental injury policy, should they encounter an unplanned injury.

Start early and keep the enrollment process simple. Start planning for open enrollment early. That way all benefits offered by an employer are integrated. For the best employee enrollment experience, it’s important that supplemental health benefits are on the same platform and offered at the same time as medical enrollment.

Don’t forget that tracking enrollment metrics, successes and challenges year-over-year is also very important. Establish a baseline to help create a complete set of success metrics for the upcoming open enrollment season. Information gathered at that time can be used to assess what to prepare for the upcoming enrollment period. Employers should plan a multi-year enrollment strategy, thus promoting enrollment growth using metric-supported best practices, year-over-year.

Communicate clearly. Clear communication and benefits education is perhaps the most important step. This is critical prior to the enrollment period, especially for supplemental health benefits. Consider hosting mandatory meetings to encourage employees to learn more about what is available to them. Provide benefits information in digestible bites using simplified language and tailor open enrollment messages to various employee locations — office, home or in the field — to ensure the content resonates with their differing individual and family needs.

While supplemental health benefits play a critical role in a holistic benefits strategy, the opportunity remains to raise awareness among employees. Employers must continue to help them understand the overall value of supplemental health plans well-ahead-of and during open enrollment. This will ensure employees have the appropriate financial, emotional and physical support should they encounter a potentially challenging scenario.

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Dear Fellow Floridians,

With peak hurricane season just two months away, the state launched an initiative to encourage Floridians to prepare now before a hurricane makes landfall. The initiative will focus on taking simple steps to prepare your home and finances for a disaster.

While Floridians know all too well the devastation hurricanes can have on their lives, it’s easy to not take the threat seriously. An active hurricane season is predicted, with the possibility of up to four major hurricanes. As we saw with Hurricane Michael, hurricanes can form and strengthen quickly, leaving little time to prepare and evacuate.

The time is now to prepare and protect your home and business. The state launched Prepare Florida to empower Floridians with information and resources so they can get ready for the next major storm that takes aim at the Sunshine State.

Visit the PrepareFL.com website for one-stop disaster preparedness information and resources.
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- Doug Myrick

I Want Leads Like I Want My Morning Coffee

When I was an agency producer, I wanted leads like I wanted my morning coffee. I craved them and sometimes could not function well without them. The only problem was – most of the leads that came across my desk were a waste of time.

“Doug – Call my buddy Bob. He needs insurance for his business. 555-1212. He is expecting your call.”

Um, ok. What does Bob need? Is he in-profile? Is he calling every agency in town? Who knows.

So, I would call. Maybe find out he needs insurance because he was cancelled for non-pay or losses. Maybe find out he doesn’t have a business, just an idea that he is researching. Maybe have a great conversation, get a competitive quote, only to find out he won’t leave his current agent. Rarely did a “lead” from someone within my agency or my professional network result in a sale.

Fortunately my sales and marketing methodology has matured over time. I no longer want leads – although I crave coffee more than ever. (working on my 2nd cup this morning) Now I only pursue prospects in my target profile. I only make warm calls. I only talk to people that have a level of interest in my organization’s solutions and that I know I can help.

How? Highly targeted prospect lists, eMarketing, seminars and warm calls. No more chasing bad leads – only chasing quality prospects identified through an integrated marketing strategy.

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- Doug Myrick

Inspiration low? Get the fire back

Are you inspired at work? If not, you run the risk of career deterioration and burnout. To get the fire back in your work—and your life—try some of these tricks:

• Help other people. One way to find inspiration for yourself is to help other people find theirs. Stretch them with demanding assignments, challenge them to learn new skills, prepare them for the future—and look for ways to do the same yourself.

• Take some initiative. Don’t wait passively for things to happen. Look for opportunities to start projects, make changes, and influence the people around you.

• Look for learning experiences. Take a class; go to a museum; learn a new sport. Open yourself to new experiences that can open your mind to the world around you.

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“Please think about your legacy, because you’re writing it every day.”  -Gary Vaynerchuck 

The Secret to Better Employee Recruitment

Rumors of a talent shortage. High turnover rates?

While there is some debate over the cause, one thing is for sure: companies are having an increasingly difficult time finding and hiring employees. This has put many business owners in a constant hiring cycle to keep fully staffed – a process that can be both time consuming and expensive.

Many companies have tried raising their pay and offering sign-on bonuses, which while attractive to employees, isn’t always enough to get high-quality staff on board for the long haul. After all, if everyone is offering these perks as part of the recruiting process, it’s no longer an exclusive offer – rather, it becomes an expected part of the onboarding package.

Instead, recruiting and retention experts have suggested something they feel is much more important when it comes to hiring and keeping employees: the ability to empathize with their needs as an employee. By taking the time to truly understand their concerns – and create recruiting campaigns that speak directly to them – you’ll be better able to attract the interests of employees who are looking for a long-term career opportunity with a company that values them as both employees and people.

Positioning Yourself as a People-Centric Company

Browse a few of the popular online job boards, and you’ll notice that most ads talk specifically about the company and their needs – instead of the needs of their prospective employees. And while this is important information to include, it can be conveyed more effectively by flipping the language so that it resonates more deeply with prospects.

Before you start writing, here are a few things to consider:

• What are the core issues your employees care about? Typically, it’s things like compensation, operations and training that pop to the top of the list. If you don’t know for sure, then ask for feedback from your current employees. Exit interview data and online reviews on Glassdoor and Indeed (for example), can also be very insightful in learning what employees like about your company – and what they don’t.
• Is the language in your ads reflecting those issues? Sell employees on your company by writing job ads that reflect the things they care about – particularly in terms of their quality of life.

Lastly, it’s one thing to position yourself as a people-centric company, and quite another to embody those values. If you want to recruit and retain the best talent, you need to make sure your ads don’t just sound good, but that they’re an accurate reflection of your company culture. By being fully transparent throughout the hiring and onboarding process, you’ll set honest expectations for employees about what it’s like to work for your company – which will go a long way towards keeping them with you and growing your business.  

- Doug Myrick

Here’s how to ensure employees know how to pick the right benefits

Annual enrollment is an important time for employees — but it’s also a stressful one. The choices they make can affect their financial health, yet the average employee spends less than 30 minutes selecting their benefits, according to research from benefits provider Unum.

With annual enrollment planning underway, now is the time for employers to ask themselves, “How can we help employees make the right benefits decisions?” The answers may be more valuable than they think.

Today’s workforce is the most diverse in history, with four generations actively working, and a fifth connected through benefits and pensions. A robust benefits package is increasingly important for recruitment and retention, challenging employers to provide choices and options that support diverse needs.

About 80% of employees prefer a job with benefits over one with a higher salary but no benefits, according to the American Institute of CPAs. As such it’s vital that employers ensure their workforce is engaged with their benefits and taking full advantage of what is available. Here are five ways employers can make sure that happens.

1. Acknowledge that decision support addresses personalized needs. Tools that demystify the benefits selection process can help employees make choices that align with their risk tolerance, financial circumstances and unique needs. The best tools lead employees to a recommended suite of benefits options that fit their individual physical, emotional and financial health.

2. Know that year-round engagement improves benefits literacy. While employees appreciate benefits, they aren’t experts. Indeed, roughly one-third of employees are outright confused about their benefits, according to recent data from Businessolver. Keeping up a cadence of communication about benefits throughout the year can help address this challenge.

3. Recognize the power of a total rewards statement. It empowers employees to maximize the benefits available to them, and these tools can be accessed any time, not just during enrollment. The most impactful solutions aggregate all employee benefits options in one integrated offering that demonstrates the full value of compensation and benefits investments made by them and their employer.

4. Think about different generations. Customizable benefits options are a crucial step in meeting the needs of today’s workforce. For example, our latest data shows that nearly two-thirds of millennials are concerned with managing their monthly budget, while over 50% of boomers are most worried about a large, unexpected cost. Having core medical plan offerings along with complementary voluntary options helps employees address varying financial needs. Likewise, paid parental leave and different health plan options assist families at any stage, and they make it likelier that your employees will engage with their benefits and remain with your organization.

5. Be sure employees know that savings vehicles contribute to financial well-being. Employees of all ages and income levels are facing financial stressors — but they may not be the same ones. Offering different financial benefits, such as student loan assistance and emergency savings accounts, in addition to retirement benefits, enables your employees to address both their immediate and long-term financial needs.

More than ever, employers have a responsibility to help employees make informed decisions when it comes to selecting the right benefits. Otherwise, they risk losing top talent to organizations that are better implementing benefits strategies and technologies.

By meeting the needs of a diverse workforce with an array of benefits options supported by appropriate decision support resources, employers can ensure they’re meeting their workforce’s needs and retaining valuable employees.

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5 Injury Prevention Tools Desk Workers Can Use

Pro-gamers and office computer users have more in common than you'd think — at least in their injury risk profiles. One surgeon is sharing tools that will help them both.

VIDEO: Dr. Levi Harrison’s advice for pro-gamers can also help reduce injury risk for any computer user.

1) Basic stretches: Pointing your arms out straight, flex the wrist either upward or downward, and pulling back gently on the hand, holding for 30 seconds.

2) Queen’s Wave: Keeping your arms extended, fingers pointed upwards, shake the wrist back and forth 10 times. For fuller motion, you can also rotate your hands in a circle, 10 times in each direction, with a fist or an open hand.

3) Wrist Rotations: Rotate your fist or your open hand 10 times in each direction.

4) Gliding exercises: Harrison developed a specific set of movements that target both nerves and tendons in the hand, designed to prevent carpal tunnel issues. The four-part move involves holding the fist in a claw position, a “tabletop position,” a half-fist and a full fist.

5) A Dose of Warmth: Harrison encourages people to run warm water over their hands or wrists periodically, just to keep things loose.

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