Employee Benefit News

Finger on the button

2013 marks a true test of leadership for benefits professionals, particularly for employee communications.

For all you do, this Benny's for you

Now in their 22nd year, the Benny Awards recognize excellence in the employee benefits/human resources field. Awards are granted to employee benefit or human resource practitioners directly involved in the management of employee benefit programs.

Inspire new employees with a strong onboarding experience

With a fervent belief in making lasting impressions, the employee onboarding process at SAS, a business analytics company, begins the moment they accept a position. Annette V. Holesh, an HR program manager at SAS, and her HR colleagues at the North Carolina-based organization know how to engage employees from the start. And they continue to buoy their workers’ energy long after the initial onboarding process has ended.

How to Present Employee Financial-Security Benefits

Two pillars of financial security for Americans – Social Security and 401(k) savings – could come under fire as Congress moves forward with deficit reduction and tax reform. While that is a daunting prospect for workers, it might also be a defining moment for employers and advisers to explain a range of benefits such as Disability Insurance, Life, Long-Term Care and Voluntary Products, along with education, on how they contribute to financial security.

This web seminar will help employers and their advisers extend the scope of financial education and help employees maximize the full value of their benefits.

Speakers:
Rich Hunt, Director of Retirement Service at Major League Baseball
Dan McNeill, Cornerstone Broker Insurance Services and 2012 EBA Voluntary Broker of the Year
Guest Moderator:
Joe Saari, CEO, at Precision Information

Life Technologies imparts CDHP communication lessons

From old communication tactics – like the ‘porcelain press’ and benefits road shows – to new ones like blogs and social networking, Life Technologies left no medium to chance when it rolled out its full-replacement shift to a consumer-driven health plan.

HR professionals: 7 tips to get attention from C-Suite

For many human-resources professionals, getting buy-in from the C-suite can be a challenge when top-level executives are strapped for time. Further, HR and C-suite representatives communicate in fundamentally different ways. In a CareerBuilder article, Beverly Flaxington, a certified professional behavioral analyst, shares her tried-and-true tips for HR professionals to effectively communicate with executives and gain leverage to achieve their goals. [Images: Shutterstock]

The 411 on the 140

Tips for using Twitter and other social media for business communication, including benefits information.

Avoid communications problems with 2013 open enrollment

Targeting specific demographics will be critical to 2013 open enrollment communications, says Univers’ Dani McCauley. McCauley tells EBN that employers will face a challenging landscape this year communicating health care reform and other benefits changes.

2013 open enrollment may be true test for benefits communications

Communicating ahead of open enrollment is both a broader and a more specific challenge in a post-health care reform world. One expert at Univers talks about how she is prepping her clients and tips for how employers should plan.

Consulting leaders advise employers to ‘be nimble’ amid changing health care landscape

Health care consultants from Mercer, Aon Hewitt and Towers Watson offered advice at a recent National Business Group on Health event in Washington, D.C.

Obama to push health data vendors for easier records sharing

While experts once predicted savings of as much as $81 billion a year from electronic records, U.S. health care spending has continued to increase, partly because of systems that don’t share information, they say.

Benefits pro offers first-hand advice on effectively communicating CDHPs

Life Technologies, a California-based medical research and life sciences company with more than 10,000 employees, shifted its workforce to a CDHP in 2010. Benefits leader Carole Mendoza says the education and communication effort for the change ran the gamut from bathroom newsletters (the old “porcelain press”) to blogs, webinars and social networks.

Recognition programs appeal to workers’ values

Behavioral psychology plays a key role in crafting meaningful and effective employee recognition programs.

Employee questions about exchanges likely to spike

Ignorance will not be bliss come October when state and federal exchanges begin enrolling individuals and small-employer groups.

Update: Disability council reports success spreading awareness

Barry Lundquist, president of the Council for Disability Awareness, says his group has had a solid start in its effort to educate on the dangerous gaps in long-term coverage.