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Worker advantages play an enormous role in attracting, engaging, and retaining talent. In accordance with an article in Forbes, 60% of employees say that advantages are extremely or very vital when considering whether to stick with their current employer.
Choosing advantages might be difficult. What I mean by that’s there are some advantages almost everyone wants (example: healthcare) but other advantages is perhaps desired by a smaller percentage of the workforce – like pet insurance. It doesn’t mean that it’s not vital but not everyone has a pet.
If a corporation desires to offer advantages that plenty of employees want … but possibly not everyone wants … voluntary advantages may very well be an option.
To assist us understand more about voluntary advantages, I spoke with Heather Garbers, CVBS, senior vice chairman of voluntary advantages and technology for HUB International. Heather is accountable for driving voluntary advantages sales and strategy. She can be accountable for partnering with clients to construct optimal enrollment and communications solutions that enhance worker understanding of and engagement in voluntary plan options.
Heather, thanks for being here. Let’s start with a definition. What are voluntary advantages?
[Garbers] Voluntary advantages is a broad term that refers to non-core insurance offerings corresponding to life, disability, critical illness, accident insurance, hospital indemnity, legal services, identity theft protection, pet, student loan services, early wage access, and more.
While a few of these plans could also be employer-paid, they’re traditionally voluntary/employee-paid plans that allow individuals to tailor their advantages to their unique needs.
What’s the advantage – to organizations and individuals – of offering voluntary advantages?
[Garbers] These offerings are gaining popularity as employees increasingly view their employers as trusted sources for comprehensive advantages that support their financial, mental, and physical well-being. For workers, purchasing these advantages through the workplace often provides access to group rates, group underwriting, and plan designs or coverage options not available individually.
For employers, voluntary advantages provide a value neutral and useful solution to stand out in a competitive job market by addressing the various needs, goals, and life stages of today’s workforce – while showing they care about their wellbeing. Maximizing return-on-investment (ROI) requires a consultative, educational approach, as many employees remain unfamiliar with these offerings. Clear, accessible communication is important to drive awareness and enrollment.
In your definition, you listed several kinds of voluntary advantages. Are you able to elaborate on a few of the more popular ones?
[Garbers] Pet insurance is currently essentially the most often requested voluntary profit amongst employees. Nonetheless, a lot of our clients at the moment are selecting to integrate accident, critical illness, and hospital indemnity coverage into their core advantages strategy. These advantages help employees manage unexpected out-of-pocket medical costs and ensure access to essential care.
Interest can be growing in non-traditional advantages like legal services and identity theft protection, which provide multi-generational appeal, cost-savings, and services that enhance overall worker well-being.
If organizations are inquisitive about offering voluntary advantages, how do they discover what employees want?
[Garbers] Your advantages consultant must have access to specialists that may evaluate your current advantages offerings, worker demographics, and benchmarking data, to discover voluntary advantages options that complement your advantages strategy and address any gaps in coverage. They may also help design worker surveys or implement focus groups to assist higher understand which advantages your employees value most.
Last query, once organizations do their internal research and know what kinds of voluntary advantages they’d prefer to offer, how can an insurance broker help with implementation?
[Garbers} A advantages consultant can work with you as a trusted partner throughout implementation—managing the quoting and evaluation, providing recommendations that align along with your technology and administrative needs, and ensuring the most effective worker experience. They may also support you with education and enrollment strategies, easing the load of communicating recent profit options to your employees.
My due to Heather and the HUB International team for sharing their knowledge with us. If you wish to learn more about voluntary advantages, take a look at this text on “4 Steps to Using Advantages Data Smarter to Create Voluntary Advantages”. It will probably help create a place to begin to explore what employees want.
There’s plenty of conversation in today’s business world about working smarter and being more productive. This often comes with asking employees to “do more with less”. And employees are willing to work hard. But additionally they expect to have an worker value proposition that aligns with their worker experience. Worker advantages are an element of that complete package.
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