The holidays are a magical time. For many of us, they offer a period of reflection, renewal and planning for the coming year. It’s a chance to ask ourselves if there’s anything we did over the past year that we can do better in the year ahead. Or, maybe there are things we didn’t get around to—things we can put on our wish list for the new year.
If you’re having trouble getting your plan members to understand and appreciate their pension benefits, ask yourself this: Do you celebrate your pension plan? Do you make it a BIG deal?
It is possible to have too much of a good thing, including communication. In fact, one of the best ways NOT to communicate is to over-communicate. Too much information can leave your employees feeling overwhelmed and confused. They may even start resisting your communication efforts—and, ultimately, tune you out altogether.
Despite the sentiment that we have entered a digitally dominant age, traditional benefits communication vehicles have not yet become obsolete.
Psst! Need to talk about pensions? Here’s how to get employees to listen.
In previous columns, I’ve talked about the importance of personalized communication—giving members the information they need, when they need it. In our information-heavy and attention-span-light world, there is a small window of opportunity to connect with your employees.
For DJ Galvanizing Corp., getting employees to take responsibility for their DC pension plan means educating them one on one
"We are trying to solve the wrong problem,” Jacqueline Taggart, associate partner and regional practice leader with Aon Hewitt, told the audience in the Getting It Right: Tailoring Benefits Plan Communications session at Benefits Canada’s Benefits &; Pension Summit in Toronto. She was talking about benefits communications and why so many plan sponsors are struggling to make members care about their plans.
A picture really is worth a thousand words. That doesn’t mean you should turn your next pension statement or benefits plan newsletter into a four-page infographic—a one-way ticket to information overload. But when it comes to communicating with your plan members, chances are you should be doing a lot more showing and a lot less telling.
If you’re not educating your employees about the cost of their group benefits plan, you’re missing an important opportunity. That’s because most plan members simply don’t appreciate the true cost of their benefits coverage—to the detriment of themselves and the organization.