Kelsey Rolfe

Plan sponsors encouraged to use benefits for preventative health care: 2024 BCHS report launch

Canadian benefits plan sponsors are increasingly seeking to balance providing competitive benefits against plan sustainability issues, said expert panellists during the launch event for the 2024 Benefits Canada Healthcare Survey last week. Andrea Belvedere (pictured right), assistant vice-president of health benefits and solutions at Sun Life, said plan sponsors are starting to ask more questions […]

  • September 24, 2024 September 23, 2024
  • 09:00

2023 Healthy Outcomes Conference: A closer look at the mental, physical, financial risk factors facing plan members

Many plan members are experiencing risk factors related to poor mental, physical and financial well-being, but often don’t know they can turn to their benefits plans for help. Indeed, when Canada Life’s disability claims report asked plan members going on disability whether they sought out counselling through their benefits plans, more than half said they […]

  • November 20, 2023 November 15, 2023
  • 07:58

How are pandemic reverberations affecting disability management programs, workplace accommodations?

About a year before the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, Algonquin College updated its disability management program. The timing set the Ottawa-based college up for success when the crisis hit, says Jessica Myers, its acting manager of wellness and abilities, allowing her team to focus on proactive supports, knowing case management was well in hand. […]

  • November 17, 2023 November 16, 2023
  • 08:54

2023 Consultants Report: How are consultants helping plan sponsors make the most of their benefits, retirement data?

In 2022, Xero sent out a global survey to all of its employees asking them to rank the most important components of its total rewards program, from time off to flexible working policies, salaries to employee benefits. The software company’s Canadian employees ranked health benefits as one of the most important aspects of total rewards. […]

  • August 11, 2023 August 10, 2023
  • 08:56

2023 Top 40 Money Managers Report: Using tools, technology to improve asset allocation, risk management

Large and small, pension plan sponsors are adopting in-house tools, partnering with technology research institutes or relying on investment managers for technological support with asset allocation, risk management and other aspects of investment management. The growing interest coincides with an increasingly complex investment, demographic and regulatory landscape. A 2020 Deloitte report on the importance of […]

  • May 12, 2023 May 15, 2023
  • 08:56

2022 Healthy Outcomes Conference: Centering employee well-being in return-to-office plans

After two and a half years of coronavirus pandemic-induced remote work, employers are attempting to bring employees back to the office, but many are failing to do so in a way that supports employees’ mental well-being and takes their desire for work-life balance into account, according to Linda Duxbury, a professor at Carleton University’s Sprott […]

  • December 16, 2022 December 12, 2022
  • 07:59

2022 Mental Health Summit: Examining the connection between gut health and mental health

Nutrition is a major factor in gut and digestive health, which impacts brain and mental health and overall well-being, said Heather Barnes, a registered dietitian at Shoppers Drug Mart, during Benefits Canada’s 2022 Mental Health Summit in November. Making healthy eating less stressful and more accessible to employees could help reduce stress and improve their […]

  • December 9, 2022 December 6, 2022
  • 07:55

2022 DCIF: How Saskatchewan’s PEPP is adding alternative investments to its DC plan portfolios

When Saskatchewan’s Public Employees Pension Plan decided to make investments in alternative assets, it took a defined benefit approach to its defined contribution pension plan, giving its members access to private equity and infrastructure while still offering daily liquidity. The strategy was fitting, given the PEPP’s companion DB plan, the Municipal Employees Pension Plan, had […]

  • October 17, 2022 October 17, 2022
  • 07:53

Employees with chronic diseases, caregiver responsibilities often shouldering invisible burden

Kristy Dickinson woke up on a recent Monday unable to move her body. The delay waiting for medication and a heating pad to kick in threw off her morning routine and a flare-up of gastrointestinal symptoms forced her to reschedule back-to-back work meetings. She wasn’t able to get her work done until later in the […]

  • March 7, 2022 March 3, 2022
  • 07:53

The importance of early intervention for employees with multiple sclerosis

People living with multiple sclerosis can continue to thrive in the workforce with early access to specialists in the disease and accommodations that give them control over their work environment. “MS really has a pretty broad impact on affected individuals’ health system and [on] society,” said Ruth Ann Marrie, professor of medicine and community health […]

  • March 7, 2022 March 3, 2022
  • 07:52