5 Ways To Help Your Employees Prioritise Their Health & Financial Well-Being

5 Ways To Help Your Employees Prioritise Their Health & Financial Well-Being

As the line has been blurred between work and life, so too has the responsibility of employers to be effective managers and to provide employee experiences that are engaging and enriching.

The part that benefits teams play in your employees’ work experience has evolved over the years to keep up with the changing health and retirement plans.

Over the last few decades, employer-sponsored benefits have become more and more common. Presently, employees are expected to manage their health care costs and retirement savings.

But is this likely to remain the case forever? These are the 5 ways to help your employees prioritise their health & financial well-being.

The importance of behavioural change

In the past, the primary focus for the benefits teams was to show how the benefits work. With the stewardship roles that employers play, they currently focus on influencing their employees’ behaviours. They encourage them to strive to be financially secure by embracing the culture or wise money investment and saving.

However, behavioural scientists have done studies that show people do not always act in their own best interest. It is hard for a person to make sound decisions, especially when they are unable to identify the experience they will have based on the choice they make.

Such focus on behavioural change is what’s driving the transformation that health and retirement programs what to achieve. Departments are banding together to come up with ways of helping employees fully realise the gain of their benefits, and this, in turn, helps the employees feel valued and appreciated. As a result, concerns about health and wealth have become intertwined.

Therefore, banding the two will help employers aid their works to navigate the at times tough waters of health and retirement benefits. And the glue that binds the two things is the advocacy for maintaining well-being.

1 – Give the staff permission to make time for their well-being

Taking care of staff welfare; be it re-evaluating investments to adjusting lunch breaks to go for a walk, takes time. As the objective is finding ways of taking time for your staff, you have to factor in their current demands for time. This may include meetings, deadlines and different things that cannot be overlooked.

Allowing time doesn’t have to come at a cost to your business. According to the health and wellness experts from Proactiv Health, “letting your staff know it is OK to take some time to focus on themselves can be through different things such as giving them some time off work, offering flu shots, and even routine financial check-ups. Small gestures can create major positive changes in staff health and wellbeing.”

Such measures will go a long way in helping your workers secure their finances and health. Make sure that you and your management team have the necessary resources that will not only see you promote and encourage your employees but also have you participating actively in the programs you lay down.

2 – Take a holistic approach to your wellness strategy

Map out your campaign from the very start and do this annually to ensure that every plan aligns with desired objectives and takes into account the employees’ mindsets.

Help your staff to boost their superannuation input if needed, especially on months when they are more focused on spending and gifting. Help them re-evaluate their financial journey throughout the year so that they can know how to realign their expenditure based on their needs.

3 – Nudge employees with frequent outreach

Statistics show that health and financial literacy rates are astonishingly wanting, and this is a global concern.

Educating people on such matters to help improve literacy may be helpful, but studies show that broad-based education may not be a holistic answer. But even then, educating employees on health and retirement wellness will help them know where to find the resources they need for such.

According to the financial experts at Maxiron Capital, “training in financial literacy can help employees distinguish between wants and needs. While this may seem like a simple distinction, it can help create a roadmap of what employees want and how they can move towards those goals.”

Outreach also provides an avenue for repeated interactions that help develop a better and deeper understanding and appreciation for such measures. If such things are in place, then you will be supporting and aiding your workers to reap the value of the benefits programs you put in place. Therefore, remember to communicate your goals and efforts to your staff effectively. You can accomplish this using the following:

• Developing a centralised information hub online with easy access for your employees. It should be a website for your benefits teams and related programs.
• Keep your workers posted throughout the year about new programs and where they can go learn more.

4 – Be specific and targeted in your wellness communications

When trying to reshape the behaviour of your staff, you will need to review your claims information, the plan participation data, and other relevant elements.

Do this one at a time as you strive to cover every area of each program you have in place so that you collectively have a holistic, high-level strategy.  Overall, it will help you prioritise your objectives and guide your efforts.

You should benchmark the effectiveness of every campaign and evaluate its impact. It will help you determine if they are influencing the employee behaviour or if you need to switch up your tactics and approaches to ensure that your works are keen about maintaining their well-being and ready for retirement.

5 – Leverage change for maximum engagement

Lastly, remember that your workforce will be open for a re-evaluation of their benefits decisions periodically. They can focus on different things, such as professional, personal, or calendar-driven events. Use such moments as an opportunity to help them plan and design changes for:

• Life events
• Annual bonus, promotion, or salary raise periods
• Seasonal and calendar events
• New hire orientation, internal job changes, and offboarding employees
• Changes in providers, funds, or platforms

Main photo: Coworkify