The answer to that question is “maybe not.” About half of all employees don’t understand their benefits. When you think about it, that’s not really all that surprising. Let’s call it like it is…our healthcare system is overly complex. Based on the Global Brand Simplicity Index, healthcare ranks last (yes, LAST) in simplicity across 25 different industries and the large health insurance companies hold three of the bottom five spots. Yikes!
This is why it’s so important to not only have a benefits communication strategy, but also an understandable one! When we boil it down, employee engagement is the most critical part for employees to understand their benefits. We need to help simplify everything for the employee.
And just to address the elephant in the room, we understand…getting engagement on healthcare topics and benefits can be incredibly challenging. In fact, the top challenges with benefits communications are:
- 80% of participants don’t open/read materials.
- 49% of participants don’t understand materials.
- 31% of participants don’t perceive value in their benefits.
It’s really an uphill battle. So, what can you do? Mark Fitzgibbons, a colleague of mine, recently wrote a blog on keeping communication plans simple for your employees…and this definitely applies to benefits communications. I encourage you to check it out!
We also have staff members on hand to help out with this very thing. Let us know what your challenges are, and we’ll work together to find a solution!
