Are Our Benefit Programs Meeting Our Employee Needs?

As we approach the season for employees to make changes to their benefit plans, progressive Human Resource departments may want to ask is:  Are our new benefit programs meeting the needs of our diverse workforce?

Open Enrollment is usually a once per year event when employees of US-based companies and not-for-profit organizations may make additions, changes or deletions to their elected benefit plans.   During this period an employer will typically communicate to all eligible employees what options will become available.  Once the changes have been communicated to the eligible employees, Human Resources will implement the changes as well as ensure that all employees understand what has changed for them and their eligible dependents.

For Human Resources departments across the country it can often be a very stressful time; however, one way to mitigate the stress is to find out ahead of time what employees are looking for in their benefits.  Would they prefer to contribute more to their plans to have more choice or security?  Would employees like to see a cafeteria program made available to them?  Is higher co-pay more acceptable versus an increase in the employee premium contribution?  These types of questions can only be answered if you ask your employees ahead of the open enrollment season.

An easy way to discover what your employees want is to ask them by way of a targeted benefits survey.  This type of surveys allows employees to provide feedback with respect to future benefits and allows them to be a part of the process.