It's Time to Take Back Control of Benefits Management PRINT VERSION
Benergy Interworks is excited to introduce Benergy 360o which allows you to gain end-to-end control of the entire benefits management process – from dependent eligibility audits and a complete enrollment unit system to benefits administration support. Our comprehensive technology solutions and services are designed to help you save time, save money, and ensure compliance each step of the way.
Sign Up for Benergy 360o Now and Get an Immediate ROI Payback
When you sign up for Benergy 360o now, you’ll benefit from special package pricing and an immediate ROI payback.
Benergy 360o is available through May 31, 2011. For more information, please contact your regional sales manager or client relationship manager, or email us at benergymarketing@adam.com.
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Benergy Enhancement Notice PRINT VERSION
Benergy Interworks is planning major enhancements to Benergy Control Center.
One of the most exciting enhancements is the integration of Vertafore’s BenefitPoint application with the Benergy Communications platform which will provide a seamless, real-time transfer of client benefit details between the two applications.
Additional enhancements include:
We will share more information as we get closer to the date of implementation.
If you have any questions, please contact us at benergymarketing@adam.com or 1-800-475-4041.
Get the Latest Costs & Trends Info in Advisor Tools PRINT VERSION
The latest benchmark data on benefit costs, benefits management, health plans, and retirement plans compiled from expert industry sources is now available in the Costs & Trends section of Advisor Tools. This product is an online broker toolbox filled with exclusive benchmarking reports, HR sources, current regulatory, and health reform information.
If you would like to find out more about any of Benergy’s solutions, please contact us at benergymarketing@adam.com or 1-800-475-4041.
Interactive Employee Communication PRINT VERSION
It's what employees want and you should know how to bring it to them.
By John Lamb
Senior Vice President and General Manager, Benergy Interworks Employee Benefit Advisor, January 2011
Communication portals for employees have been the mainstay of benefits communication for the past decade. Increasingly though, brokers are finding that communication solutions focused on benefits alone are being subsumed by corporate intranets.
An intranet is a private network that can only be accessed by employees or members of a given organization. Modeled on the Internet, intranets allow companies to create a secure, virtual environment - essentially a private version of the World Wide Web inside their corporate firewall.
Today, most organizations have some sort of intranet used for business to employee (B2E) communication. B2E communication is a broad category ranging from bulletin boards and memos to e-mail and, in today's online world, intranets.
Intranet implementations vary significantly from simple Web sites for posting and sharing documents (like corporate policies) to fully functional sites that include sophisticated capabilities like workflow applications, proactive employee communication and collaboration software. The latter are typically found in larger corporations. The good news is that cost effective solutions, with similar capabilities, have moved down market and are now available for companies of almost any size.
The Web technologies for B2E communication have benefited from the growth of consumer applications like Facebook and LinkedIn. Generations X and Y, and tech-savvy people of any age, want and expect consumer-like capabilities at work.
For example, in recent years this has driven intranet providers to add social software capabilities to their solutions, enabling a more collaborative environment for employees. But the intranet landscape is messy. It gets complicated because, in addition to a corporate intranet, other software vendors provide employee self-service capabilities for their applications. Thus, employees end up with several different systems to access. And HR ends up having to get support from the different vendors or from their company's IT group, or both.
Evolving employee communication solutions
A new wave of intranet software solutions is enabling and transforming B2E and employee to employee (E2E) communication. In fact, the term "intranet" is too limiting for this next generation of applications - they are truly interactive employee communication systems. And they are all about promoting and improving employee engagement and interaction.
These solutions include traditional intranet features and incorporate employee self-service connections (see last month's article on Single Sign On, "The X's and O's of SSO," p. 60). E2E communication features include collaboration tools, discussion groups and real-time business messaging (IM).
In 2011, we should see the expansion and acceleration of capabilities in two key areas: personalization and mobile applications.
There is a set of core intranet functions that employees want and expect. It starts with proactive, real-time communication and online interaction with the system and with their fellow workers. They assume they will have 24/7 access and self-service control regardless of their location. And that they will have easy, secure access to company information including the latest news, policies, forms, corporate directories and documents. They are looking for alerts and notifications that are integrated with the corporate e-mail system. And seamless access to personal information such as online pay stubs, 401(k) balances and health insurance benefits elections.
Proactive communication means that the system automatically reaches out to them. Either individually or as part of a group, the expectation is that their employer will keep them informed of deadlines like open enrollment or limits on annual carryover of paid time off.
Expanding on the PTO example, the ability to view PTO balances, request leave and get online leave approval eliminates paper, automates the request-and-approval process, and records the process for audit purposes. Furthermore, HR will be able to run reports and analyze trends and patterns of attendance by department, location, business unit, etc.
It's personal - the Millennials are coming!
I have been using Yahoo as my online home page since 1998. Over the years, Yahoo has evolved and now it's totally personal. News feeds, fantasy sports, weather, stock portfolio, blogs, RSS feeds, my WSJ account and more - all accessible from my home page. And I'm a Baby Boomer. Gen X (51 million) and Millennials (75 million) are fully conversant with the Web, and expect a certain level of configurability in online systems.
Therefore, a deeper level of personalization is needed, allowing employees to configure their online work environment to suit their particular job situation. In 2011 expect to see this trend accelerate.
There's an app for that
We are all aware of the proliferation of mobile devices. At the mall, at a restaurant, or even at the library people have their phones out - texting, tweeting, surfing the Web or running the latest application or game. Now imagine extending your employee portal, not just to a browser, but to mobile devices as well. Understand that this is more than access to e-mail or a browser from a mobile phone or iPad; it is about mobile applications. Picture the following scenarios:
An employee is out to dinner with her spouse and another couple. They are discussing an exhibit that's coming to town next month and the couple has tickets to a sneak preview event that's taking place on the Friday afternoon before the opening. They all agree it would be fun to attend the sneak preview together. Then, the employee pulls out her phone and, using a mobile app, requests that afternoon off! She gets approval the next day and can expect to get automated reminders as the day of the event approaches.
Or, since its wintertime, imagine notifying your employees that the office will be closed due to icy roads and that employees receive the notification automatically on their phone via not just e-mail but a text or an app specific to employee communication. The number of potential apps is virtually limitless.
Interactive employee communication is a great topic of discussion to have with your clients. Being able to speak to what employees want positions you to consult with HR on what they want. Understanding both is the key to putting the right employee communication strategy in place for each of your clients.
John Lamb is senior vice president and general manager, Benergy Interworks, at A.D.A.M. Inc., in Atlanta. Reach him at jlamb@adamcorp.com.
Meet Your Client Services Team PRINT VERSION
Grant Garris Director, Client Services
Grant Garris is responsible for client services, implementation, training, and customer relationship management for Benergy Interworks. Grant was most recently Director of Client Services, Training and Communications at Cox Enterprises and led the multi-unit implementation of PeopleSoft HRIS systems. Previously he was a Regional Vice President for Ceridian, where his team managed at-risk accounts and got personally involved in saving and improving the service levels for these accounts.
Grant attended the University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL and, while in school, worked at Walt Disney World in their Human Resources department. He has more than 18 years of extensive HR, benefits, client relationship management, technical support management, project management, training, and quality management experience.
Grant lives in Roswell, GA with his family and enjoys spending as much time as possible with his two adopted sons Devin and Rick. Devin has Asperger’s Syndrome and because of the challenges Grant has seen him go through, he has founded a website dedicated to adoptive parents and parents that have children with Special Needs. Additionally he volunteers and is asked to speak to various Government and private organizations about the adoption process. His completed his first book in 2010 and has been very involved with Australian Parliament in helping them classify and identify Intellectual Disabilities in the workplace to better assist and understand people with various conditions such as Asperger’s. Additionally, he is assisting Georgia and Kentucky governments to help understand and educate employers on the benefits of having employees with Intellectual Disabilities.
If you have any questions about the Client Services team, please contact us at benergymarketing@adam.com or 1-800-475-4041.
Benergy Knowledgeworks Health Reform Webinar Series PRINT VERSION
Based on your feedback, we’re excited to kick off the 2011 Benergy Knowledgeworks series with a line-up of Health Reform webinars to help you understand and manage all the changes due to the new regulations. The series will be co-hosted with Employee Benefit News and Employee Benefit Adviser magazines
We will start off the series with:
Health Reform: Outlook 2011-2012 Webinar February 23, 2011 2:00 - 3:00 PM EST Janet Trautwein CEO of the National Association fo Health Underwriters (NAHU)
Prior to the passage of health reform legislation in 2010, most people would have agreed that some important changes were needed to address spiraling health care costs and problems with availability and affordability of health insurance coverage. Does the new legislation address these issues? The new law has been far-reaching, and has had a tremendous impact on employers and brokers that will escalate over the next few years. This session will look at how businesses have been affected, how the cost of health care and health insurance costs will be impacted, and the changes we are likely to see to the law with the newly elected Congress.
By attending you will gain insights into:
Future Knowledgeworks Health Reform webinars will be announced soon!
March 17 Keeping Your Plans in Compliance with Health Reform Featuring John R. Hickman, Practice Leader, Health Benefits Practice, Alston & Bird, LLP
April 19 Strategically Communicating to Your Employees About Health Reform Featuring Jennifer Benz, Founder and CEO, Benz Communication
May 25 From Health Reform to Wellness Revolution Featuring Michael Puck, Director Integrated Health Programs and Benefits Innovation Leader for a Global Aerospace and Defense Company
If you have any questions about the Benergy Knowledgeworks Health Reform Webinar Series, please contact us at benergymarketing@adam.com or 1-800-475-4041.