Author Bio: Frank Mengert
Frank Mengert continues to find success by spotting opportunities where others see nothing. As the founder and CEO of ebm, a leading provider of employee benefits solutions. Frank has built the business by bridging the gap between insurance and technology driven solutions for brokers, consultants, carriers, and employers nationwide.
Technology As Your Workforce Grows
The digital age has changed the way we do business in many respects. From online transactions to branding via social media, the Internet has had a tremendous impact on all of our lives. Internally, many businesses have changed the way they operate in the Internet age, pivoting into new verticals. Below, we’ll outline six key strategies you need to follow in order to effectively scale up your benefits technology to meet the demands of a growing online workforce.
1. Create a Strong, Centralized BenAdmin System
When it comes to benefits, employees need a strong, workable system that clearly communicates data and options to feel secure. People value knowledge, especially when it comes to things like health and disability insurance, and a strong benefits system is the best way to keep your employees in the know.
When everyone is able to access systems quickly, get relevant information and answers fast, and manage their benefits themselves, satisfaction increases immensely. A unified digital platform for benefits management is a critical feature for any online business, allowing employees to view plan summaries and calculate costs. Not having one is essentially a non-starter if you want to scale benefits programs effectively.
2. Maintain Compliance with Regulatory Frameworks
Handling regulatory compliance is extremely important at all levels of business operations, including employee benefits. Ensuring rigid compliance to regulatory frameworks will help you avoid legal errors, audits, and even penalties that can cause operational disruption or even legal consequences.
Investing in an effective benefits technology partner is a smart step you can take to ensure that you are meeting all required standards for benefits administration. A strong benefits service can help you keep track of the regulations you need to follow by giving each employee a personal dashboard that links to company-wide services which regulate benefits packages.
3. Personalize Benefits and Keep Employees Educated
Employees enjoy working for companies that allow them to personalize their experience and are committed to their individual wellness. Instead of making your benefits plan a one-size-fits-all solution, keeping things malleable to the individual employee is the best way to improve satisfaction.
Furthermore, it is vital that you continually educate your employees on their benefits options, keeping them in the loop so that they can make informed decisions more easily. Giving employees accessible resources with information about their benefits can help you avoid frustrating miscommunications and errors that lead to issues with benefits disbursement or confusion over what plans you actually offer.
4. Embrace Technology and Integration
Technology is rapidly evolving in the business world, and small and medium-sized businesses have to stay on top of technological trends to promote business growth. In regards to employee benefits, investing in technology that can easily be scaled and integrated into existing business systems is crucial.
Make sure that your benefits platform, payroll system, and other employee databases are all seamlessly synced to prevent miscommunication and errors that can negatively affect benefits distribution. A fully-integrated system makes everything from onboarding to payroll much simpler, and can prevent costly and time-consuming manual remediation efforts.
5. Keep Your Benefits Plans Customizable
A customizable benefits plan is something many employees value in the business sector, and there are many different plans you can integrate into your benefits packages to keep your employees happy. Whether you choose to offer Section 125 plans, 401(k) plans, or other types of benefits, having a diverse palette of benefits packages available is ideal if you operate a business with a remote or hybrid workforce.
Instead of funneling employees into a single plan type, offering strong but customized benefits packages can be done via benefits administration technology, making the complex task of managing various plan types easier.
6. Make Security Your Top Priority
Digital security is not just valuable to a business’ customers–it is also incredibly valuable to employees, especially when it comes to benefits. In businesses with a great deal of remote or online presence, security is extremely vital, particularly in terms of benefits data, which often has to pass between company systems, making it vulnerable to security breaches.
A single security breach can have a wide ripple effect across business systems, but with an effective benefits technology partner, your systems will be secured from the start, protecting vital data. Invest in strong data encryption, identity and access management (IAM), and compliance technology that can keep you in line with privacy codes like GDPR and other important regulations.
Scale Your Benefits Tech Effectively So Your Employees Feel Valued and Respected
A strong benefits system can make or break your business’ ability to retain and satisfy employees. Flexibility, personalization, and security draw in great talent, and with a good benefits tech partner, you can keep that talent for many years.
Using technology to automate and secure the complexities of employee benefits is the way of the future, and investing in it is your best bet to stay with the times and maximize your growth potential in your industry. The steps above are just a few ways to get started, and the process of scaling up your benefits technology may require a lot of effort, but in the end, you’ll reap greater rewards from it. Your employees will be happier, your business will run more smoothly, and your reputation will benefit from those who spread the word that you are a prime example of a company with both exceptional benefits and strong technological support!
