Typically, HR coordinates open enrollment communications for most organizations, but the communications department should play a vital role. If your employees don’t understand their options, it doesn’t matter how competitive the benefit packages are.  With remote workers and plenty of distractions in your employees’ daily lives, most employees are confused.  According to a recent Voya survey, 66% of workers want a better explanation of their benefits.  Clearly there is room for improvement.

Teaming up with your internal communications department can help make your information more inclusive and engaging.  Here are some ideas to improve your communication:

• Offer content in different formats and through various channels.  Webinars can become short video clips, create employee blogs, print one-page educational sheets, and add a benefits section to your e-newsletters.
• Make sure you don’t need a degree in HR to understand the language.  The terminology needs to be in layman’s terms. You may need to rephrase things and remove jargon and acronyms.
• Tell a story, promote how your benefits help people.  Do you have family benefits, telehealth programs, mental wellness, weight loss, stop smoking programs, or an amazing EAP? Collaborate and show examples that resonate with your workforce.
• Don’t just communicate in Q4, benefits communication should be happening throughout the year.  Send out an annual calendar with special events, messaging about programs, and important deadlines should be included in your communication.  Don’t forget to give employees a way to provide feedback and ask questions year-round.  For new employees make sure there are check ins to make sure they don’t miss signing up for benefits.   

Having HR and internal communications work together to create content that accounts for various learning styles, eliminates confusing jargon, provides examples that better illustrate your offerings, and recognizes this as a year-round effort organization should result in an overall better understanding of the entire benefits package offered by your organization.

In addition, if you are looking for ways to add value to your benefits package consider adding one or all of these trending perks and benefits to your plan.

• Corporate Wellness
• Tuition Reimbursement
• Student Loan Reimbursement
• Financial Wellness Solutions
• MESP 529 Workplace Savings Program

Learn more about these programs by checking out the ASE On-Demand Benefits Series. These carefully curated, on-demand sessions provide guidance on trending benefits options that employers should consider when building their employee benefits offerings for 2022.