Vi, a developer, owner, and operator of continuing care retirement communities, has linked a strong relationship between employee engagement and employee retention. While Vi has one of the best retention rates in the industry, voluntary turnover costs Vi more than $4 million annually.
Even though Vi spends in excess of $23 million annually on benefits and offers a highly competitive benefit program, the company has had less than desirable participation in benefit programs, and perceptions and understanding of Vi’s benefits were not strong. According to Vi’s last employee survey, “Employee Benefits,” were cited as the No. 1 reason employees worked for Vi—representing 64 percent of all responses. But with less-than-stellar participation rates and low ratings for education about benefits, Vi recognized the need to implement best practices in employee education around benefits.
Vi realized that traditional communications and open enrollment sessions were not effective as training/communications. It was clear that Vi’s previous educational materials made it difficult for employees to ascertain how Vi’s benefits could save them money, enhance their well-being, and support their families. To make benefits education even more complicated, many of Vi’s employees speak English as a second language. So while benchmark data indicated Vi offered a rich benefits package, many employees did not understand the value.
The goals of the program included increased benefits utilization and higher employee survey results related to benefits. After evaluating feedback from focus groups and verbatim feedback from the survey, Vi developed a multi-faceted education program that targets benefits-eligible employees during open enrollment and new hire benefits orientation.
Program Details
Vi developed a robust marketing campaign that promoted the new interactive educational online tool. Besides teasers, education campaign buttons, posters, and communications in local and company newsletters, Vi’s Management Development Program participants engaged in educating their colleagues about Vi’s new interactive benefits tool. This was coupled with Vi’s traditional classroom education sessions and a complementary training video.
Results
In just 14 months, Vi’s interactive benefits training tool had nearly 3,000 unique logins. As a result of these efforts, Vi realized the following increases in benefits enrollments:
- 69 percent increase in flexible spending account participation.
- 41 percent increase in enhanced vision program participation.
- 7 percent increase in medical plan participation.
- 7 percent increase in dental plan participation.
- 9 percent increase in 401(k) participation
Besides the strong utilization of this new interactive benefits education tool, Vi recognized significant increases in employee participation in company benefits and rated the interactive education tool as a contributing factor in understanding their benefits.
Vi’s most recent employee survey showed the first and large gains in scores for employees’ understanding of benefits. Some 90 percent of Vi’s employees stated they had a good understanding of the company’s benefits compared to Vi’s previous survey results of 83 percent. Benefits satisfaction also rose significantly from 73 to 83 percent. This is the first increase in the benefits survey dimension in recorded survey history at Vi.
