March to May is our big season to meet with clients and perform our annual comprehensive DC plan review (most of our clients also do investment reviews more frequently). Among other things, we sit down with the plan recordkeeper and determine the communication and education strategy to address the various issues raised in our review (if any), as well as any other communication goals the client might have.
What’s the most frequent comment made at that time? “But our employees don’t care.”
Tuning in
My own personal experience, based on years of dealing directly with investors and DC plan members through employee sessions or one-on-one meetings, tells me three things:
- Most people listen to the same radio station: WIFM (What’s In it For Me).
- Most people have certain types/styles of music they are comfortable with and enjoy most.
- Most people tend to pay more attention to a DJ they know and (somewhat) trust.
For the younger generations, this would translate into a tendency to purchase their music from the same online source, search for new music based on the system’s ability to recommend new tunes from previous purchases, and getting the opinion of their social networking community.
If we extend the analogy to investment education, what this means is that plan members will pay more attention to your communication efforts when:
- they see an immediate benefit for doing so,
- they can relate to the style of the communication (i.e. it is done in a way that fits the culture they are accustomed to), and
- the communication comes from a source they are comfortable with and trust.
Keeping them on the dial
In a client discussion earlier this week, we talked about how unbelievable it was to see people lining up for 30 minutes or more just to save 3¢ a litre on gas, which would translate to savings of about $1.50 (50 litres @ 3¢) for most motorists when filling up at that price.
We were joking that some of them probably had purchased a fancy $6-latte to sip on while they waited in line. So is saving $1.50 really a benefit? It certainly seems to be for some.
So short-term benefits can take many forms, depending on one’s perception. Compare the two following titles for an invitation to an employee session on retirement planning:
1) “Planning for retirement made easy with a dynamic information session from ABC Life”; and
2) “Learn about retirement planning and enter for a chance to win an iPad!”
Which one do you think will get more traction? Obviously, the session with the iPad contest.
While a draw prize represents a cost for the plan sponsor, it can be a worthwhile investment if it gets the attention of plan members to attend the session and hear your message. Look at the cost of a draw prize in relation to your total employer contribution costs.
Getting the attention of your employees also means making the message about them. Tailoring your communications to your own organization’s context and style is important too.
Using generic materials from your record keeper can be a good start, but plan members can get turned off if they receive something about their group savings plan when it has been branded your “XYZ Employee Savings Plus Program” internally.
This also goes beyond the title page: all communications should ideally be written for your plan―using the same style and terminology as you use internally, avoiding jargon and useless acronyms. Recordkeepers are increasingly getting better at this, but their writing style will generally remain the same for all their clients, so the feel may not be representative of your organization.
Pump up the volume
To attract employees’ attention, there is nothing like having someone close to home talking to them. Again, budgets will vary, but having the president of the pension committee (or an employee representative who sits on the committee) address plan members about their specific plan and how they can take full advantage of the company match, will be far more effective than having a generic co-branded poster from ABC Life on your walls.
A great example of how well this can work is illustrated by a client who recently featured the vice-president of HR in a short video posted on the company’s intranet.
In the video, she personally invited employees to take a look at their account statements coming out the following week (yes, timing also counts) and to look at the personalized messages included with their statement to see if they needed to take action on any item (missing beneficiary, missing risk tolerance profile, etc.). The result: after years of inertia, a great portion of plan members contacted the call center to update their information!
Yes, employee communication is a science—but also an art. Keep your plan members tuned-in and engaged by applying the right principles.