The benefit you may not be offering to employees — but should be
The costs, gaps in care and stress associated with serious, long-term illness can negatively impact the health and productivity of your workforce. Surveys show that about 17 percent of full-time workers act as caregivers. Read on to learn more.
When it comes to getting better value for their healthcare dollars, employers and other healthcare purchasers may be overlooking a significant cost driver that negatively impacts the health and productivity of their workforce.
It’s the costs, gaps in care and stress associated with serious, long-term illness. In addition to the roughly 11.4 million adults and children living with serious illness, about 17% of full-time workers are also caregivers. And while a caregiving role is rewarding, it’s also been shown to reduce work productivity by more than 18%, costing U.S. businesses up to $33 billion annually. Given this, it’s surprising that palliative programs are not nearly as widespread as they should be.
Employers should give serious consideration to offering palliative care as a benefit to employees. Here are two misconceptions that can get in the way of implementing palliative care programs — and two reasons why serious illness care may be right for your organization.
First, the misconceptions:
It’s not the same as hospice care. While hospice care is a part of palliative care, they’re not synonymous. Palliative care is specialized medical care for people living with a serious illness that is appropriate at any age and any stage of their disease and can be provided along with curative treatment. It focuses on providing patients with relief from the symptoms, pain and stress of their medical condition(s) — whatever the diagnosis.
The goal is to improve quality of life for both the patient and their family. Those who would greatly benefit from access to palliative care face conditions such as diabetes with complications, metastatic cancer or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
It doesn’t affect my population. While people with a serious illness typically represent only a small proportion of the commercial population — roughly 2% to 3% — and up to 10% of retiree populations, they consume a disproportionate amount of healthcare resources. By addressing the needs of those living with serious illness, helping them avoid unnecessary, unwanted, and even potentially harmful care, employers can make a big impact on employees’ lives and the bottom line. Moreover, palliative care also greatly benefits caregivers, who can experience stress, negative impacts on their own health, and lessened productivity and presenteeism at work, even when they find their role fulfilling.
Now, why should employers offer palliative care benefits?
Quality can generate cost-savings. Palliative care’s focus on improving the quality of life of patients and their families means it leads with quality. The logic of “quality first” applies to many high-value healthcare strategies including accountable care organizations, centers of excellence (COEs) and second opinion programs. And like those other strategies, leading with quality can lead to lower costs. For instance, by providing access to high-quality care for certain services or conditions at a COE, employers hope that costly complications from low quality or inappropriate care can be avoided, just as introducing a palliative care team to a treatment plan can help patients better manage their symptoms, such as severe pain, proactively and lead to fewer trips to the emergency room.
Employers can make a big difference for patients and caregivers. Employers and other healthcare purchasers can play a powerful role in improving care for people living with serious illness by demanding certain capabilities and services from contracted health plans, other vendors and healthcare providers.
These include:
· Proactive identification of the population of patients living with a serious illness
· Training all healthcare providers in basic communication and symptom management skills
· Access to certified specialty palliative care teams across care settings
· Access to appropriately trained case managers
· Specific benefits that include home-based services and support for caregivers
To change the healthcare system, it’s important for purchasers to be on the same page with each other to ensure that providers and plans are on board with providing this type of care. After all, at the end of the day, it’s about the patient and their family. In focusing on palliative care, along with other key areas, purchasers have the power and influence to make a difference in the quality and affordability of care their employees receive.
SOURCE: Delbanco, S. (6 March 2019) "The benefit you may not be offering to employees — but should be" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/opinion/the-benefit-employers-may-not-be-offering-to-employees?brief=00000152-14a5-d1cc-a5fa-7cff48fe0001
4 questions to ask before adding biometric screenings
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), fifty-two percent of large firms that provide employee health benefits offer workers the opportunity to complete a biometric screening. Continue reading this blog post to learn more.
A growing number of employers are adopting workplace wellness programs to improve employee health and subsequently lower their health insurance spend. As they do, benefit managers are tasked with vetting options that will deliver meaningful health and financial results for their companies.
This vetting process typically involves answering questions that range from which types of participation incentives their organization should offer to what type of wellness programs will yield the greatest health-improvement outcomes.
But there’s a problem: Very few benefits managers ask for details about wellness biometric testing, even though most programs are, at least in theory, designed around the information that screening provides. Biometric screening typically involves one or more laboratory tests as well as physical readings, such as blood pressure and body weight, to identify markers of health risks if not an actual disease.
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 52% of large firms that provide employee health benefits offer workers the opportunity to complete a biometric screening.
Just as workplace wellness programs are not all the same, biometric screening can vary. Failure to question the specific details of a proposed biometric screening program can lead to suboptimal results.
Before moving forward with biometric screenings as part of a workplace wellness program, benefit managers should pause to ask themselves certain questions. Doing so will enhance the likelihood of favorable outcomes — both for employee wellness and the financial bottom line.
1. Why should we screen?
It sounds simple, but setting clear goals for biometric screening is a step too many benefits managers overlook. This may be because they do not know how to anticipate the kind of actions that will be available to them and their employees given the results.
Based on my experience, the most compelling reason to provide biometric screening as part of a wellness program is to help individuals identify risks for several chronic conditions that, if caught early, may be prevented. With insights from a biometric screening, an individual may be better able to take steps to reduce health risks. Common goals may be to reduce body weight, exercise more or visit a physician for treatment.
Biometric screening often can reveal disease risks an individual may not otherwise know. A study published in the peer-reviewed journal PLoS ONE, for instance, found that one in three first-time participants in a company-sponsored, lab-based wellness program by Quest Diagnostics were not aware they were at risk for a serious medical condition, such as diabetes or heart disease, according to biometric screening results. Many of these individuals were in a health plan, suggesting that healthcare access alone does not guarantee preventive care to identify risk for common chronic health conditions.
Biometric screening also can help an employer identify programs to target at-risk employee segments based on the type of risk with appropriate interventions. Reliable insight into disease risks for a workforce population may also aid the prediction of future healthcare costs.
2. What should we screen for?
Ideally, biometric screening should provide enough information into disease risks for both individuals and the employer in order to take meaningful actions. Here, many employers miss the mark by implementing bare bones biometric screening options. The result is potentially misleading results — and missed opportunities to identify individuals at risk.
Take diabetes screening, for instance. A non-fasting fingerstick glucose screening really doesn’t tell us anything considering the variety of food individuals might have eaten, and how that may have affected their measurement.
A fasting fingerstick glucose test may help identify diabetes risk in some individuals and be less costly to perform than a hemoglobin A1c test, which involves a venipuncture blood draw. However, a study from Quest Diagnostics found that some individuals in a workforce population with normal fasting glucose results were still at higher risk for diabetes, and a glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) test identified them.
In a similar manner, many employers overlook screening for chronic kidney disease, one of the major causes of kidney transplantation. Eighty-nine percent of participants identified as at risk for chronic kidney disease did not know it, according to the aforementioned PLoS ONE study. The estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) lab test can help identify this condition very cost-effectively, but it’s often absent in biometric screening programs. Other conditions that laboratory tests can help identify include metabolic disorders, thyroid disease, and colorectal cancer, among others.
3. How often should we screen?
Annual biometric screening reinforces the importance of management places on employee wellness. It can also help identify health risks in individuals who are new to the organization. An annual program also provides a regular cadence of engagement that is not too onerous on employees while minimizing the confusion that can occur when screening happens less frequently.
Annual screening has an added benefit of allowing the employee to track her progress over time. Quest provides graphic charts that show changes in an individual’s numbers year over year. This is a powerful motivator for those who have adopted healthful behaviors to stay the course. And longitudinal changes also can reveal patterns, like modest annual weight gain, that the individual may otherwise dismiss until they see the cumulative effect.
4. How can we connect employees to care and intervention?
Screening is just one facet of a successful wellness program. Some individuals who identify health risks may proactively modify their behavior or consult a physician. But not all will. Employers can improve the odds of at-risk employees accessing the care they need following biometric screening.
Most employees in biometric programs receive a personalized report of their screening results. Additionally, many participants can consult over the phone with a third-party administered physician.
At Quest, for instance, we offer programs that help at-risk employees access behavioral change programs. If an individual’s screening results suggest evidence of prediabetes, that employee may participate free of charge in a 16-week, CDC-based diabetes prevention program that includes coaching and lifestyle modification. An individual with a problematic cholesterol result may be able to access a similar program for heart disease prevention.
Biometric screenings can be a powerful facet of an employee wellness program. Understanding the reasons to screen, which methods to use and how often to use them, and the paths to connect employees to care are key. Benefit managers who do this well will be rewarded with a wellness program that results in healthier employees and lower healthcare costs over time.
SOURCE: Goldberg, S. (21 February 2019) "4 questions to ask before adding biometric screenings" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/opinion/4-questions-to-ask-before-adding-biometric-screenings
6 key features your employee training program needs – and how LMS can help
One way employers can keep the right employees around and happy is by providing opportunities for professional development and training. Continue reading this blog post to learn more.
Hiring the right employees is important, but keeping them around and happy is just as essential. One way to do that is to provide opportunities for professional development and training as a way to encourage workers to improve their skills and engage further with their jobs.
While you likely have a solid training program for new employees to get them accustomed to your organization, the training options for ongoing employees are often more limited.
It’s always a good idea to encourage all employees to continue learning new skills, perfecting old ones and developing as professionals. Having well-rounded workers with a range of skills boosts your business and opens up opportunities for their advancement.
Beyond making workers happier and more productive, there are revenue benefits associated with comprehensive training, too. Companies that offer workers training programs have 24% higher profit margins than those that don’t, according to the American Society for Training and Development.
And if you don’t yet have a learning management system (LMS) solution, consider investing in one. It can help streamline the training process and strengthen your entire program while offering a range of other benefits.
Whether you already have a training program you’re looking to improve, or you’re aiming to implement one, there are certain elements every successful training and development program has.
Short, specific sessions
You know better than anyone that employees’ attention spans aren’t long. No one wants to sit through hours of training, no matter how valuable the information is.
Focus instead on short, specific bursts of information that will interest workers and guarantee they retain the information.
This strategy, called microlearning, emphasizes brief (usually three to five minutes) sessions designed to meet specific outcomes. You can use it for both formal training and informal, but it’s generally more successful when applied to informal skills training instead of intense or complex processed-based training.
There are four essential characteristics of microlearning to hone in on. Make sure your training is:
- Lean: It shouldn’t need a mob of people to implement
- Adaptable: There should be ways to apply the training to many employees across a range of departments and locations. Although specificity is a key component of microlearning, it can’t be so specific that only one employee will benefit, otherwise, it’s not worth the time and resources.
- Simple: Avoid over-complicating things and confusing workers.
- Seamless: Use the technology at your disposal. Your solution shouldn’t require in-person sit-downs, but instead should be transferable to employees’ mobile devices and laptops when possible.
Many LMS solutions are accessible on mobile devices and desktops and allow you to create your own courses to provide the exact content you want to employees.
Remember: Microlearning doesn’t have to be the centerpiece of your training program. After all, there are some topics that simply can’t be condensed into bite-sized pieces. But integrating this method can help spice up your program and supply a new way of doing things.
Assessments
An effective training program is only as good as what employees retain, so you’ll want a way to measure where they started and how the training has impacted them.
A pre-training assessment can also shine a light on what workers are looking for and what they still need to learn. This allows you to target specific skills training and development to the employees who need it, while not wasting the time of workers who’re all caught up.
Post-training assessments, meanwhile, help you see who’s mastered the training and who still needs help. They can also show you where your training program could be improved.
To ensure assessments are as helpful as possible:
- Avoid yes or no questions, instead of allowing workers to provide a variety of feedback.
- Look over how the training objectives line up with workers’ perceptions of their professional development.
- Offer both task- and skill-based evaluations that look at performance and adaptation of the skill, rather than memorization ability.
Note: These evaluations don’t need to take the form of traditional tests. Very few people enjoy taking tests, so taking the time to turn assessments into a game or more fun activity encourages workers to participate and provide their honest opinions without worrying about being “graded.”
With some LMS solutions, assessments can be taken online with the information stored right where you can access it easily. Often, you can also compile the results into reports that give you at-a-glance clarity on who benefited most from the training and who still needs improvement.
Collaboration
Providing chances for your workers to interact and form connections has multiple benefits for your training program and organization at large.
When employees have bonds with their co-workers, they’re more engaged in their tasks and more productive. Getting them to collaborate during training can help convince them to take the course seriously while encouraging teamwork beyond the training.
Collaboration tools, such as built-in messaging systems and discussion boards, are prevalent among LMS solutions and give workers the chance to learn together and develop along the same paths.
Multimedia options
You’ll also want to expand your horizons beyond basic text-based training. We’re living in an age with constantly evolving technology, and your training program should take advantage of the options at your disposal.
Workers will be more engaged with the content you offer if it’s more than words on a page. And with LMS solutions, creating and importing multimedia content into your training is easier than ever.
This doesn’t mean you can’t implement text into your training, of course, but rather that you should also have:
- video
- interactive content
- images, and
- audio.
Video and images are already extremely popular in training, and if you have a current program it’s likely there are already videos and photos in it. Don’t forget about graphs and other diagrams that could help clarify certain concepts.
Interactive content can take a range of forms, from quizzes given to workers after each module to games employees play to help them retain the information they’ve learned.
These games can also increase collaboration during training, which helps participants stay engaged in what they’re learning and form connections with co-workers. Bonding with co-workers is one of the benefits offered by in-house training programs and these bonds often strengthen employee engagement with your company.
Another option is audio content, like podcasts. Offering audio content allows workers to train while performing other tasks, since they don’t have to be in a specific room or looking at something to follow along.
If you’re worried about carving enough time out in employees’ workdays to add training or professional development, podcasts and other audio content are a good bridge to get them learning new skills while still able to complete their jobs.
Easy access
A training program won’t work if its inaccessible. If workers have to show up on a specific day and time to a certain conference room, it’s significantly less likely they’ll take you up on the offer.
And if the training is mandatory, employees won’t be excited to learn and may resist absorbing the info.
This is where an LMS solution comes in handy the most. It provides a central location for training and courses to be stored and accessed. Workers can check out training from all of their devices and tackle the topics individually or in groups, depending on what works best for them.
Having an LMS solution also helps if you employ remote workers or have multiple locations, since you don’t have to coordinate a time for them to come in or run multiple training sessions at once.
Professional development
Workers, especially younger ones, want a way forward in their careers. They don’t want to just learn skills applicable to their current jobs. They want options and the chance to develop further and pick up skills that will serve them well as they advance.
Clearly define how your training program will factor in professional development, so employees can see what the payoff will be down the line. This also motivates them to stay with your company in the long run, since you’re enabling them to develop and practice new abilities and investing in their futures.
Most LMS solutions have the ability to create customized learning paths depending on where employees are in their careers and what they’re aiming to learn and accomplish.
Laying out the ways forward can also help with recruiting and hiring, since prospective employees can see the opportunities for advancement and growth available to them.
Bottom line
Training matters for every employee, not just new hires or recent transfers. A strong comprehensive training program is essential to building up your workforce and keeping workers engaged in their jobs.
When given the chance to boost their skills and develop professionally, employees are also happier and more productive, making the potential expense of implementing training programs worth it.
Plus, LMS solutions can help improve your training and offer a variety of features to employees and trainers alike in a cost-effective way.
Your training doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel to be helpful for your workers and provide benefits for your business. It just has to work for your company and employees.
SOURCE: Ketchum, K. (18 February 2019) "6 key features your employee training program needs - and how LMS can help" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.hrmorning.com/employee-training-program-lms/
4 FAQs about W-2 business email compromise attacks during tax season
Has your business been a victim of tax season cyber attacks? The most popular time of the year for W-2 related cyber attacks is during tax season. Read this blog post to learn more.
The most likely cyber attack a company will face will come in the form of an email. One of the most common forms of email attack is the business email compromise (BEC), and the most popular time of the year for the W-2 version of BEC is right now — tax season.
A BEC attack involves attackers sending emails disguised as coming from high-level executives within a company, such as the CEO, to lower level personnel. During tax season, the spoof email will often request that W-2s for employees be provided by return email.
While the email looks identical to the executive’s email, it is coming from — and then returned to — the criminal, not the executive, along with the W-2s and the personal information associated with the documents.
If an employee falls for the scam, the company now has experienced a serious data breach and must comply with certain legal requirements. Worse yet, the company’s employees’ sensitive personal information has been given to the attackers and they have this problem to worry about instead of performing their job. The disruption is substantial in their personal lives and for the company’s operations.
How do attackers use W-2 information?
In most cases, once the attackers have that W-2 information, they use it to attempt to file fraudulent tax returns for those employees and have their tax refunds sent to them instead of the employee. They also use it for traditional identity theft.
The attackers act very quickly once the information is obtained. In some cases, they have begun to fraudulently use the information on the same day they obtained the W-2 information from the company. Time is truly of the essence in responding to these attacks and legal assistance is necessary for properly responding to these data breach events.
Why do so many attacks happen during tax season?
Law enforcement officers and cybersecurity professionals report a drastic increase in these types of attacks during the beginning of each year because of tax season. This is consistent with what is seen in helping companies with these cases in past years, as well. The reason this type of attack is so common during tax season is because of the tax-related fraud aspect of this type of attack. That is, the attackers monetize their attacks by using the fraudulently obtained information to file fraudulent tax returns and obtain refunds from innocent victims.
And the sooner they can do this, the better their chances are of getting the refund before the taxpayer files and receives their tax refund.
If a company has not yet been targeted, it is likely that it will be very soon so it is important to be prepared.
What can you do to protect your company?
Educating employees is critical because they will be the ones who receive the emails from the attackers.
- Make them aware of this issue by sharing the information in this article with them so that they understand the threat, how it works and how it could affect them personally.
- Train them by having appropriate personnel discuss this threat with them and help them understand that they should be very suspicious of any requests to email out anything of this nature (or make payments, such as with the very similar wire transfer version of the BEC).
Have appropriate internal controls in place to protect against these types of attacks. These controls can include:
- Limit who has access to your company’s W-2s and other sensitive information as well as who has the authority to submit or approve wire payments.
- Have established procedures in place for sending W-2 information or other sensitive information as well as for submitting or approving wire payments so that dual approvals are required for these activities.
- Require employees to use an alternative means of confirming the identity of the person making the request. If the request is by email, the employee should talk to the requestor in-person or call and speak to the requestor using a known telephone number to get verbal confirmation. If the request is by telephone or fax (many times they are), then use email to confirm by using an email address known to be correct to confirm with the purported requestor. Never reply to one of these emails or call using a telephone number that is provided in one of these emails, faxes, or telephone calls.
What to do if your company is hit by an attack
- Immediately contact experienced legal counsel who understands how to guide a company through these incidents and, ideally, has appropriate contacts with law enforcement and the IRS to assist in reporting this incident quickly.
- Report the incident to the FBI or Secret Service and appropriate IRS investigators so that the IRS can implement appropriate procedures to protect the employees whose information was exposed in the W-2s.
- Prepare appropriate notifications to the people whose information was exposed and comply with all legal and regulatory reporting requirements. This should be a part of an existing incident response plan. Companies should have such a procedure in place to be better prepared if and when a security breach occurs.
- Inform employees that the IRS will never contact them directly, for the first time, via email, telephone, text message, social media or any way other than through a written “snail mail” letter.
SOURCE: Tuma, S. (19 February 2019) "4 FAQs about W-2 business email compromise attacks during tax season" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitspro.com/2019/02/19/4-faqs-about-w-2-business-email-compromise-attacks-during-tax-season/
Everything employers need to know about employee job classifications
FLSA job classifications can confuse even the most experienced HR managers. Continue reading this blog post for everything employers should know about employee job classifications.
Chief among the issues that keep employers up at night is staying compliant with federal and state employment laws.
Arguably, wage and hour rules are the most complex and cause the most issues for companies. Job classifications under the FLSA can confuse even the most experienced HR managers.
In fact, some of the costliest wage and hour lawsuits and penalties on record could have been avoided if only the employer properly classified an employee as either exempt or nonexempt. It’s critically important to understand the law — and the devil is in the details.
Exempt or nonexempt?
Most employers understand that an exempt employee is not entitled to receive overtime pay for hours worked in excess of forty hours per week, according to the provisions of the FLSA. Conversely, nonexempt employees are required to receive overtime pay and should be classified as nonexempt from these same overtime provisions.
While it may sound straightforward, figuring out an employee’s exempt status is not that simple. Different types of exemptions exist and each has its own unique set of requirements that are outlined in the FLSA. Most of these exemptions are specific to certain jobs or industries, for example, some exemptions only apply to specific types of agricultural workers, or to truck drivers who transport goods in interstate commerce. But for most businesses, exempt employees will usually fall into one of the following three exemption categories: executive, administrative and professional. Collectively, these are referred to as the white collar exemptions.
A common error that employers make is to classify all their salaried employees, or all employees with the word manager in their title, as exempt. Neither of these factors alone is enough to make the exempt designation. Each of the white-collar exemptions has two components: a salary requirement and a duties requirement. The salary requirement is the same for each of the three exemptions, but the duties requirements are different.
The salary basis test
For any employee to be considered exempt under any of the white-collar exemptions, they must be paid on a salary basis. This means that any employee who is paid by the hour, per day, or is commission-only, regardless of their title or position, will not meet the criteria for any of the white-collar exemptions. How the salary is paid as well as the amount are also subject to certain restrictions. The salary basis test determines the minimum amount, which is subject to change from time to time. The minimum salary is currently $455.00 per week (or $23,660 per year). This test also provides restrictions on when and how an employer can make deductions from an exempt employee’s salary.
An increase to the minimum salary per week from $455 to $913 (or $47,476 per year) was originally scheduled to go into effect back in December 2016, but industry groups against the measure successfully lobbied to block it. The U.S. Department of Labor is exploring alternatives that could appease these industry groups while keeping the regulations in line with the times. The DOL is scheduled to re-start the rulemaking process in March 2019, and prior statements of the current DOL Secretary, Alexander Acosta, suggest that the new rule may propose a more modest salary increase to around $634 per week (or around $33,000 per year).
Job duties
In addition to the salary, each white-collar exemption has its own unique set of duties requirements. Employers must look at the actual duties that each employee performs to determine whether they meet the criteria and their title or position does little to influence the outcome. So, simply naming an employee a manager does not automatically qualify the worker as an exempt employee. To be considered exempt under the executive exemption, which is the most common exemption for managers, this employee would need to supervise two or more full-time employees (or the equivalent) and have the authority to hire and fire employees. Otherwise, they would need to meet the requirements for one of the other exemptions to be paid in this manner.
Knowing that these regulations exist and being well-informed of the framework is the first step in understanding overtime obligations – and reducing wage and hour worries. Employers should seek a qualified employment law attorney for additional guidance on the specifics of each requirement to ensure compliance with applicable overtime laws.
SOURCE: Starkman, J.; Nadal, A. (15 February 2019) "Everything employers need to know about employee job classifications" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/opinion/what-employers-need-to-know-about-job-classifications?brief=00000152-14a5-d1cc-a5fa-7cff48fe0001
LinkedIn’s job search feature gets smart
LinkedIn is planning on simplifying their process of finding and hiring talent via their recruitment features. The platform plans on consolidating their LinkedIn Recruiter, Jobs and Pipeline Builder products into one service. Continue reading to learn more.
LinkedIn plans to simplify the process of finding and hiring talent through upgraded recruitment features this summer.
The career platform will consolidate its LinkedIn Recruiter, Jobs and Pipeline Builder products into one service — the Intelligent Hiring Experience — to streamline the recruitment process for its corporate customers. Artificial intelligence algorithms will help talent recruiters find the most suitable candidates for open positions.
“[The] update is about how we can make those tools work even better by fostering collaboration and more efficient sourcing,” says John Jersin, vice president of Product for LinkedIn Talent Solutions and Careers. “We’ve started along this path by bringing more intelligence into our platforms, to ensure our products are working together optimally, and helping both companies and job seekers more easily zero in on the best opportunities.”
With the upgrade, messages between recruiters and potential talent can be shared with HR professionals and hiring managers. The platform also allows the recruiter and corporate hiring team to exchange notes on each job candidate. Recruiters who rely on LinkedIn to discover talent are optimistic the upgrades will make the hiring process more organized.
“I think that would be a great feature,” says Aimee Aurol, talent acquisition specialist for Acuris Group, a media company. “Hiring managers can get a better idea of what I’m doing as a recruiter, and I can see which candidates are moving along in the process.”
Aurol says LinkedIn is her primary tool for identifying and contacting candidates for her company. While the majority of her job placements come from LinkedIn, she says the platform’s candidate suggestions could use improvement. At its current state, Aurol’s candidate searches often turn up the same candidates over and over. But she hopes the updated AI will direct her to a wider variety of available talent.
And Jersin says it was designed to do just that.
“All of these tools are created to help learn your interests and surface the right candidates,” he says. “When a recruiter reaches out to a specific candidate, or a job seeker applies for a role, our AI algorithms take note, matching profiles with job descriptions and highlighting top recommendations.”
LinkedIn’s AI will also take into consideration whether previously suggested candidates were hired or not as it adjusts its personalized algorithm. To help the algorithm learn your company’s preferences, Jersin recommends setting up projects for each available role. Then, go through suggested candidates and save the ones you want to contact — and hide the ones that don’t fit.
Once a candidate is hired, the upgrades allow hiring managers to send rejection letters individually, or in mass. This part of the upgrade was designed to improve the hiring experience for both job applicants and employers.
“We believe applicants will appreciate knowing the outcome of their contact with your company — and it's bad business to leave applicants hanging,” Jersin says. “…one survey showed that over 40% of candidates said that if they don’t hear back from a company they’ll never apply to it again.”
While the upgrades are scheduled to debut in late summer, Jersin says LinkedIn will slowly introduce the new features over the next couple of months. The feature will be included in LinkedIn’s Recruitment and Job Slots membership packages; existing customers will not have to pay additional fees to access the service.
“The new features will make it simple for recruiters to simply keep doing their sourcing and hiring while inadvertently training our algorithms to learn more about their preferences,” Jersin says.
SOURCE: Webster, K. (20 February 2019) "LinkedIn’s job search feature gets smart" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/news/linkedin-introduces-intelligent-hiring-experience-platform?brief=00000152-14a7-d1cc-a5fa-7cffccf00000
Goodbye group benefits. Hello personalized pay
Do you offer a uniform benefits package to your employees? With five generations in the workplace now, off-the-shelf benefit options are presenting employers with a challenge. Read this blog post to learn more.
In the past, it was typical for a company to provide all employees with access to the same group benefits — regardless of their age, demographics or education level. From health insurance to retirement plans and paid time off, these uniform benefit packages were designed to meet the needs of the entire workforce in one fell swoop.
But over the past few years, these off-the-shelf benefit options have presented a bit of a challenge. With five generations now in the workplace — Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Baby Boomers and the silent generation — there are diverse expectations about pay and benefit packages.
For example, baby boomers and the silent generation tend to value health insurance and a robust retirement plan. Meanwhile, Gen X workers seek a healthy work-life balance, advancement opportunities and a competitive 401(k) — or a retirement savings plan that lets you set aside and invest money from your paycheck, to which your employer can then contribute. Millennials and Gen Z prioritize flexibility — they want more paid time off, the ability to work when and where they wish and tuition reimbursement.
There is no one-size-fits-all compensation package that can fairly satisfy each generation of workers. Employees today want to feel heard, understood and cared for by their employer. Furthermore, most want a job that fits with their personal interests and lifestyle.
As a result, companies are moving away from traditional group benefits and taking a more personalized approach to compensation.
Many organizations are using social listening tools, focus groups and surveys to gather information about the types of benefits employees want. Others are taking it a step further and having one-on-one conversations to determine what motivates each individual worker and provides them with a sense of purpose at work. How else will we know what, specifically, each employee wants unless we ask them?
By collecting this information, organizations can tailor packages that effectively meet the varying wants and needs of the diverse workforce. They’re offering mixes of pay, bonuses, flex time, paid time off, retirement plans, student loan repayment assistance and professional growth opportunities. Some companies have designed an a la carte menu of benefits, with which employees can pick and choose the perks they care most about.
According to a recent survey conducted by WorldatWork and KornFerry, organizations also are offering more non-traditional benefits that can further acknowledge employees’ concerns and responsibilities outside of work. Eldercare resource and referral services, women advancement initiatives and disaster relief funds all became significantly more prevalent in employee benefits programs within the last year. Telemedicine, identity theft insurance and paid parental leave offerings increased as well.
And many organizations are taking innovation one step further. One firm recently introduced a new benefits reward program in which employees earn points based on both personal and company-wide achievements and then cash them in for perks across various categories: health and wellness, travel, housing, transportation, time off, annual grocery passes — you name it. The purpose is to give employees the power to choose the types of perks that mean the post to them.
Personalized pay can boost attraction and retention
The unemployment rate is the lowest it’s been in decades, and the war for talent is extremely tough. The average tenure for workers is 4.6 years. For millennials, it’s half that.
This sort of high employee turnover can take a massive toll on a company’s bottom line: Experts estimate that it can cost up to twice an employee’s salary to recruit and train a replacement. Not to mention, employee churn can damage company morale and tarnish your company’s reputation.
Customized pay and benefits plans can make an employer be more attractive in a tight, crowded job market. If you want to not only attract top talent but retain them as well, it’s worth taking the time to understand what matters to your candidates and offering them personalized pay and reward packages.
Organizations need to introduce more flexibility into their pay packages and adapt to the needs of the changing workforce. After all, when you invest in your employees, you invest in the overall success and performance of your business.
SOURCE: Wesselkamper, B. (11 February 2019) "Goodbye group benefits. Hello personalized pay" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.employeebenefitadviser.com/opinion/tailored-employee-benefit-plans-gaining-popularity
7 employee engagement trends gaining momentum
According to a Gallup survey, organizations with highly-engaged employees outperform the competition by 147 percent in earnings per share. Read this blog post for seven employee engagement trends that are gaining momentum.
Employee engagement is top-of-mind in the HR industry these days. In many ways, it might be one of employers’ biggest pain points. In this tight job market, it’s easier for employees to jump ship — and that’s a big headache for HR. Employers now are working more diligently to retain their key talent who are apt to go elsewhere to seek the working environment they desire.
According to the Society for Human Resource Management, it costs a company, on average, six to nine months of an employee’s salary to replace her. So, for an employee making $40,000 a year, that’s $20,000 to $30,000 in recruiting and training expenses. Others predict the cost is even more: That losing a salaried employee can cost as much as twice their salary, especially for a high earner or executive-level employee.
Think about it. Salary and benefits are important, sure. But in this job market, employees can find what they are looking for in a compensation package. So, what makes the difference? It’s employee engagement — the extent to which an employee’s personal goals and interests align with the vision and goals of the company.
Organizations with highly-engaged employees outperform the competition by 147% in earnings per share, according to Gallup. More companies are realizing the effect that improved employee engagement is having on employee performance, retention and productivity. A G2 Crowd survey reported that in 2019, companies will increase their spending on employee engagement by 45%.
This year has all the makings of being a pivotal year for employee engagement with retention being equally, or even more as important, as recruitment. HR professionals, and companies as a whole, need to review employee engagement practices to make sure their strategy impacts retention, production and performance.
What’s ahead in 2019 for employee engagement? Here are my predictions.
Employers will put much more focus on employee engagement. An analysis from PwC says the new standard for employee engagement is fulfillment — the feeling people have when their work and their motivations are aligned and they gain a sense of meaning and purpose as a result. Others say it’s the employee experience — that it’s more than better perks and benefits. It’s ensuring that employees have positive, meaningful interactions with the organization at every step. Whether it’s employee engagement, fulfillment or experience, 2019 is going to see more employers, and the industry itself, paying much more attention to employee engagement.
Flexibility will be all-important. Millennials, the largest generation in the workforce, have made it loud and clear that they want more workplace flexibility including the ability to shift work hours (such as starting the day earlier or later) and working from home one or two days a week. Turns out that non-millennials are saying the same thing. Look for companies to incorporate more flexibility into company policies this year.
The annual performance review continues to be on its way out. The trend away from the annual performance review in favor of more frequent, real-time reviews and informal feedback will start to take hold in 2019. Ongoing communication is a much more effective tactic. Millennials, in particular, like at least monthly review format/commentary. In addition, steps for development, growth and mentoring can influence an employee’s satisfaction and desire to stay with the company.
Employee appreciation will move to a year-round activity. Call it what you want — recognition, appreciation, etc. But it’s not about an end-of-year holiday party or an employee of the month recognition. And it doesn’t have to always be about the cost of doing it — a manager’s thanks and lunch brought in at the end of a big project can go a long way. This year will see more attention to demonstrating employee appreciation on a year-round basis and rethinking the ways in which we can show it.
Companies will add benefits that satisfy employee lifestyle needs. Employee engagement no longer is one-size-fits-all. Employees have various lifestyle needs that companies can address that show they care about employee life stages. For example, more attention is being paid today to the needs of nursing mothers, and many companies are providing lactation services. For example, Goldman Sachs last year started paying for nursing mothers to ship breast milk to their homes when they travel. PwC introduced a phased return-to-work program following parental leave. Look for companies to identify and add more unique benefits in 2019 that show their employees they care about their life stages.
Employers will take a much more holistic approach to wellness. Gone are the days when employee wellness meant providing a gym membership and orchestrating an internal health fair. In recent years we have seen companies start broadening their wellness approach. Happy, healthy employees are generally engaged employees and that involves addressing all aspects of wellness. According to the University of Maryland, there are eight mutually-interdependent dimensions of wellness — physical, mental, emotional, social, occupational, financial, purposeful and environmental. They don’t have to be equally balanced, and employers likely can’t address all of them. 2019 will see employers studying the holistic wellness approach and making changes that fit their particular organization and their employees the best.
Gamification will be adopted more widely. Whether it’s for onboarding, benefits communication/understanding, wellness programs or other employee engagement tactics, gamification will be considered and adopted more widely this year. Gamification techniques can be used as well to increase use of intranets, social media platforms and mobile communication. Look for employers this year to create more apps and digital games to increase employee engagement.
Employees who feel their companies care about them are more engaged and dedicated to company success. Those of us in HR need to pay as much attention to employee engagement this year as we do to compensation and benefits in order to succeed with employee retention.
SOURCE: Roberts, R. (13 February 2019) "7 employee engagement trends gaining momentum" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/opinion/these-employee-engagement-trends-are-gaining-momentum
Don’t Forget to Post OSHA Injury and Illness Data at Your Worksite
Employers who are covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA's) record-keeping rule must post a summary of 2018 work-related injury and illnesses in a noticeable place from Feb. 1 to April 30. Read this blog post from SHRM to learn more.
Employers that are covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA's) record-keeping rule must post a summary of 2018 work-related injury and illnesses in a noticeable place from Feb. 1 to April 30. Here are some compliance tips for employers to review.
Required Posting
Many employers with more than 10 employees—except for those in certain low-risk industries—must keep a record of serious work-related injuries and illnesses. But minor injuries that are treated only by first aid do not need to be recorded.
Employers must complete an incident report (Form 301) for each injury or illness and log work-related incidents on OSHA Form 300. Form 300A is a summary of the information in the log that must be posted in the worksite from Feb. 1 to April 30 each year.
"This information helps employers, workers and OSHA evaluate the safety of a workplace, understand industry hazards, and implement worker protections to reduce and eliminate hazards," according to OSHA's website.
Employers should note that they are required to keep a separate 300 log for each "establishment," which is defined as "a single physical location where business is conducted or where services or industrial operations are performed."
If employees don't work at a single physical location, then the establishment is the location from which the employees are supervised or that serves as their base.
Employers frequently ask if they need to complete and post Form 300A if there were no injuries at the relevant establishment. "The short answer is yes, " said Tressi Cordaro, an attorney with Jackson Lewis in Washington, D.C. "If an employer recorded no injuries or illnesses in 2018 for that establishment, then the employer must enter 'zero' on the total line."
Correct Signature
Before the OSHA Form 300A is posted in the worksite, a company executive must review it and certify that "he or she has examined the OSHA 300 Log and that he or she reasonably believes, based on his or her knowledge of the process by which the information was recorded, that the annual summary is correct and complete," according to OSHA.
A common mistake seen on 300A forms is that companies forget to have them signed, noted John Martin, an attorney with Ogletree Deakins in Washington, D.C.
There are only four company representatives who may certify the summary:
- An owner of the company.
- An officer of the corporation.
- The highest-ranking company official working at the site.
- The immediate supervisor of the highest-ranking company official working at the site.
Businesses commonly make the mistake of having an HR or safety supervisor sign the form, said Edwin Foulke Jr., an attorney with Fisher Phillips in Atlanta and Washington, D.C., and the former head of OSHA under President George W. Bush.
They need to get at least the plant manager to sign it, he said, noting that the representative who signs Form 300A must know how numbers in the summary were obtained.
Once the 300A form is completed, it should be posted in a conspicuous place where other employment notices are usually posted.
Electronic Filing
The Improve Tracking of Workplace Injuries and Illnesses rule requires covered establishments with at least 20 employees to also electronically submit Form 300A to OSHA.
Large establishments with 250 or more employees were also supposed to begin electronically submitting data from the 300 and 301 forms in 2018, but the federal government recently eliminated that requirement. However, those establishments still must electronically submit their 300A summaries.
The deadline to electronically submit 2018 information is March 2.
SOURCE: Nagele-Piazza, L. (1 February 2019) "Don’t Forget to Post OSHA Injury and Illness Data at Your Worksite" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/legal-and-compliance/employment-law/pages/don%E2%80%99t-forget-to-post-osha-injury-and-illness-data-at-your-worksite.aspx/
Top 4 HR trends to watch this year
HR departments are now looking to implement innovative strategies to better engage employees and maximize productivity. Continue reading this blog post for the top HR trends of 2019.
HR professionals can no longer rest on their laurels. They are now looking to implement innovative strategies to better engage employees, improve the company’s brand both internally and externally, maximize productivity and increase the organization’s profitability.
So how can HR professionals go about making this happen? The success of HR will largely be based on staying nimble, evolving their organization’s policies and leveraging technological advances to ultimately reshape their workplace practices.
With that in mind, here are the top HR trends that will take center stage in 2019.
The gig economy and the importance of flexibility. The gig economy, which is comprised of individuals with short-term or temporary engagements with a company, is substantially important to employers. Here, workers are seeking increased flexibility and control over their work environments. Since many questions remain unanswered regarding worker classification issues and the application of existing laws in the gig economy, look for the Department of Labor to issue an opinion letter or guidance in 2019 detailing how a company may compliantly work within the gig economy and not run afoul of existing independent contractors.
Flexibility also is important for all employees — not just for the gig economy. While telecommuting and remote positions are not new, they are being emphasized again to better engage employees and increase retention metrics.
The tech effect on future of HR. The strategic and consistent use of workforce data analytics to predict and improve a company’s performance has exploded over the last several years, with additional momentum expected in 2019. While most HR professionals rely on metrics for basic recruiting and turnover rates, more in-depth analytics and trend spotting has become the norm.
Once trends are identified in, for example, turnover rates, an HR professional should have the tools to dive into the data and analyze root causes, such as the need for manager training, review of compensation strategies or a change in the company’s culture. Using predictive analytics in the HR space is helping companies make better informed, dynamic and wiser decisions based on historical data, as well as placing HR on the level of other data-driven company departments, such as finance and marketing.
The collection of this enormous amount of data also poses challenges and potential risks to companies, including negative perceptions among employees about how their data is being used, employee privacy laws and potential security breaches. Strong and comprehensive security policies, protocols and controls are necessary to ensure employers are keeping their employees’ data safe. In 2019, a steady flow of communications to employees regarding advanced security and usage policies is key to prevent data misuse or misunderstanding regarding how information is collected and used.
Artificial intelligence also will continue to be a significant focus driving improvement in the HR arena. Determining which data to collect, analyze and protect will provide opportunities for AI to assume a larger role in HR. Also, in some large organizations, AI already is being used for more than just automating repetitive HR tasks, such as onboarding new employees. The future of AI for most companies will include creating more personalized employee experiences as well as supporting critical decisions. From analyzing performance data to eliminating biases when screening candidates, AI will continue to be a pivotal HR tool.
Strategies for successful recruitment. Running an effective talent pipeline should be the objective of all hiring endeavors. Pipelining is consistently gaining traction as a recruitment tool for new employees. The concept employs marketing concepts to ensure that companies have a diverse group of strong recruits waiting to be hired. Pipelining reduces time to hire and leads to better quality candidates.
Health, wellness and adequate employee training. Another area of importance is multi-faceted wellness programs, which focus on an employee’s total well-being, from nutrition to financial wellness. These programs often include a comprehensive employee assistance program, training and activities during worktime. The training can focus on anything from physical health to development of employees’ knowledge base and technology-focused education. A greater emphasis also is being placed on workplace communication coaching, such as collaboration and negotiation, which are critical to success in the workplace.
Continued training and heightened prevention of sexual harassment and discrimination will be another trend this year. Organizations big and small must ensure that compliant policies are in place and employees are trained on the policies. Several states including California, New York, Connecticut and Maine already mandate that private employers must provide harassment training to workers, and the number of states requiring this training is expected to increase in the coming years.
SOURCE: Seltzer, M. (29 January 2019) "Top 4 HR trends to watch this year" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/opinion/top-4-hr-trends-to-watch-this-year?feed=00000152-a2fb-d118-ab57-b3ff6e310000