Building A Diverse Workforce In A Small Business
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There can be little argument against the value a diverse workplace. It’s a critical element of driving innovation, increasing creativity and securing market share, but diversity also makes growth and recruitment more manageable and helps to limit the word all employers want to avoid -- turnover. Diversity is significant enough that two-thirds of people polled in a Glassdoor survey said the level of diversity was important when evaluating job offers. This can prove to be a difficult task for a small business in the tech industry.
So what is workforce diversity? It’s more than simply not discriminating based on race, gender, national origin or disability. Diversity offers an alternative view or difference in opinions. Hiring employees with differing backgrounds in religion, from varying age ranges, sexual orientation, political affiliation, personality and education can become invaluable to an organization.
That being said, it can be nearly impossible to implement or force onto a set of employees. According to Harvard Business Review, researchers examined the success of mandated diversity training programs. While it’s simple enough to teach employees the right answers to questionnaires on bias or and appropriate responses for a given situation, the actual training rarely ever sticks, not more than a few days anyway. There have even been findings that suggest these mandated diversity training courses actually have adverse effects.
In the same article from HBR, managers said that when diversity training was mandatory, it is often met with confrontation and even anger. Some, in fact, reported an increase in animosity toward a minority group. On the other hand, when workers see the training as voluntary, the result is improved attitudes and an increase of 9-13% in the hiring of minorities five years from the training.
So if diversity is crucial to the success of a company or organization, but it's also something that can tough to implement, how does an employer ensure that they are fostering a work environment that is diverse? There are a few things employers can consider when they want to step up their game in building a more well-rounded and diverse workforce.
Evaluate The Hiring Process
Assess the level of diversity in the company. Does it reflect the general workforce of the industry or of the community? Figure out which departments are behind or lacking and what the source might be. Is a team diverse in most areas but still behind in management positions? Are managers hiring based on personal biases?
Top leadership needs to be an advocate for diversity in all hiring decisions, from the entry level to leadership positions. If there is a hiring test, see that managers are adhering to it. The HBR articles noted that even when hiring tests were in place, they were used selectively and that the results were ignored.
Having a hiring panel, or a system of checks and balances, would ensure that no one person would abuse the hiring process to lean too much on their own biases. Employers should also seek out new methods or places to network.
Mentoring Programs
Implementing a mentorship or sponsorship program will create a casual relationship between employees that will help alleviate some biases a manager might have and vice versa. Providing an opportunity for stewardship and responsibility allows the mentor to bestow knowledge on their mentee as they watch them grow.
Mentees will see the value in this experience and come to respect their mentor, laying away any preconceived biases or prejudices. They will become more invested in their work and the organization. Much like training programs, mentoring programs should be optional, not mandatory.
Inclusion
Similar to soldiers who serve together on the frontlines, employees who are part of a self-managed team and working as equals who work to complete projects will learn to dismiss biases on their own. Fostering an environment where employees can connect and collaborate increases engagement and allows for more contact than they may make when left to themselves.
In order to succeed in a global market, a tech organization must move past using "diversity" as a meaningless buzzword and step into action by developing and implementing an equal opportunity employment policy, following the Federal EEOC guidelines. Building and maintaining a diverse workforce is essential to growth and innovation in any industry, especially tech. But when handled poorly, or forced upon employees, it will cause more than a few headaches or even lawsuits. It requires change, a new take on leadership and creating a company culture based the business or service rather than a culture based on individual preferences or ideas.
Read the original article.
Source:
Cruikshank G. (4 December 2017). "Building A Diverse Workforce In A Small Business" [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2017/12/04/building-a-diverse-workforce-in-a-small-business/#2b42986a4250
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Employers using fast-feedback apps to measure worker satisfaction, engagement
In this article from Employee Benefit Advisors, we take a look at measuring worker satisfaction and engagement through the use of feedback applications. Let us know what your verdict is!
The days of employers conducting employee engagement surveys once every year might be coming to an end.
Thanks to “fast feedback” applications, employers can conduct quick online surveys of their employees to measure how engaged they are at their jobs. The data from these polls is then collated and presented, often in real time on dashboards, to employers to show their workforce’s level of engagement and satisfaction. Some of these web-based programs also can present CEOs with steps they can take to improve their environment and culture.
These tools are available from Culture Amp, Glint, TINYpulse, PeakOn and others.
One of the main benefits of fast feedback, according to Glint CEO Jim Barnett, is that it cuts down on “regrettable attrition,” which occurs when talented employees leave for better jobs.
Glint customers include eBay, Glassdoor, Intuit, LinkedIn and Sky Broadcasting. These clients send out e-mail invitations to workers and ask them to take a voluntary survey, which can feature either stock employee engagement questions or queries that can be fine-tuned for a specific workplace.
Glint recommends 10 to 20 questions per Pulse — what it calls employee engagement survey sessions — and results are sent back to the employer’s HR directors and senior executives. According to Barnett, the Pulses are confidential but not anonymous. Barnett explains that while anonymous surveys do not record the respondent’s name and job title, a confidential survey means that only Glint knows who took the Pulse. The employer is only presented data from specific job groups or job descriptors within an enterprise, such as a production team or IT support.
This month, Glint announced two new capabilities to its real-time employee feedback program, called Always-On and On-Demand Surveys. Always-On allows workers to express their concerns at any time and On-Demand Surveys gives managers and executives the opportunity to perform quick, ad hoc surveys of staffers.
“Some of our companies use the Always-On Survey if they want people on their team to give feedback at any time on a particular topic,” he says.
Firms also use fast feedback for onboarding new hires, Barnett says. Companies have set up Glint’s program to gauge new workers at their 30 and 60 day-mark of their employment to “see how that onboarding experience impacted their engagement,” he says.
Culture Amp also provides fast feedback tools via a library of survey templates that cover a range of employee feedback topics including diversity and inclusion, manager effectiveness, wellness and exit interviews. Culture Amp’s clients include Aligned Leisure, Box, Etsy, McDonalds, Adobe and Yelp.
“We encourage customers to customize surveys to make the language more relevant, and to ensure every question reflects something the company is willing to act on,” says Culture Amp CEO Didier Elzinga.
Culture Amp presents its survey results to employers via a dashboard that displays the top drivers of employee engagement in real time. “Users can then drill down to understand more about each question, including how participants responded across a range of different demographic factors,” Elzinga says.
Sometimes CEOs are presented with news they were not prepared to hear, according to Elzinga. Some customers take to the employee survey process with the mindset of ‘myth busting,’ he says. “They want to know if some truth they hold dear is actually just a story they’ve been telling themselves. Every now and then, an employee survey will provide surprising results to an HR or executive team,” he says. “Whether people go into a survey looking to bust myths or gather baseline data, the important part is being open to accepting the results.”
Glassdoor takes the pulse of its workforce
Glint customer Glassdoor, the online job recruitment site that also allows visitors to anonymously rate their current employer’s work environment, compensation and culture, not only urges its employees to rate the firm using its own tools, the company also uses Glint’s software to view employee engagement at a more granular level.
Glassdoor conducted its first Glint Pulse in October 2016 and has rolled out three since then. The next is scheduled for January 2018, according to Marca Clarke, director of learning and organizational development at Glassdoor.
“We looked at employee engagement and the things that drive discretionary effort [among employees who work harder],” Clarke says. “This is strongly correlated with retention as well.”
Clarke said that one Glint Pulse found that the employees’ view of Glassdoor culture varied from location to location. Of its 700-person workforce, people working in the newer satellite offices were happier than the employees in its Mill Valley, Calif., headquarters. She speculates that this response could be due to newer, more eager employees hired in brand new, recently opened offices.
“People think culture is monolithic that should be felt across the company but we could see that there was some variation from office to office. With Glint, we were able to slice the data not just by region and job function but [we could] go to the manager level to look at how people with different performance ratings think about the culture,” she says.
Recent research from Aon Hewitt found that a 5% increase in employee engagement is linked to a 3% lift in revenue a year later. According to Barnett, Glint clients that regularly conduct surveys and take steps to engage their employees often see a boost in the price of their company shares.
“Companies in the top quartile of Glint scores last year [saw] their stock outperform the other companies by 40%,” he says. “They now have the data and can see that employee engagement and the overall employee experience really do you have a dramatic impact on the result of their company.”
Read the original article.
Source:
Albinus P. (5 December 2017). "Employers using fast-feedback apps to measure worker satisfaction, engagement" [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.employeebenefitadviser.com/news/employers-using-fast-feedback-apps-to-measure-worker-satisfaction-engagement?brief=00000152-1443-d1cc-a5fa-7cfba3c60000
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7 Ways Employers Can Support Older Workers And Job Seekers
Credit: Shutterstock
With the unemployment rate (4.1%) at its lowest since 2000, employers are struggling to retain their best workers and attract qualified new ones. Although their efforts are often directed at Millennials, in places where people in their 20s and 30s are increasingly hard to find, employers are equally focused on people in their 50s and 60s.
For example, in May, more than 170 New England employers, policymakers and business leaders came together for an event notably titled, Gray is the New Green: Unleashing the Power of Older Workers and Volunteers to Build a Stronger Northern New England. And at a recent Manchester, N.H., workforce strategies event, AARP-N.H. State Director Todd Fahey urged HR professionals to talk with older employees about the possibility of continuing to work on a flexible basis after they hit the traditional retirement age of 65.
As a boomer and a career coach, I’m heartened by this turn of the events. Of course, I’m not so naïve as to think age discrimination is over. I agree with what Chris Farrell just said in a Next Avenue post: “Older workers still face a serious uphill climb in the job market in many respects.”
So how can employers do a better job of finding, retaining and supporting older job applicants and employees?
To find out, I interviewed Greg Voorheis, the mature worker program coordinator and Governor’s Award coordinator for the state of Vermont. I also watched a video he conducted with executives from the 2017 Governor's Award winner, Chroma Technology Group, a manufacturing firm in the biotech space, based in Bellows Fall, Vt. Incidentally, workers 55 and over currently make up nearly 30% of Vermont's workforce.
7 Tips for Supporting Older Workers and Job Seekers
Here are seven tips from Voorheis and Chroma:
1. Advertise job openings in newspapers in addition to online outlets. “One of the things we’ve learned over the years is that the mature population still really likes written material, like newspapers,” says Voorheis.
The Chroma Technology Group advertises its openings in print and welcomes hard copy applications to accommodate people who might not be comfortable applying online.
2. Display photos and videos of older people in recruitment marketing materials. That helps make it very clear that all ages are welcome to apply.
3. Cut down on ageism by using a group-interview model. HR departments are often staffed by younger workers, and that can result in unnecessary age bias — conscious or otherwise. This is why Chroma uses teams of four to eight people to do its hiring. “That way, no one person’s perspective carries too much weight. And if there are biases, they are minimized,” says the company's HR director, Angela Earle Gray.
4. Encourage mentoring. When older workers mentor younger workers, that helps the employees and it’s good for the company, too.
“Experience is an important thing to pass on,” says Chroma President Paul Millman. “Work habits, ways of doing things, and attitudes towards work all mature over time.”
Chroma uses peer work trainers to both help onboard employees and to continue mentoring them until they’re able to demonstrate competency in their new roles.
5. Provide ample training for older workers. Experienced employees are usually eager to get training that will keep their skills sharp and make them more employable. Yet sometimes employers hesitate to provide it because they worry about the return on investment for workers who might retire soon. Chroma takes a different tack by encouraging all workers to seek training opportunities.
“If you can show us how that is going to benefit you, we’ll find a way to get you that training, or something similar,” says Gray.
6. Offer flexible work arrangements.Voorheis says seasonal work, such as the snowbird programs offered at IBM, can be especially attractive to older workers.
Even though Chroma prefers employees to work full-time, it offers telecommuting and flextime to accommodate workers’ needs. And when staffers have needed to go part-time for a stretch, the company has tried to make that work. “We’re not fond of ridding ourselves of employees,” says Millman.
Sabbaticals are another popular option at Chroma. Long-term employees have the option to take an extended leave, for up to 11 weeks. The leave is unpaid, but the company continues to pay for medical and dental coverage.
7. Provide a wide range of benefits. Chroma also offers generous retirement benefits, company stock and a variety of wellness programs, including reimbursement for gym memberships and fitness programs. It runs monthly employee education programs, too, on topics like retirement planning, wellness and advance-care planning.
“We take very good care of mature workers at Chroma,” says Gray. “But it was never a conscious choice to do that. The conscious choice was to take very good care of all our employees.”
Voorheis echoes that sentiment, saying: “Good behaviors and programs that benefit mature workers benefit workers of all ages
Read the original article.
Source:
Collamer N. (27 November 2017). "7 Ways Employers Can Support Older Workers And Job Seekers" [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2017/11/27/7-ways-employers-can-support-older-workers-and-job-seekers/#443ed6745ff0
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R-E-S-P-E-C-T: How To Earn Respect At Work
It's important to feel respected in the workplace. Here are some helpful tips for keeping and earning respect at work.
Someone I was coaching recently wrote in their development plan that one of their goals was to “earn the respect of more people at work.” I thought that was an interesting goal and asked her to tell me more about her comment. She said, “I just don’t feel like people respect me so I want to earn more respect.” When I asked her specifically what behaviors she thought she needed to exhibit in order to earn respect, there was a long pause and she gave me a blank stare.
You’d be surprised how many times I go through this same “respect” discussion. So here’s the deal…respect is something you have to earn – it’s not something handed out free on a silver platter. If you want to earn respect then you need to ask yourself this question, “How can I change my behavior to earn more respect from others?”
Here are some of my personal suggestions for earning respect:
- Use active listening skills – really listen and hear what people are saying.
- Treat others with dignity and courtesy at all times.
- Keep all your commitments – and never make a commitment you can’t keep.
- Be patient with people; realize that most people want to do what’s right.
- Treat others as they would like to be treated; in other words, learn to flex your social style so you can work better with others.
- Don’t state your opinions unless you can back them up with data. And be sure you fully understand the situation before you comment on it.
- Be sincere.
- Be generous.
- Be humble.
- Be confident, but exhibit confidence without arrogance.
Sometimes I think we speed through life so quickly that we don’t take enough time to really hear other people. To do so takes the ability to be patient, generous with your time, and sincerely care about others. These are all behaviors that will lead to earning more respect from co-workers.
Read the original article.
Source:
Quast L. (27 February 2012). "R-E-S-P-E-C-T: How To Earn Respect At Work" [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.forbes.com/sites/lisaquast/2012/02/27/r-e-s-p-e-c-t-how-to-earn-respect-at-work/#164b42015749
Benefits to plants at your desk
Leaves on trees have turned, and a walk to the office often feels like a walk through an icebox. Open windows are a thing of months past. Cooped up, breathing dry indoor air, no one could blame you for feeling down.
But you can brighten your mood and boost your health by adding a plant or two to your workspace. You don’t even need much natural light or a green thumb.
Plants bring a bit of nature inside, along with other good stuff.
They make people happy, and taking care of them can make people even happier. That’s especially true if you’re digging in a garden – horticultural therapy helps sharpen memory and cognitive skills – but desk-side pruning can do wonders for your mental state too.
Plants are also terrific air purifiers.
The air in your office (and home) might be more polluted than air outside – especially if you’re in a big city. Furniture, carpet, plastic items and other synthetic materials are to blame, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Plants help by wicking away airborne chemicals and the carbon dioxide we puff out, and then give us oxygen, research from NASA shows.
Four decades ago, NASA scientists found more than 100 volatile organic compounds floating through the air of the Skylab space station. The bad stuff came from synthetic materials off-gassing low levels of chemicals such as formaldehyde, benzene and trichloroethylene – known irritants and potential carcinogens that are in earthly buildings too.
When the chemicals are trapped in an area, people breathing within that same area can get sick because the air isn’t getting “the natural scrubbing by Earth’s complex ecosystem,” as NASA puts it.
Hail plants.
Here are two that demand next to nothing and tolerate very low light (but are just as happy with lots of it). Expect them to live for years and years, without repotting. I speak from experience, but you’ll also find them on plenty of lists and in lots of books about easy-care plants that are good for your health.
Snake Plant or Mother-In-Law’s Tongue (Sansevieria trifasciata)
A sturdy plant with upright and stiff leaves. Ideally, its soil should dry out between waterings. It will grow bigger and look better if you water it as soon as the soil dries (not wait forever) and if it’s in medium light. But it still will live for months if you ignore it, and spring back to robust happiness when you give it a little love.
Pothos (Epipremnum aureum)
A flowing plant with vine-like stems that can easily take over your desk. Ideally, its soil should stay a little moist. But if you let the soil dry out completely, you can jolt the plant back to life with watering. It’s perfectly happy with all kinds of lighting, including florescent, but it will be fuller with better color when it gets decent natural light.
Read the original article.
Source:
Malek M. (4 December 2017). "Benefits to plants at your desk" [web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://workwell.unum.com/2017/12/3255/
5 ways to empower employees to make smart healthcare choices
As an employer, it's important to help your employees out when you can - especially when it comes to making smart healthcare choices. In this article from Employee Benefit Advisor, Anne Stowell lists five different ways to empower your employees.
As uncertainty in healthcare policy lingers, creating a benefits package with real value for both employers and employees can seem increasingly complex and difficult to achieve. Striving to provide the right care services — ones that are easy for employees to use, and designed to increase engagement in their care while being mindful of costs — is undoubtedly a tricky balancing act.
So how can employers engage to help employers offer benefits that have real and lasting value, while empowering employees to make smart care choices? Here are five tips:
1) Learn your clients’ hot buttons. Value is one of the most important factors employers consider when shopping for benefits. Rise Broadband, for example, the largest fixed wireless service provider in the U.S., has a large number of employees working in the field to service remote customers. Accessing healthcare when employees are on the road was a real challenge. Jennifer Iannapollo, the company’s director of HR, says their telehealth benefit provides employees with real value, and was the clear answer for this Colorado-based employer.
Bloomberg/file photo
2) Recognize empowerment comes with confidence. Employees won’t use what they aren’t sure of. Iannapollo also was careful to choose a telehealth platform that focused on quality. “Some people needed reassurance about who would be treating them and how they would know their medical history. We reassured them that their medical records and history are collected when they register and that the physicians are all board certified and average 20 years of experience. That provided them with peace of mind,” she says. Security practices and certifications can also add a level of comfort, and are something advisers should keep in mind in their recommendations for any product to employers.
3) Remind employees to take charge of their own healthcare destiny. A recent Teladoc survey of more than 300 employers found that a whopping 66% stated that lack of benefit awareness negatively affects employee engagement with health benefits. That’s where advisers have an opportunity to shine by emphasizing the need to communicate and educate employees not just during benefit season, but whenever/wherever their moment of need might be. “Surround sound” reminders are proven to help. One creative idea that Rise Broadband adopted was dashboard stickers that help field technicians’ keep available benefits top of mind.
4) Combat “vendor fatigue.” Employers are inundated by the staggering number of benefits options, not to mention trying to manage countless vendors that all have a piece of the benefits package puzzle. Advisers can help clear the confusion by working closely with their clients to help them source solutions that meet a broad array of needs for everything from sinus infections to behavioral health to getting second opinions.
5) Educate employers that employee engagement is a winning strategy. Advisers agree with us that technology that provides real-time information for decision-making and access to quality healthcare for employees provides real value. Reed Smith, SVP/employee benefits practice leader, CoBiz Insurance, in Denver, believes that like other disruptive innovation (think Apple and Amazon) that has transformed consumer interactions, engaged telehealth, when deployed effectively, can result in a happier, healthier and more involved employee, which means a healthier bottom line for the employer.
Source:
Stowell A. (8 November 2017). "5 ways to empower employees to make smart healthcare choices" [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.employeebenefitadviser.com/opinion/5-ways-to-empower-employees-to-make-smart-healthcare-choices
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How to Inspire and Energize Your Workforce Every Day
In this article from the SHRM blog, Desda Moss brings up some fascinating points on how to energize your workforce, as well as provides some great examples of books and behavior. Dive in with us below.
- Listening is the highest rated inspirational behavior. We're not inspired as much when someone talks at us as we are when someone listens to us. Time spent crafting beautiful messages matters less than what happens when leaders are quiet. To be an inspiring leader, you have to listen fully, with an open mind.
- Small moments have the biggest impact. Most people recall their most inspired moments as times they were engaged in personal conversations where another person spoke authentically and focused on them. People can hold the words from an inspiring 10-minute conversation for their entire lives. Conversations create an inspirational trigger. For example, a conversation about purpose hits upon why we are at this moment in our lives and in our careers. These conversations transcend what we're doing in the here and now to reveal patterns that take us further, enhance our enjoyment, tap into our passion and spark in us the will to be in service to a larger cause.
- Identifying and vocalizing another person's potential is life-changing.People who inspire us notice and grow our potential—honestly, specifically and graciously. We are often unaware of the unique talents and value we bring. Having someone take the time to tell us is a powerful reminder and can open our minds to what's possible.
- People who inspire us are real, just like us. Contrary to common cultural myths that inspirational leaders are either charismatic iconoclasts or flawless, unflappable ideals, those who inspire us are actually relatable and down-to-earth. Truly inspirational leaders don't script their words, put on false airs or try to be perfect. They get through to us because they're authentic. To be more inspirational, you need to let any well-honed professional persona go. We connect with people on emotional terms. We want to see what they actually care about.
- Technology is killing inspiration. Distraction and distance are enemies of inspiration. One study found that just the appearance of a cellphone on the table during a conversation—even if silenced—reduces empathy. If you want to be inspiring, you need to get away from distractions, electronic or otherwise, and show up fully.
What's the Dish? A Family Recipe for Salsa Lovers
In this month's Dish, we bring you the delicious "Dine In" and "Dine Out" choices from our very own, Abby Graham!
Abby Graham is a Wellness Director Saxon Financial Services. She has been in the insurance, health and wellness industry for over 12 years. Prior to joining Saxon Financial, she spent the last 7 years working for Humana/HumanaVitality. She is passionate about making sure members understand their medical and wellness benefits as well as how to maximize their potential.
Abby holds a degree in Human Resource Development from the University of Tennessee. She has also received her Group Benefits Disability Specialist (GBDS) certification.
She is an active member and board member of the Cincinnati Modern Quilt Guild. Abby also enjoys sewing, quilting, and spending time with her husband, Jon and her son, Carter.
Stay In:
Abby's favorite family recipe is Corn Avocado Salsa. She and her husband make it together. It’s best in the summer when the tomatoes are ripe and the corn is sweet!
1 ripe tomato
1 avocado
1 ear of corn
½ cup chopped cilantro
1 sweet onion
1 jalapeno
2-3 garlic cloves
1 ripe lime
Salt to taste
Grill the tomato until the skin is cracked and peeling off. Cut the avocado and grill it face down for about 5 minutes. Grill the corn until it is cooked all the way. In the meantime, finely chop the onion, jalapeno, cilantro and garlic cloves. Squeeze ½ of the lime over onion, jalapeno, cilantro and garlic combination.
Once tomato, avocado, and corn are finished grilling, cut corn off of the cob, and peel skin off of tomato. Dice tomato and avocado and add to chopped mix. Add salt to taste and serve warm with tortilla chips!
Dine Out:
Her favorite place to Dine Out is Dilly Café. Want driving directions? Get them here.
Our favorite restaurant is the Dilly Café in Mariemont. The outside seating is perfect on a nice night and/or when we have our little one with us. They generally have a band playing, the food is excellent, and the beer and wine list are great! Their crab cakes, wings and burgers are my favorites!
YUM! We hope you enjoy Abby's recipe and dining suggestions. We know we will!
CenterStage...Open Season for Open Enrollment
In this month’s CenterStage, we interviewed Rich Arnold for some in-depth information on Medicare plans and health coverage. Read the full article below.
Open Season for Open Enrollment: What does it mean for you?
There are 10,000 people turning 65 every single day. Medicare has a lot of options, causing the process to be extremely confusing. Rich – a Senior Solutions Advisor – works hard to provide you with the various options available to seniors in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana and reduce them to an ideal, simple, and easy-to-follow plan.
“For me, this is all about helping people.”
– Rich Arnold, Senior Solutions Advisor
What does this call for?
To provide clients with top-notch Medicare guidance, Rich must analyze their current doctors and drugs for the best plan option and properly educate them to choose the best program for their situation and health. It’s a simple, free process of evaluation, education, and enrollment.
For this month’s CenterStage article, we asked Rich to break down Medicare for the senior population who are in desperate need of a break from the confusion.
Medicare Break Down
Part A. Hospitalization, Skilled Nursing, etc.
If you’ve worked for 40 quarters, you automatically obtain Part A coverage.
Part B. Medical Services: Doctors, Surgeries, Outpatient visits, etc.…
You must enroll and pay a monthly premium.
Part C. Medicare Advantage Plans:
Provides most of your hospital and medical expenses.
Part D.
Prescription drug plans available with Medicare.
Under Parts A & B there are two types of plans…
Supplement Plan or Medigap Plan
A Medicare Supplement Insurance (Medigap) policy can help pay some of the health care costs that Original Medicare doesn’t cover, like copayments, coinsurance, and deductibles, coverage anywhere in the US as well as travel outside of the country, pay a monthly amount, and usually coupled with a prescription drug plan.
Advantage Plan
A type of Medicare health plan that contracts with Medicare to provide you with all your Part A and Part B benefits generally through a HMO or PPO, pay a monthly amount from $0 and up, covers emergency services, and offers prescription drug plans.
How does this effect you?
Medicare starts at 65 years of age, but Rich advises anyone turning 63 or 64 years of age to reach out to an advisor, such as himself, for zero cost, to be put onto their calendar to follow up at the proper time to investigate the Medicare options. Some confusion exists about Medicare and Social Security which are separate entities. Social Security does not pay for the Supplement or Advantage plans.
Medicare Open Enrollment: Open Enrollment occurs between October 15th and December 7 – yes, right around the corner! However, don’t panic, Rich and his services can help you if you are turning 65 or if you haven’t reviewed your current plan in over a year – you should seek his guidance.
Your plan needs to be reviewed every year to best fit your needs. If you’re on the verge of 65, turning 65 in the next few months, or over 65, you should consult your Medicare advisor as soon as possible. For a no cost analysis of your needs contact Rich, Saxon Senior Solutions Advisor, rarnold@gosaxon.com, 513-808-4879.
16 building blocks that bolster employee engagement
Need a strategy for improving engagement from your employees? Check out this great read by Lauren Stead
Do you know what sets your company apart from the rest for job seekers? Is it your recent accomplishments? How about your Fitness Fridays or Casual Mondays? Or is it the opportunities you provide for employees to grow throughout your firm and take their careers to the next level?
The chances are it’s all of these things, which collaboratively come together to build up your culture. Today, culture is what sells your company above, as innovation is no longer a reliable way to set yourself apart from your competition. What makes for a great culture is great people, engaged in their company.
So how can you get ahead and stay ahead in this current market? How, exactly, do you build up your culture so employees stay more engaged?
Rusty Lindquist, VP of human capital management strategy for BambooHR, recently spearheaded a panel at the virtual HR conference Elevate 2016. His presentation focused on 16 components that are key improving employee engagement efforts. He said when your current workforce is engaged, they’ll be the ones who help sell the company to others and help it grow.
Lindquist’s breakdown to getting your employees more engaged included these steps:
- Objective – knowing where you’re going and why you should care about it.
People need to know where they’re going. Otherwise, they’ll be aimless and lack motivation to keep going forward, simply spinning their wheels in place. Rusty explained that if you were just set at the top of a mountain and left to roam, you would accomplish far less than the person who’s put at the base and has the summit pointed out to them as the goal. Make sure managers are sharing what the company’s mission and objectives are with their teams, to keep everyone working toward that summit. - Alignment – capability to do work and succeed at it.
Managers need to find the sweet spot between the three factors that make up an employee’s alignment: competency, opportunity, and passion. In other words, an employee needs to actually be able to do what’s set before them, have the chance to move forward afterward, and enjoy what she’s doing. If something is off with these three factors, chances are the employee will be under-performing. - Plan – knowing what the next step is or how to move forward on your career path.
People need to know what to do next and have a clear visualization of a path they can follow. They can be sold on their objective and feel comfortable in the company, but managers need to make sure there’s no confusion on how to achieve that objective. Break down future goals into achievable steps. - Space – having what you need to move forward.
Get out of employees’ way so they can create and accomplish personal goals. Space can mean having autonomy, ownership, permission, trust, influence, or just the right tools. - Contribution – getting things done and feeling like you’re making a difference.
People need to feel that what they’re doing is making a difference. The moment someone feels that they don’t matter, they begin to under-perform. If someone isn’t contributing, it’s a good time to evaluate the other engagement elements to see if something is out of alignment. - Score – keeping score of your contributive value.
Progress and impact need to be measured in some way. If a sense of progress is removed, people tend to contribute less value overall. Rusty compared it to playing a game with yourself. There’s no sense of accomplishment or context if you’re just racking up points by yourself. - Momentum – having a sense of moving forward and inevitability.
Momentum may drop when a project is completed or canceled. Before a new project starts up to take the old’s place, there’s a window where there’s no momentum. While periodic breaks are good, make sure managers are keeping employees focused on the overall summit. - Investment – feeling like you have skin in the game.
This is a factor you can notice outside of the workplace. For example, consider a stamp incentive program at coffee shops. Each time you visit, you’re given a stamp and when you achieve a certain number you’re given a reward. These types of programs instill in you a sense of investment, that you’ve potentially lost out on if you quit now. This is the same sort of feeling employees need to feel from their managers. - Growth – feeling like you’re gaining mastery, progressing personally or professionally.
Everyone likes the idea that they’re getting better at what they do. When careers stagnate, people begin to stall and lose interest in moving forward. Have managers challenge employees so they feel like they’re growing by providing them opportunities to improve personally and professionally. - Meaning – finding fulfillment and purpose in what you do.
Connect people to the work they’re doing through a story. This isn’t necessarily done through the company’s objective or mission statement, and it should be more personal. Managers need to identify what matters to their team, and then connect that meaning to their work through a narrative or story. - Value – feeling appreciated and adequately rewarded for your efforts.
Value isn’t completely tied up in compensation, since more compensation doesn’t always directly improve someone’s engagement. It also relies on rewards and recognition. Managers need to find ways to give people all three. - Identity – knowing who you are, what you’re capable of, and believing in yourself.
This building block relies on the theory of functional fixedness, the idea that people rely on their past successes to inform their next actions. If something has worked in the past, why not continue doing it? Managers need to push employees to think outside the box, consistently innovating new solutions to old problems. - Leadership – having someone who believes in, challenges, and shows you the way.
Every workplace, in some fashion, has a leader who is capable of showing people the way. Most times, these leaders are the ones who can self-diagnose and critique themselves. These employees aren’t necessarily managers or in executive-level positions, but they are the ones people lean on when they need a guiding light. Give these people a platform. - Relationship – having connections with people you care about.
When people are invested in each other, they have a sense that they don’t want to let their team down. Even when things with the company are bad, people will tough it out because they want to stay for the people they’ve built up relationships with. Foster those relationships. - Environment – having surroundings that support and enable your efforts.
If people are living in a bad environment, their behaviors will reflect their surrounding negativity. This was evident in New York’s broken windows theory. The city had high amounts of crime. Some people wanted to bolster the criminal and justice system, and crack down on that crime. A new mayor instead invested in beautifying the environment, cleaning up the city and fixing broken windows. Amazingly, the crime was reduced in those areas. Be aware of your company’s environment and how it impacts employees. - Renewal – finding restoration through balance and moderation.
Finally, this block of engagement is important for every employee. There may be a time when a great worker becomes disengaged and feels burned out. A short break or new challenging project may be in order to rouse spirits once more.
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Source:
Stead L. (2016 November 30). 16 building blocks that bolster employee engagement[Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.hrmorning.com/16-building-blocks-that-bolster-employee-engagement/
