Solidify Your Strategy for Annual Enrollment

Take advantage of these resources as you prepare for annual enrollment 2022.

With the busy annual enrollment season fast approaching, August is a good time to do a quick gut check to ensure that your strategy is solid. That’s why we developed the 2022 AE Strategy Kit.

With as many as 12 resources created for benefits and HR professionals, the kit can help you answer important questions like these:

What is “benefits literacy” and why does it matter during annual enrollment?

Like health literacy, benefits literacy is less about reading ability than it is about developing a fundamental knowledge of employee benefits. It’s about the ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform benefits-related decisions.

Due to the increasingly complex nature of employee benefits, a lack of benefits literacy continues to be a significant issue. In a survey by Policygenius, only 4% of Americans could correctly define deductible, coinsurance, copay and out-of-pocket maximum.

Using data from approximately half a million users of the MyChoice^TM Recommendation Engine, this guide explains how benefits literacy, along with state of mind, and financial sensitivities, impact the choices employees make each year during annual enrollment. More importantly, it includes five recommendations on what employers can do to support their employees not only during annual enrollment, but year-round.

How much time do employees spend selecting their benefits?

On average, employees in the U.S. spend more time deciding what to watch on Netflix (18 minutes) than they spend in selecting their benefits (17 minutes)—benefits with a value of several thousand dollars that will serve them and their family members for the next 12 months.

What does this data tell us? It’s that employees do not like shopping for benefits. Even though we are a consumer-driven society that clearly cares about the benefits package being provided to us, we don’t want to take too much time electing or managing that benefits package.

Embedded in the AE Strategy Kit, this blog post explains how these numbers were calculated and, more importantly, how technology can help employees make the most optimal benefits decisions for themselves and their covered dependents.

How do I avoid burnout during annual enrollment?

A long overdue decision by the World Health Organization in 2019 categorized burnout as a syndrome that results from “chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. So, first and foremost, watch for symptoms like these:

feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion;
increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one’s job; and
reduced professional efficacy.

Check out this infographic for five tips how to alleviate burnout. After all, HR professionals can’t take care of others unless you take care of yourself.

What are the pros and cons of an active vs. passive enrollment?

This is perhaps one of the most strategic questions HR pros ask themselves each year. Each model is significantly different from one another and each comes with their own set of consequences:

In an active enrollment, employees must select their benefits by a certain date or risk losing certain coverages.
During a passive enrollment, employees who take no action receive the benefits they had the previous year.

This late in the year, you’ve probably already decided whether to hold an active vs. passive enrollment. If you’re still on the fence, use this handy quiz to get an idea of which direction might make sense for you.

Modeled on Cosmopolitan Magazine’s popular “Cosmo Quiz,” this fun activity uses five questions you ask yourself. Then, just like a Cosmo Quiz, you apply a score to each answer, the sum of which tells you which enrollment model would work best for your organization.

How can I avoid drama within my team during the stressful annual enrollment season?

Annual enrollment only comes once a year. Whether you’re thinking, “Thank goodness!” or “Bring it on!” one thing is certain—AE can be accompanied by both adrenaline and anxiety, enthusiasm and exhaustion.

You’ll get through it. But rather than simply “survive” AE, wouldn’t it be better to “thrive” in AE?

The key to helping your team thrive during this important time of year—and exceed the expectations of the employees you serve—can be summed up in a single word:

Accountability

Developed using Cy Wakeman’s Reality-Based Leadership principles, this guide walks you through four essential elements to building accountability within yourself and your team, thereby avoiding much of the drama that can bubble up during the stressful AE season. If video is more your thing, Solver Dave Plorins also addresses each of the four elements in this short YouTube playlist.

Ready for more?

Check out the 2022 AE Strategy Kit to learn more about these publications and eight more resources.