How NOT to Pick Employee Health Benefits
1 big thing: Benefits Don’t Have to be a Sad Sitcom
The Office "Health Care" episode dramatically highlights the challenges around employee healthcare decisions and what NOT to do.
We can all relate to needing to save money but also wanting to offer (and/or have) great employee benefits. When selecting a health benefits strategy, this episode provides a beautiful case study worth watching (and apparently writing a long LinkedIn post) to try to capture the wisdom. So here are my takeaways watching this episode from the lens of an employee health benefits consultant and health coach.
Why it matters. Employee benefits can be stressful, but so is life! We have come up with creative ways of defeating stress, now it’s time to leave behind what does not work and move forward with winning strategies.
4 things NOT to do:
❌ Delegate the task to someone else on your team because you are overwhelmed by the work
❌ Choose the worst plan thinking this is the only way to save
❌ Hide in your office because you are so embarrassed by your benefits
❌ Throw ice cream sandwiches at your employees to make it all better
4 things leaders should DO:
✅ Collaborate with your employees about the process
✅ Explore direct contracts with providers to offer better care with lower costs
✅ Support healthy lifestyle decisions with incentives and a healthy culture
✅ Work with partners like Bull Benefits who offer proactive, proven solutions
Health Care Episode Summarized to help you appreciate the episode, below is a summary of Season 1 Episode 3 "Health Care":
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Dunder Mifflin is under financial pressure, and it's important that the branch manager, Michael Scott, chooses an inexpensive plan for his employees. However, Michael wanting to be liked (as always), isn't enthusiastic about cutting their benefits. So he quickly tries delegating the assignment until he finds a taker in Dwight who eagerly accepts the challenge of choosing an employee health plan. Dwight, who did not understand ERISA and his Fiduciary Responsibilities under a group health plan to its members, believes in cutting costs and picks the absolute worst plan. Chaos ensues and the episode deserves to be watched to experience it fully.
Hope this was fun to read, now let’s not be like Michael or Dwight at least when it comes to employee benefit management!
-Justin