Is It Time to Rethink Our Approach?

TL;DR Summary

• Most benefits strategies weren’t built from a blank sheet of paper.
• They evolved over time through a series of decisions that made sense when they were made.
• In technology, this phenomenon is often described as technical debt.
• Benefits strategies can develop similar characteristics. Let’s call it Benefits Debt.
• Healthcare has changed dramatically over the last decade.
• Many benefits strategies still reflect assumptions from an earlier healthcare environment.
• Before employers redesign their benefits, they may first need to rethink their approach.

Looking at Benefits Through a Different Lens

For years, benefits conversations have focused on offsetting never-ending challenges by making incremental improvements:

• Reducing costs.
• Improving engagement.
• Adding new programs.
• Enhancing existing benefits.
• Negotiating better renewals.

 
And while those efforts matter, they all tend to start with the same assumption: The current framework is fundamentally correct.

But what if the greatest opportunity isn’t improving the framework?  What if it’s rethinking it?

A Simple Thought Experiment

Let’s imagine for a minute that you are tasked with building a brand new benefits strategy… starting from scratch.

Not in 2010… Not in 2020….
Today.

With everything we now know about:

• Rising healthcare costs
• Virtual care evolution
• Employee expectations
• Healthcare navigation
• Modern access models
• Digital healthcare experiences

 
What would you build? More importantly…

For many employers, the answer is probably:
Not exactly.

The Right Decision Yesterday Isn’t Necessarily the Best One Today

Most benefits strategies weren’t built from a blank sheet of paper. 

They evolved.

• One renewal at a time.
• One carrier decision at a time.
• One vendor relationship at a time.
• One budget cycle at a time.

 
Each decision may have been exactly the right decision when it was made. And that’s the key principle being addressed.

Because this isn’t about bad decisions. 
It’s about one-off, good decisions… accumulated over time.

And in technology, there’s a concept known as technical debt.

Technical debt occurs when systems become increasingly constrained by historical decisions.

• The system still works.
• Sometimes it works very well.
• But it becomes harder to take advantage of new opportunities because the architecture was built around assumptions that no longer exist.

 
Benefits strategies can develop similar characteristics.

Benefits Debt occurs when a benefits strategy reflects yesterday’s limitations more than today’s possibilities.

• Not because employers made mistakes.
• Not because advisors gave bad advice.
• Not because carriers failed.
• But because the healthcare landscape changed.

 
And too often, it changed faster than benefits strategies could evolve with it.

The World of Benefits Has Changed

Consider what’s happened over the last decade.

• Virtual care has matured.
• Consumer expectations have changed.
• New healthcare access models have emerged.
• Healthcare has become increasingly digital.
• Employees have more options than ever before.

 
Yet many benefits strategies were built around a healthcare system where those options didn’t exist.

It’s Time to Reshuffle the Benefits Deck

The challenge may not be that employers have the wrong benefits. The challenge may be that those benefits were arranged for a very different healthcare environment.

Think of it like a deck of cards.

• The goal isn’t to throw away the deck.
• The goal isn’t to buy a new deck.
• The goal is to evaluate how the cards are arranged.

 
And whether they’re still being used in the most effective way possible.

• Healthcare has changed.
• The available tools have changed.
• Employee expectations have changed.

Building A Better Path Forward

The employers that navigate the future most successfully may not be the ones that spend the most.
And they may not be the ones that cut the deepest.

They may be the organizations willing to challenge assumptions… reevaluate long-held beliefs…
And reframe the way they think about healthcare delivery.