The war for talent is at an all-time high. As a result, employers are offering more incentives to attract and retain employees. While HR departments have historically been the trusted resource for benefits information, growing complexity and changing employee dynamics make this challenging. It is increasingly more difficult for employers to get it right.

According to a recent McKinsey study, there is an unmet need to create a superior experience for employees attempting to navigate the “dizzying array of vendors including insurers, enterprise-resource-planning (ERP) systems, payroll systems, benefits administration interfaces, retirement recordkeepers, and care providers.” Reinforcing this position, a recent study by EY found that employees are looking for more transparent information and recommendations about the benefits best suited to them–with as many as 59% lacking confidence in their understanding.

“The workplace has shifted from a heterogeneous in-office population to one that is culturally, age, & location diverse. As a result, businesses are now forced to create an inclusive and hyper-personalized benefits strategy that leaves their employees feeling cared for and supported with no employee or contractor left behind,” observes Adam H. Michaels, Founder & CEO of Enrollify.

Michaels maintains that Silicon Valley’s answer of AI bots and Avatars bolted to benefits administration tools fall short of the decision support they promise.  The result of this is a mistrusting consumer who perceives AI as manipulation. He points to research completed by insurance carrier Trustmark that suggests that when it comes to their benefits, 93% of employees want to “talk to a human.”

“The problem with all ben tech is that it provides no empathy, leaves no opportunity for Q&A, and instills no confidence,” Michaels opines. “Basically, these AI bots use flawed data from the last twenty years to lead consumers to bad decisions faster.”

Benefits have become increasingly more complex–from design to the volume of options. With the average company offering 17 different benefit plans and a myriad of choices, “open enrollment is a lot like a Cheesecake Factory menu–totally overwhelming! Most employees never open the menu. Instead, they stick with what they did last year,” Michaels notes. “It’s the equivalent to ordering the chicken Caesar salad because it’s easy, and you don’t have to think.” But unlike getting a consistently good meal, when applied to selecting benefits, this has led to an estimated 80% of employees ending up in the wrong coverage–costing the average household $1,431 per year. Equally problematic, defaulting to prior elections all but guarantees a company's strategic priorities to contain costs fail.

Michaels believes the majority of problems in employee benefits administration can be solved through increased employee/consumer engagement and active education from empathetic experts who are people-centric and product-agnostic. In other words, experts whose only objective is helping an employee feel cared for and supported. That’s what the Enrollify PaaS (Platform as a Service) offers.

Founded in 2019, Los Angeles-based Enrollify sought to build an alternative to data-driven bots. Their integrated platform enables agencies and enrollment firms to amplify their clients’ corporate narratives of gratitude and appreciation. Through embedded calls to action, Enrollify helps its subscribers and clients increase employee engagement and facilitate education. By matching employees with credentialed subject matter experts, Benefit Gurus help them feel cared for, supported, and confident in their annual elections.

It seems that Enrollify has stumbled on the answer–to benefit employees, we need to add humans back into the human resources equation.

“Benefiting People is more than a clever catchphrase,” says Michaels. “It’s a commitment to delivering extraordinary value to every stakeholder in the ecosystem while solving a $3.57T problem.” This sense of purpose has led Enrollify, through its subscribers and footprint of more than 4,000 benefit gurus, to deliver increased engagement and empathetic decision support to more than 500,000 U.S. employees in 2022.