Researching, enrolling and updating benefits continues to be a top task of employees on the corporate intranet (after directory, search and news which continue to be amongst the top visited areas regardless of company and industry). Yet, most benefits programs are outsourced and hosted by outside vendors.
According to a report on the BenefitNews.com highlighting the research of Forrester (EBN/Forrester Research 2005 Benefits Strategy and Technology Study), nearly one-quarter of companies in a recent survey plan on implementing a benefits portal in the next two years.
In Five steps to implementing a benefit portal (a very good article), France Lampron highlights the key five steps to implementing a portal:
Step 1: Determine organizational readiness.
Assessing the readiness of your organization will allow you to put the proper timeline in place for the implementation of a benefits portal. Does everyone in the organization have access to a PC? If you have a manufacturing plant, do you have kiosks or PCs in a private area for employees?
Step 2: Review the current benefits processes.
Whenever you consider moving any process to the Web, start with a review of the current process. Look at one process at a time by gathering the forms, the rules and reviewing the workflow to decide if there is room for improvement. If you are going to upgrade the process, now is the time. On the other hand, if your current forms are up-to-date and efficient, it is a good idea to use them for your online templates.
While a comprehensive benefits portal will address everything from open enrollment to vacation time it is open enrollment that typically drives HR to seek a technology change. Be sure to select a benefit portal that supports your organization's open enrollment.
Step 3: Think about what you need from the system.
Whether you build or buy the technology to support your benefit portal, you want to gain an interactive, secure, portal that you can update in the HR department. These are the kinds of questions to ask each vendor (or your company's IT department, if it plans to build the application):