2021 Signature Awards - Financial Wellness

Financial wellness programs work to address employees’ total financial circumstances, rather than focusing solely on retirement. These programs can help employees with cash management, debt reduction strategies, saving for college, home buying and other financial life events that people face throughout their careers. This category highlights financial wellness programs offered by plan sponsors that achieved significant results.

1^st Place – The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) with Prudential Retirement
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) is North America's largest transportation network, serving a population of 15.3 million people across a 5,000-square-mile area surrounding New York City. They employ more than 70,000 people. The MTA wanted to promote their Deferred Compensation Program through a financial wellness themed strategy. This included the introduction of a 20-minute long “Financial Wellness Boot Camp Workshop” presented live and recorded for future playback. Additionally, personalized follow-up one-on-one virtual appointments with the counseling team were offered. The rollout of the new initiative was to occur March 2020 but was moved to a virtual event in the fall of 2020. A fitness theme was used throughout the communications with various exercise images and taglines. The campaign used emails, a postcard mailed to non-participants, a calendar of live webinars and a “Financial Wellness Boot Camp” checklist. A theme of “Get your financial future into shape!” was developed and branded with a “Financial Wellness Challenge 2020” logo. The results were that the campaign had a high email open rate generating 300 new enrollments in four weeks, a 30 percent increase from the prior month. More than 300 employees explored the financial wellness tools right after attending the Boot Camp. One-on-one meetings with 857 employees produced 61 rollovers. The MTA won because of its holistic approach to address financial wellness wrapped into a fun, engaging campaign. Diverse representation was used in visual pieces and age-banded messages were very appropriate to the employee base. Solid results were evidence of employee engagement with the financial wellness message.

2^nd Place – State of Oregon Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) with Voya Financial
The State of Oregon has an employee population of 178,677 who have access to multiple retirement plans including a mandatory defined contribution plan that requires employees to contribute 6 percent of their salary annually. The goals for the 2020 education campaign included a more organized web presence for online retirement and financial wellness education, improving outreach to new employees and existing local government employees for the voluntary plan, and developing the annual expo typically held in person during National Retirement Security Week. Later in 2020, National Retirement Security Week was changed to celebrate during the entire month of October and the Expo became virtual. Early in 2020 a microsite was launched to showcase the team of local education and outreach representatives who provided both workshops and one-on-one sessions. Later in the year a second microsite became available for eligible employers to access information on the voluntary plan as well as to provide information applicable to the employer. In addition, emails marketed animated videos and retirement checklists. Post-event surveys indicated that 70 percent thought the checklist was the most helpful resource for them. One lesson learned was that the call to action to go directly to the checklist was much more successful than providing a website link requiring employees to go through a lot of information. Overall, plan assets increased 11.5 percent from before the expo and the number of participants increased one percent. With its use of an attractive website and solid measurable outcomes that the expo was effective, Oregon PERS created a winning campaign.

3^rd Place – DTE Energy with Empower Retirement
DTE Energy is a Detroit-based diversified energy company involved in the development and management of energy-related businesses and services nationwide. The purpose of the education program was to leverage America Saves Week (“ASW”) as the catalyst to increase overall engagement with the plan among DTE Energy’s 10,865 employees. The communications needed to work not just during ASW, but through the remainder of 2020. A kickoff email from the Director of Compensation, Benefits & Wellness introduced the fact that employees would be receiving daily emails. 

These emails contained articles with hyperlinks and details about participating in the plan, planning ahead, saving more, and investment diversification. Employees received a challenge to test what they learned throughout the week for the chance to win prizes. The theme of the campaign was “Your Five-Day Financial Forecast” with weather-themed language and icons to help remove any cloud of doubt that through the DTE 401(k) Plan participants have a bright financial future. In addition to emails, e-boards were displayed in common areas at various DTE sites, e-banners were located at building entrances and table tents were placed in cafes and break rooms. This campaign was the last on-site campaign before the pandemic caused everyone to work from home. The kickoff email had a 40.55 percent open rate while the five daily emails had open rates ranging from 25.96 to 32.38 percent. More than half of employees visited the plan’s website. Overall, 165 people enrolled in the plan, 311 participants started contributing to a new contribution type (pre-tax or Roth), and 58 participants named a beneficiary. Even with an already high level of engagement with the plan, DTE Energy’s employees were enticed to do more, making the company a winner.