Boost benefits-spend ROI with personal financial coaching

HR leaders looking to boost benefits-spend ROI can solve for workers’ top stressor, personal finances, with a solution as flexible as financial challenges are diverse, amidst all-time high costs for financial services.

Smart employers interested in boosting your benefits-spend ROI should consider personal financial coaching for your workers.

From 2023 to 2024 the percentage of employers who report rising benefits costs as a challenge leapt from 48% to 63%, according to PNC’s 2024 Financial Wellness in the Workplace Report.

In this environment, then, why not focus your scarce benefits resources on solving for your workers’ top stressor, personal finances, with a solution as personal and flexible as your people’s financial challenges are specific and diverse?

From rising rents to out of reach mortgage rates, student loans to vehicle payments, medical debt to credit card interest, debt collections to emergency and retirement savings, different (generations of) workers have different financial stressors, priorities, and goals.

Personal financial coaching > financial literacy training, workshops

Personal financial coaching addresses them all in a way that financial literacy training and financial literacy workshops not only do not but cannot.

Many employers offer financial education, 36% in 2024, up from 30% last year, per PNC’s report, which is a positive development.

But smart employers with an eye on benefits ROI, and employee financial benefits ROI specifically, keep one powerful fact in mind:

“One-size-fits-all financial education has little to no effect on changing real-world financial behaviors. A meta-analysis of more than 200 studies found that educational interventions explained only 0.1% of the financial behaviors studied.”

As TrustPlus personal financial coaches know well, financial literacy, knowing what to do, is only a fraction of one’s financial journey, a teeny, tiny, fraction as it turns out.

Money is personal, emotional, which is why employers who are strategically motivated to solve for employees’ financial health need a personal solution.

Financial wellness benefits ROI for every generation

Smart employers know financial wellness benefits ROI relies on a strong match between employee demand and employer supply.

Is your employee financial benefits offering as effective with Boomers as it is with Gen Z?

Does it match your specific workforce mix?

Per PNC’s report, workers born between 1997 and 2012, Gen Z, are the most stressed about personal finances.

76% are “very or somewhat concerned” about personal finances.

Their top personal financial priority is improving their credit score.

Meanwhile, Millennials, Gen X, and Boomers are more focused on saving for retirement.

The beauty of personal financial coaching is that it solves for your workers’ top stressor, personal finances, in a customizable way that’s tailored to each and every member of your team.

And the results are often transformative, for people and for organizations, especially in our current economic environment where workers have been squeezed by inflation, high interest rates, and the rising costs of financial services themselves.

Workers are paying more than ever for financial services

It’s more expensive than ever for workers to secure financial services they need to survive paycheck to paycheck:

“…increasing debt balances and higher borrowing costs contributed to a 17% increase in year-over-year spending on interest and fees, reaching an estimated $415 billion in 2023.”

It’s an all-time high, according to the Financial Health Network’s FinHealth Spend Report 2024.

“Our analysis shows that Americans are carrying higher credit balances, paying higher interest rates, and increasingly holding more debt than is manageable — signaling a growing financial burden that weighs most heavily on vulnerable households.”

Smart employers know it’s a financial burden that’s weighing heavily on your workers, too.

78% of U.S. employers say their workers are financially stressed

Survey after survey adds to the growing body of research that finds the vast majority of workers are stressed about finances and that this financial stress harms your workers and your organization.

Among the most recent examples:

78% of U.S. employers say their workers are financially stressed, and 75% say employee financial stress negatively affects their business, according to PNC’s report.

Moreover, per PNC, 85% of workers worry about personal finances at work and 68% say their financial stress negatively impacts their mental health.

Estimates of related costs to organizations and the economy range from $250 billion to more than ten times that per year.

What’s a smart employer focused on employee financial benefits ROI, profits, and impact to do?

Take a long, hard look at personal financial coaching for your workers.

It’s a solution that solves for your workers’ top stressor and ensures that they’re maximizing the benefits you already offer, in the context of pursuing their financial dreams.

Now, that’s smart leadership.

Schedule a time to speak with TrustPlus about strengthening your employee financial benefits.