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In a world that continues to be affected by a pandemic, more businesses are choosing to utilize remote work for their employees. However, it’s a new field for most company leaders, especially when preparing your employees for open enrollment is already a tough task by itself. While this shift from in-person interaction to more virtual communication is new for many, a little bit of planning ahead and organization can make this sudden change more bearable for benefit enrollment season.

What is working remote?

Working remote is the practice of employees either working at their home or a location outside of an organization's usual place of business. For businesses that require constant communication between team members, remotely working relies on online internal communication through messaging and video calls, in addition to client and customer communication for online presentations and project organization. While remote work has become a more popular option for many companies today, this work style has been an available feature in professions for years since video calls and similar web services like Slack, Trello, Microsoft Teams and many more were first created.

Why is working from home beneficial?

Working from home saves time, money and the environment. The average commute time in the country was at an all-time high of 27 minutes. All that money you put into fuel for commuting to work vanishes, increasing your carbon footprint! If totaled up, working remotely, even just half of the time, can save the average working person between $2,000-$6,500 per year, according to Global Workplace Analytics.

Working from home offers much more flexibility, workspace customization and comfortability when it comes to approaching the daily grind. Most companies are less focused on how work gets done, as long as it’s done with quality. Working remotely gives people the opportunity to adjust their schedule around the other parts of their life without downgrading their work output. The work-at-home life allows you to create your ideal office space minus the typical distractions found by working in an actual office.

Most importantly, remote work can be a remedy for your overall health and wellness. Being at home encourages you to cook more and prepare healthier meals, rather than rely on fast food options when you’re in a rush. Remote work gives you more time to step outside and maybe go for a walk around your neighborhood while on break. Being able to focus on your work while minimizing external distractions can rejuvenate your mental health and help you approach your work with a better mindset.

How to effectively reach your employees remotely

With your work force all operating remotely, you can still reach them with important benefit information in several ways:

  1. Webinars
  2. Podcasts
  3. Emails and mobile texts
  4. Home mailers
  5. Survey research

You aren’t limited to these options, but the methods of communication listed are just a few effective and creative ways to reach the employees of your organization in the way that best serves their individual needs.

Webinars

For a company that functions remotely, webinars are the closest you can get to an in-person conference or meeting. Whether you choose to hold webinars over Zoom, Webex, Microsoft Teams or another video call software, all choices allow you to seamlessly host workshops, lectures or presentations through screenshare and open the floor to those watching if they have questions or comments. If a large number of your work force is working from home, you can schedule several webinars to meet the needs and times that work best for the people in your company. The webinar is your best friend when it comes to operating a business remotely.

Podcasts

You may have thought podcasts were only designed to talk about true crime, sports and news. Well, podcasts are also a great way to communicate employee benefits information, too! Releasing a weekly or monthly podcast that focuses on a specific topic that employees may not quite understand is a great way to reach them. Podcasts are nice to have on in the background and people can listen to whichever topic they want at their convenience. For those that lead busy lives and are always on the go, podcasts might be the best medium for them.

Home mailers

The home mailer is the tried-and-true method of reaching the remote employee. Pamphlets, brochures and postcards all work to give the employee a tangible notification that it’s time for open enrollment. Having a physical booklet or guide sent to your home also makes it easier to go over the information with your family to determine the best plan for you. While the home mailer is falling out of favor for environmental purposes, it is still effective at what it achieves.

Emails and mobile texts

Whether you want to go green or are just more in-tune with your devices, emails and mobile texts are excellent ways to instantly reach your teams remotely. Mobile texts are effective at alerting you to deadlines, while emails are capable of carrying a lot of valuable information and graphics. Being able to access information about your benefits through your devices is perfect for the remote worker who is constantly traveling and doesn’t stay in one place for too long.

Survey research

Sometimes a survey to gather feedback can be an effective way to pick the brains of your employees and give them the method of benefit communication that works best for them. If a large majority of those working remotely can’t stand the sight of benefit pamphlets in their mailbox, that can save you a lot of money that would’ve been spent in printing costs. Surveys are effective at helping you understand what your employees want, and it allows them to feel heard at the same time.

How PartnerComm utilizes remote work

PartnerComm is more than familiar with helping companies adapt to managing a largely remote work force. Given that almost half of our employees work remotely across the country, we know the importance of clearly communicating benefits information.

The pandemic led many companies toward exploring remote work for the first time, as they sought out ways to reach their teams through a computer screen. For one client specifically, we developed a guide of principles designed to help a team of those working remotely to establish the best ways to communicate virtually. By teaching businesses to over-communicate and also offer encouragement and support along the way, the isolating nature of working remotely doesn’t have to feel like an individual effort.

PartnerComm has also helped almost a dozen different clients kickstart a successful benefits podcast for their employees to listen to. We believe in taking a more conversational approach to explaining something as not-so-straightforward as accessing preventive care or comparing a health savings account to a flexible spending account. By simplifying the topics and using basic conversation to answer common questions, the podcasts we help create are effective at reaching employees in a unique and creative way that fits their needs.

Reach out to an expert today.