How to Conduct a Successful Open Enrollment for Remote Employees

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Open enrollment — the annual period when employees can sign up for health insurance or change their benefits plans — begins for most companies around November 1. With the game-changing growth of remote work over the past few years, HR teams have become more adept at blending virtual open enrollment activities with in-person events and face-to-face meetings for onsite staff.

Flexible work schedules call for a flexible open enrollment system so you can meet the needs of employees wherever they’re based. So, whether you’re new to virtual enrollment or want to refine your existing process, these tips should help you conduct a successful season.

Set a baseline by gathering your HR team to review what you got right and what you can improve over last year. It’s a good practice to capture this feedback immediately after the open enrollment period each year while the experience is fresh in your employees’ minds. Users can tell you if the system is straightforward and suggest options they would like to see included. Analyzing their experiences will help you make the process more accessible for all.

A cloud-based open enrollment hub enables employees to access all the resources they need, from documents to how-to videos. Ask your IT team to help you assess the various software packages on the market to ensure their functionality meets your needs. Having mobile capabilities meets the needs of younger generations that are more accustom to reviewing this on mobile devices. The more intuitive and user-friendly the platform is, the less time you and your team will spend fielding basic questions.

Beyond this, you’ll want to think creatively about how to share updates and reminders in a timely, efficient way. Think about the digital tools your employees are most comfortable with — email, Microsoft Teams, Slack, and your company website and intranet come to mind — and use those to get your messages out. And because you can’t expect every employee to read every email or internal message, a good strategy is to mix quickfire reminders with some centerpiece events — such as virtual town halls where groups can connect with an HR professional or benefits rep.

New to managing a remote team? Try these tips from Robert Half.

Your open enrollment hub should offer some analytics that will allow you to track engagement and activity. Keep a close eye on employees who show no sign of interacting with the platform. They may require some extra reminders before they start making their decisions.

Tracking engagement can answer other questions as well: How many people are opening your information emails? How many are attending virtual town hall meetings? If you don’t have a tracking system, then connect with local managers. Ask them to speak to their teams and find out how comfortable employees are with remote online enrollment.

Benefit selection is trickier than it looks. Employees will have plenty of questions, especially if they’ve gone through a change in circumstances over the past year that could affect the benefits choices they make.

Not all these questions are suited to town hall-type settings. Benefits can be deeply personal, and many employees won’t want to discuss them in front of coworkers. Offer some times when enrollees can speak one-to-one with you or a benefits rep. Encourage employees to invite their spouse or significant other to the appointment — a unique advantage of the remote process.

HR’s job is to be there for employees no matter what. If your team is struggling to keep up with queries, consider bringing in contract professionals. Adding reinforcements with experience in open enrollment could be the key to a smoother process.

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