Francine Reyes realized that employees weren’t reading their benefits information — and were pestering HR for answers that were obvious in the benefits info. She decided something had to change in the way HR communicated the info to newcomers and existing employees.

Here’s her story

The procedure here for informing new employees about HR and benefits had been pretty standard for years: Here’s a thick pamphlet describing everything. Read it.

Yeah, right.

We might as well have handed them a doorstop. No one was reading the pamphlet. Which meant we were continually answering the same questions for employees over and over.

We thought about asking new employees for ideas on improving that part of the orientation process, but we realized they probably wouldn’t have enough background to give us meaningful info. So, instead, we asked our veterans.

‘Give us a list’
Essentially, we said, “Give us a list of the typical questions you’ve had about our benefits.” We combined that with our own list of questions people were always asking, and came up with an FAQ supplement to the orientation pamphlet.

The supplement lists typical questions and their answers, and tells readers, “To learn more about this topic, go to page …”

What a difference.

Now, we get a lot fewer questions about benefits. And a survey of our employees revealed they’re better informed and understand what’s in the pamphlet we hand to them.

(Francine Reyes, HR director, Spokane, WA)

Tags: benefits, HR