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Brittany 00:02
Employees want to feel connected. They want to be joined together to accomplish a shared purpose. They want to be supported and to be able to support others.

Susan 00:13
Welcome to The JoyPowered® Workspace Podcast, where we help HR and business leaders embrace joy in the workplace. I’m Susan White, owner of Susan Tinder White Consulting, an HR consulting practice. Joining me is my co-host and dear friend JoDee Curtis, who owns Purple Ink, a large scale HR firm that I am an executive collaborator with.

Susan 00:34
According to the US Office of Personnel Management, employee assistance programs, or EAPs, are voluntary work-based programs that offer free and confidential assessments, short-term counseling, referrals, and follow up services to employees who have personal and/or work-related problems. EAPs address a broad and complex body of issues affecting mental and emotional well-being, such as alcohol and other substance abuse, stress, grief, family problems, and psychological disorders. I think this is a really important topic for us to address, JoDee.

JoDee 01:10
I do too, and as much talk as there is about people suffering from some of these things, I just so hope that people are utilizing these programs available to them.

Susan 01:25
I so agree. So you may be asking, you know, how many US companies have employee assistance programs? Well, there was a June 9, 2024, article written by Matthew Burr, and he cites these statistics on who has EAPs: 97% of companies with more than 5,000 workers offer EAPs. That’s almost, you know, universal, right?

JoDee 01:48
Yeah, that’s amazing.

Susan 01:49
It is. 80% of companies that have between 1,001 and 5,000 workers offer EAPs. And then even organizations as small as 251 to 1,000 workers, 75% of them are offering EAPs. So truly, if you’re a listener and you’ve got a company and you’ve got employees, I hope that today you’ll walk away saying, if I don’t have an EAP, I’m going to get one.

JoDee 02:12
Yes, and you know, I want to encourage that. We have 12 employees, and we have one, and they are not very expensive, so I really encourage those smaller than — Well, I encourage everyone as well, but even those less than 250 people to really consider this.

Susan 02:35
I love that. Matthew Burr mentioned that the average EAP usage at these companies, these larger companies, is less than 10%, so even though they’re being offered widespread, a lot of employees are not taking advantage of them.

JoDee 02:50
Which, honestly, is why they’re not very expensive.

Susan 02:55
Right. Low usage, right?

JoDee 02:57
Most people don’t use them.

Susan 02:58
Interesting. In addition to the types of issues that EAPs deal with, that the, the Office of Personnel Management noted, Burr mentions that financial counseling, legal services, adoption services, child and elder care services, workplace trauma counseling, and education and training are fast becoming part of organizations’ EAP trainings. The typical EAP will provide up to a specific number of counseling sessions to an employee per year at no cost to the employee. If the issue cannot be resolved in the number of counseling sessions offered, the staff member is usually referred to a behavioral health benefit that the organization may offer as part of their normal, traditional welfare benefit plans. EAPs can be internal and offered in-house by EAP professionals that are employees of the organization, and that’s usually true for those mega large organizations. Or, more commonly, they can be available through external providers. Or you can have a blended program. You know, JoDee, when I was with JP Morgan Chase, we really had a blended program. We had some EAP experts inside the organization, and then we also had a very robust external, and so often we, you know, we in HR would turn to our local, our internal EAP, talk through a situation, they would determine if they should get involved or if it should be outsourced to our external EAP. How about you? What are your experiences?

JoDee 04:26
You know, to be honest, Susan, I never even have heard of a blended program. I didn’t even know that was a thing. Because I’ve only ever been a part of outsourced provider programs.

Susan 04:40
I think that is the most common. And it does make sense. There’s a lot of, I think, benefit to external. Employees don’t really always want to share if they’re going through an… some type of a domestic abuse situation, or going through drug abuse, or going through financial needs, with somebody inside the organization, you know, they don’t always trust people inside, and they feel better about somebody external. So I do see merit and value with external EAPs.

JoDee 05:09
You know, Susan, you just made a great point, too, when you said you might first look to your internal providers in a blended program, and then go external. Just a reminder to people that it’s also available, like, it’s available to me to get assistance to talk about issues my employees might be facing, or how to give them better help. So you don’t have to be experiencing some of these things yourself, you can be, use, use it to learn how to coach or counsel, not that you want to take on that role of a therapist, but maybe to encourage them to go to get assistance from someone.

Susan 06:03
You know, I love that. I also like tapping into your EAP to do some lunch and learns and workshops, because we’ve got employees who may never come forward and say, “I need help,” but maybe we can educate our workforce on different types of mental health, financial health, all those types of things, that your EAP is a wonderful source for that. So I know it sounds like we’re doing a commercial for EAPs. We both just believe in them so much, and that’s why I wanted to do this episode today, to get the word out. I will tell you, Burr’s research has found that 94% of employees who actually use their company’s EAPs report overall satisfaction with the program. Yeah, there’s very few things that we as employers do that make people as happy as that, but 94% are pleased with it.

Susan 06:50
So to go deeper on this topic, we have invited a guest who can give us some really, I think, some good insights. It’s Brittany Mattfeld Craig. Brittany serves as a managing director at Global Impact. It’s a leading organization in fundraising efforts and focuses on employee engagement and corporate social responsibility. Brittany has a passion for problem solving and believes in the power of giving back to create transformative change, both individually and within the many communities in which we belong. Brittany has spent over 12 years working in the employee engagement space, working with giving programs, volunteerism, employee business resource groups, and employee assistance funds with clients of all industries and sizes. Welcome, Brittany, we are so glad that you’re here.

Brittany 07:36
Thank you so much for having me.

Susan 07:38
So our first question for you is, how are modern workplaces supporting employees in need, from their mental health to their financial well-being?

Brittany 07:47
So I think first to answer this question, it really comes down to what, what we all expect from the workplace today, and how that has really changed and evolved and really placed new emphasis on employees experience. So the way that we really see workplaces is one, and one of really being a community. It’s, it’s one of the communities that individuals belong to, and really where they’re spending a good portion of their day. And so what that means is that there are different expectations from the workplace. Employees want to feel connected. They want to have… they want to be joined together to accomplish a shared purpose. They want to be supported and to be able to support others. And that goes from mental health to financial well-being. And that’s really, I think, the imperative for, for why companies offer employee assistance programs and are looking to support their employees in, in ways that are beyond a paycheck. Employee assistance funds, I think, you know, really have… they encompass a lot of ways that employees are struggling within the workplace that are largely often unknown, whether that be mental health, substance abuse, stress, family problems. I mean, it can run the run the gamut, and these programs just offer that way for, for them to be a little bit more present at work and to bring more of their whole selves, I think, to the, to their workplace.

Susan 08:14
Fair enough. Fair enough.

JoDee 09:24
Yeah, I love that. Brittany, I’m always telling people I think the key to life is to set good expectations about whatever in our lives is happening. So I love starting with that about understanding, creating, setting expectations around this. But what — tell us, you used the word “employee assistance funds.” What are those, and why do you think it’s important for a modern workplace to have them?

Brittany 09:54
So, you know, employee assistance programs, really, I think, historically, have been seen as programs that are providing counseling, they offer referrals, they offer services for those employees. And one of the areas that we feel is often missing is around financial support. So financial stress is really one of the strongest associations to anxiety, depression, anger, and a lot of mental health challenges, and so employee assistance funds are a way for companies to support their team members, their employees through financial assistance. They can cover a variety of events and hardships, from natural disaster, you know, hurricane comes and hits, to personal hardship. Life happens. There’s a death in your family. You may be now taking on the caretaking of, of a parent, a niece, a nephew. And these things happen, and it happens to all of us, and these really pose those unexpected financial stresses that cause a lot of work product, loss of work productivity and really can be debilitating to just overall well-being. So we see employee assistance funds as kind of a missing piece often and a component of a more comprehensive employee assistance program to be able to support employees.

Susan 11:18
And tell us, how are employee assistance funds usually funded?

Brittany 11:22
So these can be funded in a variety of ways. The bulk of the funding usually still does come from the company, corporate foundations or just company corporate giving. In addition to that, we think it is really important to offer employees a way to give to each other. And so when you run your employee assistance program through a foundation or a nonprofit, you give employees that ability, right? So as a part of this kind of comprehensive way of building a community in the workplace, you’re supporting colleagues, but you’re also allowing colleagues to support one another. You’re helping employees in time of need, but you’re also letting employees help their colleagues. So, you know, we, when we look at employee assistance funds, we really see both sides of it. We want to be able to offer that way for employees to give as well as to receive support. And so we’re beginning to see more and more of the programs being able to be self-funded through employee contributions, and there are other different fundraising mechanisms to support employee assistance funds.

Susan 12:27
Yeah, that’s interesting. Yeah, I like that. Brittany, how do employee wellness programs like EAPs and employee assistance funds fit into corporate employee engagement and recruitment efforts?

Brittany 12:40
You know, really it’s about being competitive. Most companies with over 5,000 employees offer this benefit, and that is really across all sectors. So I work for a nonprofit, and we have access to an employee assistance program. And so while comparing, not necessarily comparing financial assistance from this company to this company based on a disaster that happened, that’s likely not going to become of your pro con list when you’re interviewing for a job. However, you know, I really feel these are proof points and demonstrate companies’ commitment to wellness, to building a supportive community within the workplace, communicating that your company has a culture that takes care of one another. And so, you know, we see the employee assistance programs as being competitive. And employee assistance funds, which is the financial assistance component of it, have really surged since the COVID-19 pandemic. You know, we, part of that, I think, stems from the pandemic exposing some of how personal hardship impacts day-to-day productivity at work, ability to work, and all of those things. And so we’ve seen not only a significant increase in requests from companies to develop these programs, to host these programs, to manage these programs, but also to expand these programs. It was very traditional for companies to only have and activate these when a disaster hits and impacts a property, but now we’re really seeing companies take that more comprehensive approach to acknowledging personal hardship happens all the time, and we want to support employees in need in any of those scenarios.

JoDee 14:15
And how do you… you know, a question I think we all probably get when we’re implementing new things into our culture is, how can we measure the success? So specifically related to some of these employee wellness offerings, how do you, you know… you might see it that one person got this money to do this, or we helped this person with the rent or… but overall, how do you measure that?

Brittany 14:47
So, you know, I think usage and awareness are very kind of common tools for a lot of EAP programs, for employee assistance funds. You know, we do take a few different approaches. We look at some general benchmarking across industries, usage, location, and geographic differences in usage that can really kind of give us a sense of awareness, as well as some of the cultural differences between wanting and feeling comfortable using these types of programs. So we take that into consideration when we’re, when we’re working with companies and providing some of that data back. So, you know, I think that there’s a lot of different things you could look at, and it’s really about what, what you do with those measurements to better understand what they mean. What this often comes down to are cultural attributes within various cultures that based on region, different global contexts, and how they feel they can approach wellness, how they can approach receiving counseling, how they can approach receiving financial assistance, and whether or not that’s something that is, is a part of their culture.

JoDee 15:59
Nice.

Susan 16:00
Interesting. Do you track retention as a measure of success?

Brittany 16:05
You know, for this kind of program, in a lot of cases, it’s a once and done thing, right? They experience a death in the family, and that’s not going to happen, hopefully, every single year. So, you know, that’s one of the things that we look at. We want users of our programs to have a really good experience. You know, one of the things we, we really pride ourselves on is ensuring that our customer service and what we’re doing is really taking an empathetic approach, recognizing that people are at their worst when they’re coming to us. And so, you know, we want them to have a good experience, and we want them to be able, to be able to feel comfortable sharing their experience with other colleagues. But them returning is not necessarily our goal. We don’t want them to have another hardship.

Susan 16:50
Yeah. I was thinking employee retention for the organization.

Brittany 16:53
Oh, right, yeah, certainly, yeah. Like, employee engagement stat, like, yeah, your, right, your, your, your overall engagement with the company, yeah, absolutely.

Susan 17:00
Yeah, yeah. Interesting. So what tips do you have if you’re a listener today and you’re thinking, I want to go out and find a different type of EAP, maybe one that has an Employee Assistance Fund or just is more broad, how do you go about choosing the right provider for you?

Brittany 17:16
So employee assistance funds, there’s a number of different ways that you can operate them. They are governed here in the US by IRS guidelines, and there’s a certain set of criteria you need to implement in order for your employees to receive those contributions as tax, tax free income. So when you’re looking at service providers, that’s a really important component of choosing an Employee Assistance Fund provider versus an employee assistance program provider where they’re doing the counseling support. For an employee assistance fund where you’re providing that financial assistance, we are a nonprofit, and so therefore we house a number of these initiatives at Global Impact, and there’s some, there’s a variety of different approaches the different service providers take for us. What I think we believe is really unique about our approach, and I think are really important considerations when you’re choosing a service provider, number one is that we take a really philanthropic approach. Our goal is to support employees in need, and that is embedded in employee engagement. So we work best with companies that are embedding this as a part of their overall employee engagement framework and how they are thinking about employee engagement, wellness of their employees broadly. The second is customization. So, you know, we work across a variety of industries, and not surprisingly, the hardships faced in different industries and with different groups of, groupings of employees look very, very different. And so it’s important to build the governance framework for these programs to really be specific to the industries and the companies that we’re working with, working in, in the context of, the you know, what kind of needs their employees are going to have, so that your program is effective in reaching the need of those employees. And then the last thing is adaptability. So, you know, in today’s current world, in the past three, three years, I’ve seen Ukraine occur. I’ve seen Israel Gaza conflict occur. I’ve seen unprecedented amount of hurricanes, wildfires in Maui, locations where snow storms, tornadoes in areas of the country that are not prepared for these kinds of things to occur, and so adaptability of programs is really important. We have built into most of our programs a variety of ways for employees to receive support and for companies to really activate around disasters. And I think that’s an important consideration when you’re talking to service providers. How can we adapt our program? Let’s say all of our employees are impacted at this location. What can I do different? Does every single employee have to apply? And so I think that’s really important.

JoDee 18:46
And how can our listeners reach you if they’re interested in learning more about this or in setting up an Employee Assistance Fund?

Brittany 20:24
Feel free to visit our website, charity.org, or you can email engage at charity dot org and happy to provide more information on how we structure our engagements and can support programs like these.

Susan 20:38
Yeah, that’s great. We will put that in our show notes. So hopefully listeners, if you’re driving right now, you’ll be able to go back, look at our show notes and get that information. So our very last question for you, Brittany, we ask all of our guests, because we’re The JoyPowered® Workspace, a JoyPowered® question. And so our question for you is, what’s one small step people can do in this area of EAPs and EAFs that could create more joy at work?

Brittany 21:03
Yeah, and I’m gonna take it up even a level, right? So creating more joy at work, Global Impact’s mission is to inspire greater giving, and I think giving people the opportunity to give, whether it be to a philanthropic cause or to your colleagues in need through an Employee Assistance Fund, those are opportunities to spark joy. Giving releases endorphins. It creates that sense of community. And so for me, it kind of all circles back into philanthropy, giving, and how we take care of one another.

Susan 21:39
That’s wonderful.

JoDee 21:39
Love it.

Susan 21:40
Yeah. Well, thank you so much for being here, Brittany. We really appreciate it.

Brittany 21:44
Yeah. Thank you so much for having us and having such an important light, joyful way of talking about some of the hard things that we face at our work and in day-to-day life.

JoDee 21:54
Here’s our listener question today. “Do you have any tips for a first meeting for a president elect that is stepping into a role where the current president has not been effective?”

Susan 22:08
I do have a few ideas based on my experience as I’ve been a senior HR leader helping assimilate new leaders into organizations, and sometimes they were you know, replacing somebody who wasn’t so good. Sometimes they’re replacing people who lost favor with top management, or perhaps that person’s been promoted up, or there’s just a lot of dynamics going on. But let’s assume, in this case, we’ve got somebody who wasn’t too good at what they did. We’ve got a new person. Honestly, I do think that first meeting should be, we in HR can help coach them through this. If I was that new leader walking into the situation, I think they need to come in with quiet confidence and really come in with a learning mindset. And I would announce to people the next three or four weeks, I’m going to be meeting you. I’m going to be learning from you. I’m going to figure out what, what makes this organization tick. And that’s what I would do. I would, I would come in and I would spend time with my leadership team. I would ask them what they had been working on, what they saw as being effective, what they’re seeing going on that is not working in the organization. And I would get their insights on what they would do if they were in my shoes. I would do one-on-ones with subject matter experts in each of the areas of the organization to get their perspectives on what’s missing or what needs fixing, and really just kind of keep that open mindset, that learning mindset. Then I would take a breath, and then I would assess the individuals at my leadership table to figure out, are they the right people? Given what I understand the problems to be, what I understand the opportunities to be, do I have people in the right roles? And that’s where HR, I think, can be very helpful in helping understand the full person. I would certainly meet with all the people at my individual leadership team table and find out what their hopes and dreams are. Are they living their best life? Are they… Is this where they want to be? Or can I help them get to where they want to be? So I would do that. By about six weeks in I do think that new leader needs to, to announce their vision. What is it that they hope to accomplish? They spent the first three or four weeks learning, next two weeks figuring out, you know, how to set the table, and then I think they’ve got to be really good communicators about here’s where I think we need to go and start to rally the troops, maybe share your new org structure and who the players are. So that would be my thoughts for that new president elect.

JoDee 24:38
I agree. I don’t have anything to add to that, that sounds like a great plan.

Susan 24:43
Listener, let us know how it works. Much success to the new person. Well, JoDee, it’s time for in the news. A November 15, 2024 article on HRmorning.com was entitled “3 Ways to Up the Ante on Your Hiring Events,” and it was written by Michele McGovern, and it caught our attention. JoDee, if you’re like, me and I’m sure with many of your clients, they do hiring events when they have an urgent need, or even if they have just a spike in hiring, they try to put on some type of a on-site job fair, or they even rent out a hotel space or somewhere to draw as many qualified candidates and push them through whatever your hiring process is in an abbreviated, quick way as possible. So some tips that this article mentioned, or those types of hiring events, the first thing you need to do is really focus on getting the word out. Think about how many ways any touch points possibly exist for you to draw candidates out of the woodwork. You know, first of all, be sure you’re posting the job on your career website, because no doubt, if people are interested in working for you, they’re visiting it. Be sure and use all of your normal job posting systems. But think about, are there some other job boards we don’t traditionally use that this time we want to use, right? And then really think about when you’re getting the word out, using social media, optimizing it, having all of you in HR, all of you in the leadership team, and even your employees, invite them to share that information, to repost the announcement about the job fair on whatever social media platform they’re using. JoDee, you want to share the second tip from this article?

JoDee 26:28
Yes, they suggested to give perspective. That is, have some HR professionals on hand to explain the company and the role. Have employees on hand to give the real insight on each job, the good, the bad, and the ugly. And I think just those two — I have one more point, but those two things are important. I think that you, that you don’t just have HR people at these events, or that you don’t just have individual employees at these events, but a combination of the two can be super helpful. And then number three, maybe play some company culture videos or have benefit collateral material to share with them as well.

Susan 27:18
I think that makes great sense. And then finally, according this article, you want to be ready to answer. Build in time for candidates to ask questions so that you can respond to their needs and answer whatever’s on their mind. And finally, make sure that they know when they leave that hiring event, are they hired, are you still thinking about it, or is it not going to work out? But be ready to have answers with you so that you really close it in a nice and a professional way. Well, good luck, listeners, on your hiring events.

JoDee 27:47
Thanks for listening today, and make it a JoyPowered® day.

Susan 27:51
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