Enhancing Recruitment & Retention With Strategic Retirement Plan Design
Designing retirement plans to aid in recruitment and retention is increasingly crucial in today’s competitive job market. A well-structured retirement plan can serve as a powerful tool for attracting top talent and ensuring long-term employee loyalty. One effective strategy is to make all employees eligible for employer contributions within their first year. This immediate benefit can be a compelling incentive for prospective hires, signaling that the company is invested in their long-term financial well-being from the outset. Additionally, customizing vesting schedules to align with the organization’s turnover rates and needs can further enhance retention. By offering gradual increases in vested benefits, employees are encouraged to stay longer, reducing turnover and fostering a more stable and committed workforce.
Fred Barstein, CEO and founder of TPSU, interviewed Brendan Speers, Director of Retirement Plan Services at Legacy Planning, after a successful TPSU program held at Sales University near Allentown, Pennsylvania. During the conversation, Brendan shared insights into his role and the comprehensive financial advisory services his firm offers to plan sponsors and individuals.
The focus of Brendan’s presentation was on leveraging retirement plans as tools for recruiting and retaining employees. He explained that this topic was chosen in response to concerns from clients about effectively retaining staff and attracting new talent. Brendan outlined three key strategies for designing retirement plans to aid in recruitment and retention: ensuring all employees are eligible for employer contributions within their first year, customizing vesting schedules to match organizational needs and turnover rates, and implementing profit-sharing plans with new comparability allocation models.
Read the Full Transcript Here:
Fred Barstein:
Greetings. This is Fred Barstein, CEO and founder of TPSU. I am here on the sales university campus near Allentown, Pennsylvania, where we just completed a very successful TPSU program with our adjunct lecturer, Brendan Speers. Welcome, Brendan.
Brendan Speers:
Thank you, Fred. How are you?
Fred Barstein:
Good. Okay if we ask you a few questions?
Brendan Speers:
Yeah, absolutely.
Fred Barstein:
Great. Before we do, tell us a little bit about yourself and your firm.
Brendan Speers:
Yeah, so Brendan Speers, Director of Retirement Plan Services at Legacy Planning, and we are a comprehensive financial advisory firm that work with plan sponsors and individuals with regard to their retirement plan and their individual planning.
Fred Barstein:
So today, your presentation was about using the retirement plan to help with recruiting and retention. Why’d you do that?
Brendan Speers:
We did this presentation. It came out of a number of different questions and concerns that our clients had about being able to retain folks, bring them on to their organization, and be able to have a benefit that they could continually vest in and make sure that they were a long-term fit for the organization.
Fred Barstein:
Right. So give us two or three tips that people can design their plan to recruit and retain.
Brendan Speers:
Yeah. I think one thing is that in your first year, everybody is eligible for an employer contribution with limited focus on how much is needed, so that’s one thing. The other thing is that with regard to your investing schedule, those are things that can be controlled, can be changed, depending on what you’re going for and the type of turnover that you’re seeing within an organization. And then third is really having a profit sharing plan and having a new comparability allocation model is really important to a successful strategy.
Fred Barstein:
So final question. Why should a plan sponsor attend a TPSU program? It’s a lot of time out of the office: half day, three quarters of a day. What’s in it for them?
Brendan Speers:
Yeah. I think all our time is valuable and the breakout sessions are the most highly rated feedback that we receive from plan sponsors. So being grouped into a sponsor of similar size that’s having potentially similar issues or similar things that are working or not working is really important, and that’s how they get feedback from their peers and that’s how they potentially solve situations or are able to look into solutions to solve situations.
Fred Barstein:
Great. Well, thanks for your time today, Brendan, and thanks for supporting and being an adjunct lecturer for TPSU. And thank you for watching 401kTV. Please stay tuned.
