Retirement Plan Technology Moves Participants Forward
Retirement plan technology consists of a thoughtful design that has been made available to Improve Outcomes of plan participants, retirement plan sponsors, retirement plan advisors or retirement plan service providers. Retirement plan technology impacts retirement plan performance and each plan participants’ retirement readiness. For a myriad of reasons, the retirement plan industry is embracing retirement plan technology full bore. Retirement plan technology can include everything – identifying the targeted participant base, tools for communicating, enrollment platforms, retirement plan websites, mobile interfaces, and digital investment advice tools. Even investment strategies such as intelligent-decumulation and spend-down strategies could be considered 401k retirement plan technology.
When considering retirement plan technology in a world with self-driving cars, space travel and the mapping-of-the-brain, retirement plan technology seems insignificant. But to the approximately 160 million Americans who work, many of whom are saving for a better tomorrow, retirement plan technology represents a significant contribution to the ever-increasing use of technology throughout the world. Yes, everywhere one looks, people are clutching smartphones while staring into a tiny illuminated screen for hours on end each day. The retirement plan industry has accepted the fact that Americans are spending more time on their devices, and as such, retirement plan technology is beginning to move in the technology direction faster than ever before. But, faster than ever before in the retirement plan industry is a relative term.
That may mean slowing down and considering how we introduce and approach retirement plan technology. At a Plan Sponsor University Program in Atlanta (TPSU), we learned that plan sponsors nor plan advisors are not always able to anticipate or dictate how fast retirement plan participants will adapt to retirement plan technology. One TPSU Program attendee cautioned 401kTV viewers, that retirement plan technology is perhaps not so easy to use and implement as those driving these innovations would have us believe. Retirement plan technology can be both intimidating and confusing. This is true not only for plan participants but also for retirement plan sponsors and advisors! The question remains – How fast can retirement plan technology move the industry?
