401(k) Fridays Podcast

With almost 70 podcast episodes to date, we’ve had some amazing guests who have shared their experiences and perspectives to help employers better understand their retirement plans.  Out of all our prior episodes, some of our more popular ones have been where we have had business leaders in the retirement industry talk about the current and future trends they see and how they are positioning their organizations to address them.  In this episode, Jason Crane, the Executive Vice President and Managing Director of Transamerica Retirement Solutions stopped by to share some of his thoughts on the growing trend in the retirement industry of providing a more comprehensive suite of products and services to help employees on their journey to retirement.  During our conversation we hit on the impact of rapid changes in workforce demographics, the evolving definition of both retirement plan success and retirement readiness and whether employers are ready for some of the recent industry offerings.  Finally, don’t miss Ja

Automatic enrollment, automatic increases and investment default strategies, you’ve likely heard about these fundamental plan design features either from our prior guests on the podcast, current service partners or conversations with your peers.  If you aren’t familiar, we do spend the first couple of minutes of this episode providing a foundation and background.  However, my guest Jeff Bograd, a Senior Retirement Plan Consultant with John Hancock then quickly proceeds to blow my mind for the remainder of the episode with some new and cutting edge plan design strategies that in my opinion truly represent the next frontier.  While some of the ideas and concepts we discuss may not be right for your plan, many of them should give you some food for thought during future conversations about your retirement plan design.   Guest Bio Jeff Bograd is the Director, Senior Retirement Plan Consultant for John Hancock Retirement Plan Services and has been with the company for more than 27 years. In this role, Jeff serves a

Have index funds dropped the proverbial mic, walked off the stage and declared victory in the decades long debate of active vs. passive investment management?  My guest, Sean Lewis, a CFA and Institutional Investment Strategist with BlackRock has a few things to say about the topic!  He does a great job explaining the current market forces driving the continued growth in index investing, questions employers should be asking of themselves to help strike an appropriate balance between index and active management and what asset classes tend to favor index or active management.  Sean also reveals that not all index funds are created the same, a few tips to evaluate them, whether its harder to index equity or fixed income securities and how to tell if you have a plain boring index or one that is trying to do something more than just track their benchmark.     As you listen to our conversation, if it causes you to think a little more about how your retirement plan investment menu is constructed, as a reminder last

Ah the good old days, when life was simpler, people retired with pension plans, social security was fully funded and you spent your retirement golden years in relative financial security.  Fast forward to today, there is a perception that our retirement system is broken, and we are either already in or headed for a dramatic retirement crisis.  Much of the blame for our current state of  retirement preparation has been placed on the rise of 401(k) plans.  However, does the data support both the romanticized vision of the past and the bleak picture of our present and future?  To help sort through things I have Andrew Biggs, a Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute with me today.  His research on retirement preparation, social security and his relentless focus on data lends for an interesting conversation and perspective on some popular narratives in the media about workplace retirement plans.   Guest Bio Andrew G. Biggs, Ph.D., is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washing

As a listener to the podcast, you might be "in the know" about the current retirement plan trends and motivated to tackle new ideas or strategies to put your employees on track for better retirement outcomes.  But what can you do when not everyone in the company or on your retirement plan committee is on board with you.  How do you either get the ball rolling, get the right people to the table or otherwise remove roadblocks that might stand in your way to improving employee retirement readiness?  Well, Laraine McKinnon, a Retirement Readiness Strategist with BlackRock has worked with numerous employers to do just that and shares her strategies and experiences on the podcast!  Guest Bio Laraine McKinnon is a retirement readiness expert who works with major employers and advisors to help improve participant outcomes and drive employee engagement.   Laraine advocates for retirement readiness through her thought leadership including breakthrough research on retirement engagement and innovative new tools to help q

We have spent a lot of time on the podcast talking about how to make your retirement plan stronger and healthier.  Today, we turn the conversation on its head and discuss strategies to make your retirement plan unattractive, to plaintiff’s attorneys and the ERISA lawsuits.  With me I have two previous podcast guests, we have our legal eagle Tom Clark, ERISA Attorney with Wagner Law Group and our voice of the retirement industry Josh Dietch.   There is laughter, witty banter and even some great suggestions you can take away and bring to your next retirement committee meeting.   Before we get started, we will soon announce our next live webinar to our email subscribers coming up in May.  Thank you again to everyone who voted!  I am happy share that our next topic will be, drum roll, “Should Your Employees Consider Your HSA Plan as a Retirement Plan?”.  Again, stay tuned for the email soon to come email announcement.  As a reminder, if you are not an email subscriber, you are missing out on valuable podcast upda

Get beyond the eyeball grabbing headlines, the ever present three bullet summaries and hear some well thought out perspectives to help guide conversations and decisions in your workplace retirement plans.  Our guest today, Brian Reid, the Chief Economist at the Investment Company Institute or ICI, shares that goal and provides some great food for thought for you.  He addresses some recent stories you might have come across such as “Are 401(k) Plans A Failed Experiment”, and were “Employees Better off Under Pension Plans”.  He also provides some context on the other side of the conversation we had a few episodes ago about State Run Retirement Plans.  As I said in that episode, not everyone is convinced that they are ready for prime time.  Now, you may or may not agree with all of his points, but what I really appreciated is that Brian is armed with research, facts and he does a great job keeping the conversation engaging and thought provoking!   Guest Bio Brian K. Reid is chief economist at the Investment Comp

With all of the 401(k) and ERISA lawsuits floating around these days, we have gotten a fair number of questions from employers about fiduciary liability insurance.  We have also made reference on several prior episodes that it is critical to ensure you have a well crafted fiduciary liability insurance.  As they say, never bring a knife to a gun fight, so I reached out to the biggest gun I know,  Dana Kopper, a Managing Director and an Professional Liability Insurance specialist with Lockton Insurance Brokers.  After nearly forty years in the business, handling thousands of claims, being integrally involved in countless settlements, Dana shares some of his insights on how fiduciary risk management, insurance and indemnification all work hand in hand to protect both employers and their retirement plan fiduciaries.  He also dispels a few myths, shares some stories and offers a few thoughts on what not do when it comes to fiduciary liability insurance.     Don’t forget, for each podcast episode we have a dedicate

This is our second episode where we tackle the ins and outs of retirement plan discrimination and compliance testing.  The first episode we released a few weeks ago hit on some of the core concepts around discrimination testing and laid five strategies to improve your results.  Today, we pick up where we left off with the last episode and address some more complex concepts around discrimination testing.   Thankfully, I have Chad Johnson, a fellow admitted 401(k) nerd, and Third Party Administrator with Plan Design Consultants to help us out.  Over the years I have had numerous conversations with retirement service providers of all shapes and sizes on M&A, Control Groups, Grace Periods and Discrimination testing.   In my humble opinion, I think Chad provided one of the better explanations of all this that I have heard!    Let me know if you agree, disagree or if we missed something you have questions about, shoot us an email at info@401kfridays.com.     Guest Bio Chad Johansen is a self-proclaimed retireme

In prior episodes we have talked about how to "Transition from Financial Education to Financial Wellness", how "Financial Wellness is a Trend too Big to be Ignored" and we have even talked with Cisco Systems to learn how they designed and rolled out their financial wellness strategy.  What we haven’t spent any time on is making sure that as you introduce or expand your financial or general wellness programs, you don’t run into compliance problems along the way! So, I was excited to have Monica Novak, an ERISA Attorney with Drinker Biddle & Reath join me on the podcast.  Monica does a terrific job sharing her experience working with employers on questions and concerns on both financial wellness and more traditional physical wellness programs.  As much of our conversation does focus on what can go wrong with wellness programs, I did want to share that Monica is a big fan of wellness and didn’t want some of the doom and gloom we chat about to scare anyone away from pursuing workplace wellness!   Guest Bio Mo

Whether you are aware of it or not, several individual states are getting ready to launch state sponsored retirement plans.  Their intent is to help workers who are not eligible for or not offered a retirement plan through their employer.  What you also might not know is that in the Pacific Northwest, Oregon, the Beaver State, is likely going to be the first state with a live program with a scheduled launch on July 1st, 2017.  For most employers, the reactions and questions have been pretty consistent, why are the states going down this path, how will the programs work, if we already offer a retirement plan what does this mean to us?  Well, it wouldn’t be like me to leave you guessing on what all this means so I was excited to have Joel Metlen, the Public Engagement Manager from the Oregon State Treasury Department and the OregonSaves retirement plan join me to address these questions and much more.  Even if you don’t have an office or employees in Oregon, much of what we talk about is broadly applicable to w

Whether you are passing or failing your discrimination testing, well, this is maybe a bit more timely if you are failing testing, this is a great episode to help get your arms around some of the key concepts and fundamentals behind coverage and discrimination testing.  My guest is Doug Van Galder, a Compliance Analyst with the ERISA Law Firm Boutwell Fay, who has worked with countless employers over his 35 year career to help them navigate the sometimes challenging testing waters.  We start with the basics, discuss strategies to improve testing results and believe it or not, we don’t even mention the concept of safe harbor until the very end!  As you’ll hear, its all about getting the  math to work in your favor!   Just a quick reminder to provide your input on the one question you have always wanted to ask your employees but have been afraid to.  We have received some great questions already, but definitely want to hear from some more employers.  Go to 401kfridays.com/question to learn more and for the link

Scott Knowles, the internal architect of the Financial Wellness program at Cisco Systems stopped by the podcast to share his experience to help other employers who are considering going down a similar path. He provides candid perspectives on the why behind their program, how they rolled it out and what they plan to do in the future to keep improving upon their early successes!   Before we get started, just a quick reminder to provide your input on the one question you have always wanted to ask your employees but have been afraid to.  Go to 401kfridays.com/question to learn more and for the link to the survey.     Also, we plan is to conduct at least another three or four employer interviews on the podcast this year.  If you have done something interesting in your retirement plan that you feel other employers or for that matter the retirement industry could benefit from knowing about, shoot me an email at info@401kfridays.com, we would love to hear more about it and potentially have your or someone from your t

Regardless of how you feel about visiting the doctor, after you listen to my conversation with Dr. Greg Kasten, the Founder and CEO of Unified Trust Company and if you follow a few of his prescriptions or strategies they could help you make a lasting impact on the future of your retirement plan and workforce!  There are a lot of memorable takeaways for anyone looking to explore some new concepts to get different results.  Personally I liked when Dr. Kasten: Compared how selecting a retirement plan service provider because of their great technology is like picking a hospital because it has a really nice parking lot!  Observed how unfortunately most employers think a retirement plan must be a good investment plan and why that thinking needs to be changed Described key employee savings behaviors and tendencies and how you can use that knowledge to help them get better results without making them lift a finger!  Suggested it might help plan sponsors better fulfill their fiduciary responsibility by analyzi

As a retirement plan sponsor, you are constantly bombarded with sales calls, articles, new products, updates on litigation and much more. This information overload can make it challenging to filter through the noise and bright shiny objects to focus on what’s really important to your retirement plan and your participants. With that in mind, I was excited to have Tom Kmak, CEO and co-founder of Fiduciary Benchmarks rejoin me on the podcast to offer some perspective.  By way of background, Tom is consistently recognized as one of the most influential people in the retirement industry, prior to founding the incredibly successful firm Fiduciary Benchmarks he was the CEO of JP Morgan Retirement Plan Service.  During our conversation, he pulls from his over three decades of experience to comment on how current “trending topics” such as financial wellness, the focus on fees, ERISA litigation, commoditization and few others can draw attention away from helping retirement plan participants retire successfully.   Also,

Today is inauguration day and depending on your political leanings, it represents the beginning, the end, the beginning of the end or some other variation on that theme!  However, what I am excited about is sharing my recent conversation with Bob Holcomb, ERISA Attorney and Vice President of Legislative and Regulatory Affairs at Empower Retirement where we discuss what employers should expect from retirement plan policy during the Trump Administration.  Now, despite what I just said a minute ago, Bob does a really nice job of providing a thoughtful and rationale view of the landscape to help you digest information and plan accordingly.  Our   conversation starts with what impact the President has on retirement policy, moves to initiatives in Congress, potential changes in tax policy that could impact both retirement plan sponsors and your participants, then on to the Department of Labor and closes with some predictions of what the future holds.    Before we get started, as a reminder we are getting ready to l

If you are interested to learn how thinking differently about your company culture and employee benefits could help you win the battle for talent today and in the future, then you don't want to miss this episode!  And if that wasn't enough, we also reveal that we are in the midst of a complete revolution in the nature and composition of the workforce which occurs every four generations while sharing some great strategies for employers who might be struggling to adapt!  Full disclosure, there’s not a lot of talk about retirement plans in this episode.  My guest is Jamie Notter, the Founding Partner of WorkXO, a startup that helps organizations map their Workplace Genome and turn workplace culture into a tangible business tool that drives growth. Jamie also co-authored When Millennials Take Over, Preparing for the Ridiculously Optimistic Future of Business and shares some great tidbits from his research as well.     We are also getting ready to launch a podcast and social media research project where I am going

Well here we go, kicking off another year and I couldn’t be happier that the first episode of 2017 features my conversation with Meghan Murphy, Director of Thought Leadership at Fidelity Workplace Investing.  While I won’t steal Meghan’s thunder, I will tell you that she shares a lot of valuable information for employers that should be very helpful to your retirement plan and participants this year and well into the future.     Before we get started, not only is this the first episode of 2017 but it is also our 50th episode, that’s 5-0!  To everyone who shared feedback, questions and challenges you’re facing in your retirement plan with us, thank you.  Your input shapes the content, selection of guests and questions I ask!  With 50 episodes completed, this also means we have a robust library of prior episodes you can explore on demand featuring interviews with attorneys, investment managers, professors, industry leaders, fellow employers and others who share a wealth of information for employers, plan fiducia

Happy New Years and I hope that 2017 gets off to a great start for you both perennially and professionally!  After a wild 2016, I am happy to say that this is the last episode of the year which is rebroadcast of a prior episode before we release the first of many exciting new episodes in 2017!  This episode with Dr. Joe Coughlin, the founder and director of the MIT AgeLab is one of my personal all time favorites.  Not only was he a great guest, but he shared a lot of interesting insights on generations, the evolving workforce and the future of retirement.  As I re-listened to this episode earlier today and compared my recent notes from with the ones from the first time I released it I was pretty surprised that I had some very different take aways from our conversation this time around!  So, if you have already heard my conversation with Dr. Joe, I would suggest you take another listen, you’ll probably pick up a few new tidbits of knowledge that could help you position or refine your benefits, retirement or wo

Happy Holidays everyone!  As a little treat here are two of our more popular episodes bundled into one for your listening pleasure.  Both episodes feature Jason Roberts, ERISA Attorney and the Founder and CEO of the Pension Resource Institute which provides strategic consulting and training to retirement plan service providers and fiduciary education to plan sponsors.  In the first part of the podcast we discuss how current 401(k) and ERISA litigation is shedding new light on fiduciary responsibilities and best practices as well as why Jason feels that spending too much time reviewing plan investments might not provide the fiduciary protection you have been lead to believe it does!  In part two we build on many of the concepts in part one, with a specific focus on conflicts, compensation and reasonableness.  Why those three terms, well according to Jason, they are at the heart of roughly 90% of the recent 401(k) litigation.  Also, Jason shares strategies to determine fee reasonableness in light of value, six