EXCLUSIVE: Gain insight into the impact of financial wellbeing on long-term business growth and productivity at Employee Benefits Connect 2017.
Jeanette Makings (pictured), head of financial education at Close Brothers, will lead a session titled ‘Integrated financial wellbeing: the missing piece in future wellness strategies’ as part of the driving performance conference stream on Wednesday 1 March 2017.
The session will outline why initiatives to address employees’ financial concerns should form part of a wider health and wellbeing strategy, and why the need for financial wellbeing support could intensify in light of current economic conditions and future uncertainty.
Makings said: “From an employer’s perspective [periods of economic uncertainty] can make trading more difficult, so I think [organisations are] looking for ways to improve return on investment for what [they] do now in terms of their employee value proposition [and] their benefits spend; [employers] want [to] make sure they are getting the best return they can from that, and a focus on financial wellbeing really helps with that.”
In the session, Makings will also highlight how financial wellbeing can impact on employee engagement, retention and productivity, drawing on research by Close Brothers and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) to demonstrate the size and scale of the issue.
She added: “There is a big push on wellbeing in the workplace at the moment and wellbeing is about three things: it’s about physical, emotional and financial wellbeing. For some time financial [wellbeing] has been the poor relation of those [but] the impact it could [have] on things like engagement, retention and productivity is significant.”
Employee Benefits Connect 2017 will take place on Wednesday 1 March 2017 at Park Plaza, London.