ALL THE LATEST BLOG POSTS FROM STEVE HARRIS, CEBS

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In Search of Zero's and Hero's
In Search of Zero's and Hero's

The employer plan sponsors that I have met with since 2018 may have noticed that I take a sterner tone when we broach the topic of strategies around preventive medicine, population based health and well-being, clinical or targeted disease management programs. The reason for me is simple. I saw a system fail a family member and it impacted his quality of life when it was all completely preventable.

Primary Care Delivered to the Home
Primary Care Delivered to the Home

Our company recently enhanced our employee benefits program to allow for all plan participants to be able to schedule a Virtual Checkup through our corporate health plan. Since I just completed the process yesterday, I thought I would share some perspectives as a professional employee benefits consultant who works with self-funded plan sponsors and my unique experience.

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What Is Employment Branding?

As our economy gains is footing coming out of a global pandemic, employers are finding that they must now compete in a brand-new world of work. One in which labor is reassessing whether their values, purpose in life, time commitment, total rewards, and the environment aligns with their place of work.

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It Is Always Hard to Say Goodbye ...
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WE GET THE POINT! — A PLAN SPONSOR’S GUIDE TO SIMPLICITY
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Family Photo Album

My father left the YMCA to serve as the first employee and Executive Director of the Cooper Aerobics Center in Dallas in 1971.

Opioid Addiction – What is a Plan Sponsor to Do?
Opioid Addiction – What is a Plan Sponsor to Do?

The leading PBMs and carriers are aligning interventions with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) guidelines. Here are four considerations you might want to review under your corporate benefit plans:

BIGGER IS NOT BETTER…BETTER IS BETTER
BIGGER IS NOT BETTER…BETTER IS BETTER

If you ever travel to Vail, Colorado, there’s a famous chef named Brian Little who used to work at one of the toniest spots in the Valley. Chef Little realized working nights and weekends towards a Michelin star at one of the largest hospitality brands in the world was not his purpose. He never saw his family, so he decided

How Hospital Chargemaster Law Impacts Employer Health Plans
How Hospital Chargemaster Law Impacts Employer Health Plans

This New Year’s Eve hospital systems across the country watched the ball drop in NYC while also preparing their double-dutch secret pricing lists to post online. In industry parlance, this master pricing is known as a Chargemaster. This federal mandate falls under a requirement in the 2010 Affordable Care Act that calls for every service or procedure and it’s associated billing costs to be listed online. Until this week, hospital systems were not required to publish them.

'SKIN IN THE GAME' IS NOT WORKING
'SKIN IN THE GAME' IS NOT WORKING

The year was 2003 and I was working with a Fortune 500 company in Austin, TX that would be the first large employer (10,000+ covered employees) to launch a consumer driven health plan (CDHP). The savings the company realized from the federally mandated high deductibles would be redistributed in the form of health savings account (HSA) dollars so employees and their dependents could be better stewards of their own money. Employees loved that the money in the HSA was theirs to keep and they would not lose it at the end of the year (FSA) or when they left the company (HRA).

As we flash forward to the 2019 healthcare marketplace, average deductibles for employer health plans have

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