Princess Starr is the benefits manager for the Cobb County School District
in Marietta, Georgia. She has her master's in business administration and
has been a benefits manager for 20 years. Prior to that she was a benefits
representative (equivalent to a benefits coordinator) for about a year.
"As the benefits manager I'm more or less responsible for the strategic
planning, development and design of the benefits plans that we offer to Cobb
County School District employees, as well as the administration of those plans,"
Starr explains.
There are about seven other people in Starr's department assisting her.
She says an important quality for a benefits coordinator or manager is to
be able to react calmly when people have concerns about their benefits plans.
"Because employee benefits can be such a reactive type of working environment,
you have to be able not to take things personally," says Starr. "In benefits,
you're really more or less 'soothing the savage beast,' so to speak."
Mike Farrier says there are two sides to the employee benefits equation.
He's the vice-president of human resources for a company and he teaches an
employee benefits course at a university.
"One, a lot of what goes on in employee benefits is very administrative,
and that's like dealing with the [insurance] carrier, making sure employees
are registered, getting all the employee information updated [and] making
sure beneficiaries and dependants are updated," says Farrier. "So there's
a lot of paper-shuffle aspect to employee benefits, and that aspect of the
role I think caters to a certain personality type.
"The other side, of course, is making employee benefits work within organizations,"
Farrier says. "And that requires a person who can certainly engage with people,
be able to explain employee benefits in layman's terms.
"A lot of times people will be looking for benefits support and assistance
in a very difficult time, when something's gone wrong and they need coverage
or they need to find out about coverage for certain things...
"A lot of benefits practitioners will wear both those hats, obviously,
so you need to be a pretty well-rounded person, I think," Farrier adds. "[You
need to] like meeting with people but also have some degree of attention to
detail."
Paul Nerland is a benefits manager for the County of Fresno, in California.
He says employee benefits coordinators and managers need to have a strong
sense of fairness.
"I tell my staff all the time: What we do for one, we do for all. Meaning
that if we make an exception for one, we don't do it just because we like
that person that day," says Nerland. "We must be consistent on how we apply
things, and so that takes very careful consideration for every situation.
"The other thing I would say is the ability to be empathetic," Nerland
adds. "And those two things need to go hand in hand. You need to be consistent
but at the same time I need to be reminded sometimes that this is about people.
"So if one person comes into my office and they have a situation that is
impacting them right now, whether it be a loved one who is in the hospital
and they're having a problem with their health insurance coverage [or] someone
who has lost a spouse and they're trying to file a life insurance claim, it's
very personal.
"And so... I think it's an important quality to have a level of empathy
of dealing with people who are struggling with these issues, and remember
that that's why we're doing it," says Nerland.