It’s important to incorporate a culture that stresses diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) into your small business. Experts say that a business’ willingness to foster diverse opinions and perspectives allows for enhanced creativity, outside-the-box decision-making, and strategic solutions to difficult problems.
The more comfortable employees feel at work, the more willing they are to reach their full potential every day. DEI is also top-of-mind for job seekers, especially when talent appears to be in short supply.
DEI is critical for small businesses. And so is providing health insurance. That’s why its important that your health insurance benefits are meeting the evolving needs of today’s workforce.
Reconsider the health benefits you offer
Does your health plan cover virtual care? This can increase health care access and improve health outcomes.
Do you offer multiple options for health coverage so that employees can find a plan that works for their specific medical needs?
Are mental health benefits available?
Do you offer wellness benefits?
These are just a few questions to consider when you are engaging a diverse team and need to meet their healthcare needs.
Meet the health insurance needs of every individual
Health insurance offerings are becoming more personalized to ensure they meet the diverse and evolving needs of today’s workforce. They offer more features for preventative care so your team can stay on the job, and you can avoid loss of productivity including:
Virtual Care
Virtual care access helps eliminate time and transportation costs when seeking medical consultations and can provide faster care to those seeking medical services. No matter what your employees’ needs are, they can get the care they need more quickly making it easier for them to avoid obstacles that could get in the way of seeing a health care provider, such as childcare.
Support to improve specific health conditions
Health insurance plans offer targeted programs aimed at specific health conditions, like diabetes and musculoskeletal pain, including online support for nutrition, fitness, and stress management. This specific support enables your employees to live healthier.
Mental health support
Employees deal with their and their family’s mental health from stress and burnout to anxiety, depression, and substance use problems. Treatment from a general practitioner will usually not cost an employee anything, but expenses for other therapy to help employees cope with life’s hurdles including individual, marriage and family therapy, or addiction counselling, can really add up. Health insurance helps cover the cost for visits for counselling provided by a psychologist or social worker so your employee can think about their problems differently and give them ways to manage.
Health insurance also delivers many “built in” tools including mindfulness and motivational programs to help them focus and achieve their health goals and access to recent articles on finding care, managing their health, and preventing illness.
Educate your employees on what you offer
Once you’ve chosen your benefits, make sure that your employees are aware of how your health insurance plan can help. After all, health benefits can be confusing—that’s why many employees don’t use their health insurance to the fullest and sometimes fall short in maintaining their optimal health.
Better health management starts with education. You can encourage your employees to download the apps available with most health and dental insurance plans to make managing their mental health easier.
Give your people highlights of their plan features and if they need other options or more coverage, connect them to SBIS. If your employee or their family members do need medical care, they need to understand that they can depend on health insurance to absorb some or all of the cost of mobility aids, nursing, dental care, prescription drugs, therapy and more.
Does your diverse team need new diverse health insurance options?
Connect your team to SBIS for options to supplement the health insurance plan you provide. Plans may be offered to full-time and part-time employees and 100% participation is not required. Employees can keep their coverage plan no matter where they work within Canada Your business does not need to have a plan administrator, which saves you money and time.
Your employees can take advantage of convenient payment terms and there is no cut off age for when they can apply for many plans regardless of changes to their health. Coverage is guaranteed renewable for life once they are enrolled in the supplemental health plan.
Is there a gap in the dental insurance you offer? Would additional mental health benefits help? Is there opportunity to top-up therapy coverage? A supplemental plan can fill these needs, and more.
SBIS addresses diverse needs with equal attention to budget and options
At SBIS, we specialize in helping small business owners make the best possible decisions on what individual or small group health insurance plan will work for best your employees. Call us at 1-800-667-0429 Monday to Friday, 8:45 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. ET or go online to discover small business health insurance options for your business, and supplemental options for all of your team’s needs.
