Jennifer Weinstein is a self-described storyteller, which she deems "one of the most important skills to master in benefits."
Headlining her story as VP of benefits at Albertsons Companies are some impressive stats: She led her team in achieving over $47 million in productivity savings in fiscal year 2025 (and over $150 million in fiscal years 2022-27). She also boosted traffic to the company's benefits website 31% over the prior year and increased email open rates to an average of 60% (versus industry average of 9-12%) with her team's communication efforts.
That all-important benefits communication was also streamlined with the implementation of a centralized care-guide model, giving the company's more than 100,000 employees eligible for company-sponsored benefits access to a "go-to" person for all their benefits questions.
Weinstein also developed and initiated "Project Possible," a large-scale plan to begin synthesizing over 3,000 time off and leave policies into "one best way." Her team completed the first phase of recommendations, which included moving from more than 500 policies to 35.
But for all the impressive long-term projects, Weinstein also values being a support system for employees in the day to day.
"Benefits allows me the opportunity every day to help people at a time in their life when they need help the most, through our benefits," she said. "Be it a scary time in life, like a cancer diagnosis, or an exciting time in life, like building a family, helping employees and their families is the reason why I feel my career is not just a job, but a calling."
Among Albertsons' initiatives that make this ongoing support possible are a surgery center of excellence program, a second-opinion program to help members navigate challenging diagnoses, and mental health and parental support programs.
Weinstein recognizes that the success of each relies on effective communication.
"I see leading benefits like running a business, and adding a point-solution like launching a new product to market," Weinstein shared. "I incorporate business, marketing and advertising ideas into our benefits strategy to help employees better understand their benefit offerings."
"Being able to tell a great story helps people remember, and helps them be able to retell that story to others," she added. She drew on this storytelling prowess to author a book earlier this year, "Benefits Burnout: How to fall (back) in love with your employee benefits career."
Weinstein hopes to parlay her companywide communication skills into a needed dialogue with her benefits professional peers.
Her book "sheds light on a topic that most benefits professionals are only talking about in closed-door meetings: they are burnt out, and many are leaving, or considering leaving the employee benefits industry," she explained. "My hope is that the book opens a much-needed public conversation before it's too late."
Jennifer will be honored at EBN's Benefits at Work conference in September, which you can
