Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

Staying in touch. It's what we do with our family and friends ... the people we care most about. So wouldn't it make sense that we also stay in touch with our clients?

The National Business Group on Health has launched an ambitious, three-year initiative aimed at helping employers design benefit plans that reflect the latest information and expert recommendations on cancer treatment and prevention.

Worksite voluntary benefits as we know them are dead. Driven largely by the spiraling cost increases in group health insurance, over the past decade or so employers have been shifting benefit costs to employees.

The cover story of this month's issue of Employee Benefit Adviser provides insight into how brokers can make innovative use of social software in their practices. Understanding the use of social software technology in the workplace is complicated because it is a broad and evolving category and the vendors competing in this space are coming from different perspectives and areas of expertise.

January's cover story made a very important point - if you are a long-time adviser, give something back. Give back to your industry organizations. Give back to the new people entering the profession. The need for professionalism and expertise in our field has never been more important than right now.

In the next several columns I will be putting on my benefit sales trainer hat, with a series of columns called, "If you want to sell, do this." These will be detailed selling techniques that producers in my firm's FutureOffice Network use every day with great success.

It's now February - the perfect time to take stock of where you are and where you are going.

The Affordable Care Act is about to test how well people respond to economic incentives. About 3.5 million Americans who are uninsured today could get health coverage in 2016 for less than what they'll pay in penalties under the ACA

The future of a brokerage lies in its up-and-coming talent. Top firms know it, and are investing heavily in grooming young advisers who show fortitude. EBA knows it as well, and for the 6th year in a row, we are looking for rising stars who are making a difference in the employee benefit industry.

Zenefits made the list of the year’s most-read EBA stories twice, including a defamation lawsuit that ADP filed against the Silicon Valley startup. Other attention-grabbing articles included the Aetna-Humana merger, Cadillac tax repeal efforts, attempts to tweak the ACA and the elimination of broker commission.