Work/Life Trends
LifeCare Conference Reveals Attendees Grappling With Aging Workforce Issues and Proving Value of Employee Programs

LifeCare’s eighth annual Life Event Management^® Conference, held May 19 through 21 in Rye Brook, New York, addressed a number of timely work/life topics including the integration of work/life and wellness programs, creating a business culture of support, and the importance of advancing public policy that strengthens working families. Two cutting edge trends that emerged from the conference were solutions for supporting an aging workforce and methodologies for calculating the value of employee programs such as work/life offerings.

LifeCare’s annual Conference brings together representatives of client companies, leading work/life authorities, and HR subject matter experts for a free and open exchange of information, ideas and best practices in the work/life discipline. More than 100 individuals attended this year's Conference, representing such well-known organizations as Altria; Bank of America; Charles Schwab; Delta Air Lines; MBNA; Office Depot; Prudential Financial, U.S. Postal Service; and Wells Fargo Bank, among others.

Aging Workforce Issues Take Center Stage

Opening his presentation on geriatric care management, LifeCare’s Managing Director of Successful Aging, James Weil, asked audience members to indicate whether they personally provide care to an aging loved one. More than two-thirds of the audience raised their hands in response and, within a matter of moments, began relating their own adult caregiving experiences as well as those of employees within their organizations. Although the details of these experiences differed, each one carried the same theme—the difficulties caregivers face in balancing caregiving tasks with job responsibilities and personal needs.

“Judging from the audience response, it was clear that people everywhere are now dealing with adult caregiving,” noted LifeCare co-founder and CEO, Peter G. Burki. “This issue has huge implications for employers and employees alike, impacting productivity levels, personal health and related costs, recruitment and retention efforts and, ultimately, an organization's bottom line. We want to help clients get a handle on this issue now, rather than waiting until it becomes a full-blown epidemic.”

During his presentation, Weil gave his perspective on the “Caregiving in the U.S.” report released in April by the National Alliance for Caregiving and AARP. This report shows that America’s eldercaregivers are getting younger: 22 percent are now younger than age 22; 33 percent are age 35 to 49; 32 percent are age 50 to 64; and 13 percent are over age 65. “In the past, conventional wisdom held that younger workforces are not greatly affected by eldercare,” Weil told the audience. “This new data tells a very different story. Employers with younger workers are no longer immune to the challenges posed by adult caregiving.” Weil went on to cite some of the programs that employers are offering to workers to help them balance their caregiving and professional responsibilities. These include flexible work schedules, resource and referral programs, EAP services, in-home GCM services, and caregiver fairs.

Weil’s co-presenter, Helene Bergman, Director of Elder Care Alternatives, LLC, spoke on the subject, “When Caring for Family Becomes the Job.” Drawing from her long experience in the greater New York area as a Geriatric Care Manager and a member of the Academy of Certified Social Workers, Bergman offered real-life case studies of people providing elder care while holding down a full-time job. Despite the demands on their time and the difficult challenges they face, Bergman told the audience, employees who provide care want to be at work. “Their jobs are often their sanctuary,” she said. Bergman went on to describe the services provided by professional geriatric care managers, challenges that working caregivers frequently confront, and the benefits to employers who provide caregiving support through work/life programs and flexible work arrangements.

Justifying Employee Programs

Attendees also widely agreed that the need to justify the costs of employee programs is an ongoing and urgent challenge. In fact, roughly 75 percent of audience members indicated that they recently had been asked by senior management to measure the return on investment (ROI) of their work/life programs.

In his presentation entitled, “Proving the Value of Work/Life,” Tom Carey, LifeCare’s Vice President of Sales and Government Business, offered an overview of LifeCare’s patent-pending ROI tool, explaining how it can be customized to provide organizations with highly accurate results regarding the impact and the ROI of their work/life programs.

One attendee noted that, in light of the current economic and competitive environment, it's now almost impossible to get senior management's buy-in for employee programs without offering solid proof of their return. The LifeCare tool, she stated, “couldn’t come at a better time.”