This episode features an interview with Michael Menerey, Senior Vice President of Alliant Insurance Services. He currently oversees and manages the Los Angeles employee benefits team and is focused on new business development and recruiting and developing talented team members. Michael has been with Alliant for over 20 years in various roles such as Vice President and Benefits Consultant. In 2021, he was named by Risk & Insurance Magazine as a 2021 Power Broker® Award Recipient for Employee Benefits. In this episode, Sasha sits down with Michael to discuss the broken aspects of the traditional healthcare system, the lack of price transparency and quality metrics in healthcare services, and the necessity of tailored communication strategies for different workforce demographics.
This episode features an interview with Michael Menerey, Senior Vice President of Alliant Insurance Services. He currently oversees and manages the Los Angeles employee benefits team and is focused on new business development and recruiting and developing talented team members. Michael has been with Alliant for over 20 years in various roles such as Vice President and Benefits Consultant. In 2021, he was named by Risk & Insurance Magazine as a 2021 Power Broker® Award Recipient for Employee Benefits.
In this episode, Sasha sits down with Michael to discuss the broken aspects of the traditional healthcare system, the lack of price transparency and quality metrics in healthcare services, and the necessity of tailored communication strategies for different workforce demographics.
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“When you're fully insured, there's just not a lot of levers that can be pulled from a cost containment standpoint. Once you move into that self-funded world, there is just a whole universe of different levers and tools at your disposal that can not only control cost, but can also improve the quality of care for employees and improve the member experience, relative to what it is in a traditional insurance model or even the traditional healthcare system.” – Michael Menerey
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Episode Timestamps:
*(01:19): Michael’s career journey
*(02:54): Why healthcare is broken
*(11:49): The benefits of self-funded health plans
*(20:18): Three point solutions that every employer should consider
*(24:36): How workforce demographics impact benefit plans and communications
*(35:23): Michael’s advice for how to manage your day
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Links:
Connect with Michael on LinkedIn
Connect with Sasha on LinkedIn
Learn more about Collective Health
Sasha Yamaguchi: Let's face it, healthcare is confusing and costs are continuing to rise. Employers are looking for ways to improve the health of their people and their bottom lines. The good news? Many leading companies are leveraging self-funded health plans and innovative benefit solutions to do just that. Learn from some of the best minds in employee health.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Welcome to the Benefits Playbook, Strategies for self-funded Health Plans. I'm your host, Sasha Yamaguchi. Commercial Leader at Collective Health. On today's episode, we are joined by Michael Menerey, Senior Vice President of Alliant Insurance Services. He currently oversees and manages the Los Angeles Employee Benefits Team and is focused on new business development and recruiting and developing talented team members.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Michael has been with Alliant for over 20 years in various roles, such as Vice President and Benefits Consultant. In 2021, he was named the Power Broker Award Recipient for Employee Benefits by Risk and Insurance Magazine. Thank you, Michael, for being with me today.
Michael Menerey: Hey, excited to be here. Going to be fun.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Great. You and I have talked about doing this for a bit, so I'm really excited to have you as a guest. I know we'll talk about a lot of great things going on in our industry. So I always love to start, of course, I would love for you to share with the audience, tell them a little bit about yourself, your career journey.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I know we've spent time at some of the same places and then also just share a little bit about Alliant and what Alliant does and what you do there in your role.
Michael Menerey: Sure. Sure. That's a lot, but gosh, a little bit about me, wife, two kids, which is a blessing. I have a life outside of work. I like to cook. I like to play golf.
Michael Menerey: You know, I'm a fantasy football nut and a college football nut. So, but as far as my career, you know, I don't think anybody gets into insurance intentionally. I think it's an accident for most of us. I. Needed a job out of college and found myself as an underwriter at Cigna Healthcare and try not to be you know, too mean here, but not my favorite job.
Michael Menerey: But I met some wonderful people there and built some great relationships and they connected me to some folks at Alliant. And after a year and a half at Cigna, I started my career at Alliant. Started at the bottom as an analyst and then account manager and, you know, quickly moved into a production role and been here ever since.
Michael Menerey: It's been great.
Sasha Yamaguchi: That's great. So you've been on both the carrier side and the broker side, which I always find fascinating. And I, I love that out of college, you were in underwriting, something we share. I wasn't in underwriting, but I married an underwriter. And that was his first role out of college. So I get what you say about maybe not your favorite role, but well, I'm excited to have you.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I know you personally, you have done a podcast in the past and really created a lot of resources for groups to understand. You know, self-funded, our industry. So you launched a podcast a couple of years ago, back in 2017, reconstructing healthcare. So I think well ahead of what we're talking about today.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Years ago, you were already trying to get ahead of the traditional healthcare system being broken. This is such a big question, but why do you feel It is broken. Why did you do the podcast as in what did you feel you needed to help people understand and what do we need to do as an industry really?
Michael Menerey: Yeah, so first and foremost, I feel like, well my title, you know, is executive vice president and a producer consultant at Alliant.
Michael Menerey: At my core, I'm an educator. My mother was a teacher, and I feel like I've got a lot of that, you know, in my DNA. And, you know, when you first get into the industry, you're learning a lot, right? And, you know, we get carriers kind of explaining to us how things work, and On the surface, that's what you believe, right?
Michael Menerey: But as you continue to gain experience in consulting and working with clients, and especially when you start getting into self-funding and understand the underbelly of how things work, I quickly realized just how broken the system is, right? There's just a lot of inherent flaws in The traditional insurance model, first and foremost, let's just think about price, right?
Michael Menerey: I mean, in any other industry you can, you know, or for any other consumer good, like we're Amazon shoppers. I'm sure you are too, right?
Sasha Yamaguchi: Oh yeah.
Michael Menerey: And you can price anything. You can get reviews. It's transparent. If you don't like it, you can return it. I mean, that is the consumer marketplace. And as Americans, we're amazing consumers, except when it comes to healthcare, because There is no price, there is no transparency, there is no quality metrics, and what I discovered is just there's a lot of waste.
Michael Menerey: And the network model in and of itself is kind of asinine, you know, like, Hey, let's give you a discount off of a fictitious price for this service that has no actual relation to what it actually costs that provider or that hospital or facility to deliver the service. And, you know, whenever I'm talking to employers about.
Michael Menerey: self-funding and, and how to control costs, you know, I always give the example of, you know, my wife has some GI issues and a couple of years ago, you know, she was told she needed an MRI, an abdominal MRI, and she was going to go to this place, get the MRI, but I said, Oh, hold on, pause, let me make a phone call.
Michael Menerey: Right? So I called just to see how much it was going to cost with our network discount, our Anthem network discount. And they said, Oh, 2, 500. And I was like, okay, thanks. And so I called a place that was literally across the street. And I asked the same question. Hey, for this abdominal arm MRI, you know, what would it cost?
Michael Menerey: 500. That's a 5, 000 percent price differential. And that is, that example is pervasive throughout any network. It's not just Anthem. It's the same thing with Anthem, Shield, Cigna, Aetna, United. And then there's no quality metric. I mean, how do you know that you're going to the best provider for that service?
Michael Menerey: You don't. All of the facilities market themselves. I mean, you see the marketing. It's all, it's billboards. On streets, on freeways, because they're all trying to steer the volume. So in any case, high level, I mean, pharmacy is a whole nother conversation about how that is completely broken. But yeah,
Sasha Yamaguchi: I'm sure we might get into that a little bit, but yes, that's a whole nother subject.
Michael Menerey: And that's, that's just the insurance side. If you think about the provider side of it, the provider side is completely broken as well. I mean, there's misaligned incentives and how providers are getting paid. And if you think about, I like to think about the diabetic patient who's overweight. They go to their PCP, and the PCP gets to spend 10 minutes with them.
Michael Menerey: That's the average time for a physician, a primary care physician, to spend with their patient. How is the physician going to counsel them on what they need to do to take care of themselves and manage their, their diet? They don't have time. As a result, what do physicians do? They do what they're trained to do.
Michael Menerey: They prescribe medication, right? And this is one of the many reasons that I think the healthcare delivery system is broken and then how we pay for it. Via the traditional health insurance network model is also broken.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Everything you just said is so spot on. And two things that you mentioned that I want to hit on is the doctor spending the time, like as you're saying it, and I know that you and I know this, but anyone listening, I mean, when you really think about that, someone is going in that needs to change their life
Sasha Yamaguchi: and their health and they get 10 to 15 minutes. Like, it's just absurd. And the MRI thing. So just ironically, yesterday I took my son for a doctor's visit for migraines. And I swear, halfway through the visit, I remember thinking, she's still in here. Wow. Like one, I was surprised she had to, cause she had a lot of questions.
Sasha Yamaguchi: But then at the end, she said, I'd love to just precautionary do an MRI. And I'm like, Okay, write it up. I'll research and we'll take our time on that. But it's like so quick and I don't think people realize how easily they will send you for an MRI and the cost difference. And that, that hits the plan, that hits the member.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I mean, it's just, it's one of the big things in our industry. That's definitely a hot topic. So I just went through it yesterday too.
Michael Menerey: Yep. Yep.
Sasha Yamaguchi: So that's interesting you use that as an example. Why do you think, again, I know this is a big question, but I guess why do you think there's resistance to change And or it's taking so long or will take so long for the system to make the changes to get to a better spot.
Michael Menerey: Yeah, so change is always driven by incentives, right? And so in the, I guess we could talk about in a couple different areas, right? With providers, I don't know that there's a lot of incentive for them to change, right? The healthcare system is really good at doing two things. Treating illness. And making a lot of money.
Michael Menerey: There's just not a lot of incentives for them to kind of change what they're doing. Now, you can talk to a CEO of a health system and they always make themselves out to be like superheroes, right? You know, we're changing the world. No, you're not. There's just not a lot of incentives at the provider level to make changes.
Michael Menerey: And while there, there is a big push for value based care and moving away from fee for service, what I've discovered, and I hate to be cynical, but in my career working with. Health systems is, in general, the clinicians don't have the power. They don't have the juice. The CEO doesn't have the power and has the juice.
Michael Menerey: You know who has the juice? The finance people, right? And so if you're trying to push change that negatively impacts the finances, Mmm, it's hard. It's hard. And then, look, on the insurance carrier side, like, insurance carriers do what they're incentivized to do as well. So they're making a profit margin and underwriting profit.
Michael Menerey: They make, well, they make monies in a lot of different ways, right? On the drugs and under underwriting profit, you know, on their pooling charges, there's really not a lot of incentive for them to control costs because, and really all they're doing is passing on costs. That is it. And they take a little margin and that margin, you know, a percentage on a higher number.
Michael Menerey: Equates to higher profits, right? So insurance carriers are doing what they're incentivized to be doing and same with PBMs. The only person in this whole equation that has an incentive to change the system are employers because we pay for it. Right? And the actual employee's independence because we are the payers of it and the victims of the poor healthcare system.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Yeah. No, I love that because I feel like as we educate employees, it goes back to when HSAs and HRAs first came out, right? And we would say, You know, this benefits them if they do the research and they find the right treatment and it's within, uh, not affordable, but a reasonable cost, it helped the plan, it helped the employees.
Sasha Yamaguchi: But if all of that starts working in a good cycle, then things are lower, right? The premiums, the claims, the contributions can be more manageable. So I think that's a good point in that. If employees are good consumers and employers are putting the time and energy into changing what they communicate and what they offer, it actually could break the cycle in a good way.
Sasha Yamaguchi: So the big topic and you're such an expert on this and what I wanted to have you on for is I think the one way that employers can do this, and I believe even in California where it was very slow moving, we're seeing so much more self-funded. So I would love to kind of dive into just in general, self-funded, lots to talk about, obviously, but just starting off, I'm sure you've had many clients move from fully insured to self-funded, and I will say for the audience, some groups are made to be fully insured, right?
Sasha Yamaguchi: There are some groups out there that, that need to stay fully insured possibly, but we are seeing the shift from traditional fully insured to self-funded. What are you seeing with your clients? Why are they moving? And I assume it's something that you are talking to Any group that you're meeting with as an option.
Michael Menerey: Yes, yes, of course. So, so first of all, you know, we're in California. California is a little bit weird, right? Because we have Kaiser. So if you looked at the number of self-funded employers in California versus the rest of the country, it's significantly less. And a lot of that has to do with the prevalence of Kaiser and the fact that, you know, you get Kaiser with 50, 60, sometimes 70 percent enrollment.
Michael Menerey: It doesn't make sense. To self fund those groups, right? Because of the potential for adverse selection. Now, that said, there's plenty of organizations that could and should be self insured. And the way that we tend to talk about this is there's just a lot of fat. And profit in the insured and what we try to educate employers is like, look, buying a fully insured product is one way to deliver the insurance and the healthcare to your employees.
Michael Menerey: But being self insured is a way to remove the profit. Right? And for all intents and purposes, create a not for profit health insurance structure. And ultimately, what we believe and what we see is that over a five year period, any self-funded employer is going to do better over that five year period than you would being self insured.
Michael Menerey: And so that's one reason on its own, just efficiency, right? But when you're fully insured, there's just not a lot of levers that can be pulled from a cost containment standpoint. And once you move into that self-funded world, there is Just a whole universe of different levers and tools at your disposal that can not only control cost, but can also improve the quality of care for employees and improve the member experience relative to what it is in a traditional insurance model.
Michael Menerey: Or even the traditional healthcare system.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I would love to talk a little bit more about those for anyone listening that's interested. Let's talk about just the levers for controlling cost. Maybe just highlight one or two things that you are always talking to clients about in that category.
Michael Menerey: Sure. So, we talked about waste in the network, right?
Michael Menerey: So, one of the tools that you have at your disposal when you're self insured is what I would call network optimization, Tools, and these are tools, resources to help employees get to the high value provider, which is going to be lower cost. higher quality. Okay. And so those can be bolt on navigation tools.
Michael Menerey: Those can be integrated navigation vendors that are taking over the customer service component. They can be TPAs like collective health that have that navigation component built in to the model. And so those tools and resources and sort of. And, uh, infrastructure can help reduce network waste. That's one, one of them.
Michael Menerey: I think another one is direct contracts, right? Where you're circumventing the network. And so when you think about direct contracts, It may sound like, well, what is that? Well, they're everywhere, right? Think about virtual care, right? Virtual care, whether it's a virtual primary care, virtual specialty care, that in essence is a direct contract.
Michael Menerey: And if you think about some of the chronic condition programs that are out there, you We've called them point solutions, right? There's tons of point solutions for diabetes, right? I just got off a call earlier where we're talking about weight management vendors who can be the sole prescriber for GLP-1s, right?
Michael Menerey: But these are actual, they're not just point solutions. They're virtual clinics. Right? Where, in reality, that diabetic patient that we talked about, who goes and, you know, sees their PCP for 10 minutes, and the PCP says, hey, you need to eat and exercise better, right? Well, what does that mean? They never got, I mean, that can mean anything.
Michael Menerey: Yep.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Time's up, and that's all they tell them, and then you have to leave and go figure it out.
Michael Menerey: See you in six months. So what happened in the last six months? I don't know, doc. I tried. But when you're dealing with virtual clinics Right. And you're getting not only a coach, a clinician, somebody that can text with you and speak with you every day, somebody that can help you with nutrition, you're getting significantly increased quality of care.
Michael Menerey: So, so I would say those chronic condition programs, virtual clinics, those are direct contracts, right? You're essentially bringing in a different provider network that layers over that baseline network that you have. So that's another example.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I love that example, and I feel like, tell me if you agree with this, thinking about that, one, it makes access to the employees easier, first and foremost, it allows that member to do follow up and have more conversation when they leave the PCP's office, and then I feel like I'm trying to tie it back to the employer plan as well, because One, members are getting healthier, hopefully, but they're also accessing these virtual services versus multiple physician in office visits, which also helps the plan, I assume.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Yeah. Again, maybe lowering the cost where it can be lowered, and then also members getting more access and more care, so it's like a win win.
Michael Menerey: It's a value play. Like the quality of care that an individual with chronic disease gets with these solutions is far better than anything they could ever get in a brick and mortar scenario, right?
Michael Menerey: Because the brick and mortar physician offices, they're not equipped with these resources. Right. You're not going to get access to a nutritionist if you just walk through the door to go see your PCP. So it's a value play to improve quality of care, but inevitably when people get those resources for behavior change, you're going to see improved results.
Michael Menerey: You're going to see lower A1C levels. People are going to lose weight. Their sleep is going to be better. They're going to see their other risk factors come down. So that is, a different way to sort of attack it, where you're, you're actually attacking population health risks with some of these direct contracts, virtual clinics, chronic condition programs.
Sasha Yamaguchi: And would you agree, I'm thinking about an old industry buzzword, presenteeism. Would you agree that this also helps for present? Because as I heard you say, better sleep, right? All that helps the employee the next day when they're at work, right? And they're focused on their job. And it's just, it's more important than ever.
Sasha Yamaguchi: And, you know, I almost feel like, how did we do without all this virtual option, right? That was just a few years ago, and now there's so many options for people, and it's crazy to think 10 years ago, a lot of this was not an option for employees at all.
Michael Menerey: Yeah, I mean, it's, look, it's been super exciting to see the progression of digital health solutions, virtual clinics.
Michael Menerey: And I think, It's been a win win situation for employers and employees who've been able to take advantage of that. And again, going back to your original question, like why self insure? Because you can take advantage of these things that exist that can actually create value for your employees and your, and their dependents that you may not get access to, you know what I mean?
Michael Menerey: Let's be honest. Like the engagement in the fully insured and traditional ASO vendors, their disease management programs, their wellness program. It's horrible. It's like low.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Low, low, low, low, low, low.
Michael Menerey: 1 to 3%. And I'll never forget a conversation with one of these organizations where, you know, we had a meeting, we're reviewing annual review and they get one of their team members on that's going to talk about the engagement and their disease management programs.
Michael Menerey: And we had 3 percent engagement. This is years ago. And they were really excited. They're like, that's great. And I'm thinking if that's great, Then we've got a problem.
Sasha Yamaguchi: We're in trouble. We're in trouble. You're right though. And what's funny is that makes me think too of we give those results and then it's like and here's the hundred employees We couldn't reach so we never got to engage with them and it's like why can't you reach them?
Sasha Yamaguchi: It's all part of what we do So I'm thinking as we're talking about virtual care if you were talking to a client of yours What would be the two to three point solution type vendors that you think every employer should at least consider? Just out of curiosity. So weight management, GLP 1s, but just if you think of the top three accessible programs, what do you feel are the most important right now?
Michael Menerey: That's a great question. So top three, let's start with mental health. So I think, you know, it's no secret that access to care in traditional networks to behavioral health providers is putrid. And then same with EAPs. And it's even worse, right? If you are an employer that has people that live in rural areas, right?
Michael Menerey: It's a provider desert. So there's so many studies these days that show that mental health and mental health issues, like they impact Cost of care, the impact quality of life. And so as an employer, like when your people need access to a psychologist, psychiatrist, you want them to be able to access those providers.
Michael Menerey: And unfortunately, you know, in the current network model that we have, you have providers leaving those networks because the reimbursement is too low. Right. And so that's an access issue and an affordability issue. So the first thing that I really love is digital behavioral health vendors. You can call that a mental health supplement that kind of wraps around the core medical program, your, your core EAP.
Michael Menerey: We've had a lot of success implementing those and the feedback from employees is fabulous. I mean, cause you're getting access to care in one to three days versus three weeks to three months. Right. So big fan of that. I do really like the chronic condition point solutions and what we're seeing now. I mean, there's a lot of them.
Michael Menerey: I think originally plenty focused on diabetes with the rise of GLP 1s, we're seeing more that are focused more holistically on pre diabetes, weight management, plus diabetes. And we're starting to see. Vendors try to address more than one. You know, niche issue, which I think is great, but I'm a big fan of those types of solutions because you're improving the quality of care and you're helping to reduce costs, right?
Michael Menerey: If your average diabetic costs 20, 000 a year and I can get 25 to 50 percent engaged in a program and get that cost down to 10. That's a win, not only from a cost standpoint, but we're improving those people's quality of life. And the other thing that I really like are centers of excellence for select surgical procedures.
Michael Menerey: I think there's such a wide range of quality out there when it comes to, you know, surgeries. And this is one of those things where you can really align incentives well. Where the providers that are really good at what they do because they do it all day long, they're at the top of their game when it comes to quality.
Michael Menerey: Those are the people you want doing the surgeries. Not the guy or the gal who does it 10 percent of the time. And so being able to get people to a center of excellence to receive high quality treatment. Typically you're going to see savings from a unit cost standpoint. And the way that we like to align incentives is to have a 0 copay.
Michael Menerey: Right? Where the employee is rewarded for making that choice. But those are three that I, I really like and that I think should be integrated into any self insured plan.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I love those. And ironically, surgical procedures, I agree, but I feel like it's not talked about as much. So when you said it, I was like, Oh, I love that you're adding this in because.
Sasha Yamaguchi: You know, we all talk about the mental health solutions and the, the weight management, but we don't always hit on that one. So I'm glad that you highlighted that one. Cause I think that is really important and it's a surgery. It's a major medical situation. You want to go to the right provider for sure.
Michael Menerey: And it, I mean, the pricing structure typically with the city center of excellence vendors is different. You know, if there's a readmission, you don't get charged. If you go to a regular network provider, and you have a procedure done, and oops, didn't go well, you gotta come back, we gotta fix it, guess what?
Michael Menerey: You get charged twice. There's no penalty.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Yeah, I think any employer listening should latch on to what you just said, because that's pretty important. So, because how often are surgeries having to be redone, right? Back surgery being probably one of the most common that I've heard. As we talk about these options, one thing that comes to mind that I would love to, to hear from you, and you and I have been in the industry a very long time.
Sasha Yamaguchi: So, when employers are building their plans and they're looking potentially at having a population of multiple generations, right? How should they look at building what they're offering based on millennials versus Gen Z ers versus baby boomers? There could still be baby boomers on the plan. So out of curiosity, what are your thoughts on that?
Michael Menerey: Great question. We were actually talking about this the other day with a potential client. But at the end of the day, what are employers interested? They're interested in, one, leveraging their benefit program to be part of their recruitment and retention, you know, strategy, their total reward strategy. And I think.
Michael Menerey: Where we find ourselves is in a situation where we have an evolving workforce demographic where Millennials and Gen Z are gradually becoming the largest segment of the workforce. And if you think about it, Millennials and Gen Z employees, they value different things than boomers and Xers. Right. And, you know, having a standard benefit plan with a 401k, like that's not going to cut it if you're looking to retain people for the long term.
Michael Menerey: And so I think human resources leaders and employee benefit managers, you need to be cognizant of that, that this segment of the workforce wants different things. They want work time flexibility. They want everything to be digital. And so that goes back to communications. So if you are communicating in the old fashioned way of, Hey, here's our printed benefit brochure and we're going to do open enrollment, you know, once a year.
Michael Menerey: I mean, there's plenty of flaws in that approach on its own, but if you're a millennial Gen Z and it's not on your cell phone, it doesn't exist.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Right.
Michael Menerey: And so you really have to start thinking about benefits that go beyond core medical and core ancillary that wrap around your core offerings that are going to be meaningful to that, you know, segment of the workforce.
Michael Menerey: And you also have to think very strategically about how you communicate, right? Because email? Nope. Not going to do it. People don't read it, right? Print, not effective. And so you really have to start thinking creatively about different ways to communicate to and engage the various segments of the workforce.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I agree with all that and love that what you've highlighted, you just reminded me. So for those listening, I spent 23 years on a traditional side of our industry, moved over to a Startup, no longer a startup. And you just hit on something that makes me laugh about email. When I joined Collective Health about two weeks in, I was like, Is my email broken?
Sasha Yamaguchi: Because there are very few emails here because we communicate via Slack and via other channels that I was so not used to. So when you just said sending something out via email you are so right and I'm living it now because where I'm at here at Collective, email is very light. Compared to where I came from, it's night and day.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Even if you send one out, you don't necessarily get a response. It's not that old mentality of you have to respond to everything right away, but we do a lot on Slack. So I love that you hit on that. And it is really important because also as an employer, you're paying for these services to be available, but if employees are not accessing and using them, what's the point?
Michael Menerey: Well, it's, it's a, it's a negative ROI.
Michael Menerey: So if you're going to invest in these programs and these resources, you want employees to use them. Otherwise, you're not getting the bang for your buck that you want. You said employees. What about dependents?
Sasha Yamaguchi: Dependents. You're right. Who don't even get it.
Michael Menerey: So again, like how employers think about getting a return on investment for their benefit program, it has to change.
Michael Menerey: You know, you have to start focusing on getting to the different segments of the workforce, but you also have to get to the spouses. And so that needs to be. Part of the strategy.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Agree. No, that's a good point. And over the years, I think we've always talked about that. Years ago, you would do a mailer to the spouse because you knew they may read it more or they may need it.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Member experience, I think is something is it's important in our industry. It's talked about a lot, but I would love to hear. So it kind of ties to what we're saying. Great offerings, but if an employee or a dependent aren't accessing them or having a good experience, they're likely not to re, re engage with collective health or whoever it may be.
Sasha Yamaguchi: So around member experience, what have you seen that has worked? And then within that, I, of course, am biased because I believe having a model that brings it on, you said the words, you have to have it on the phone or certain populations won't access. That's right. Right. So that's something we're really passionate about at Collective, but member experience, why is it important and the access within that?
Sasha Yamaguchi: Changing our industry and the fact that dependents, employees can access and have a good experience so they continue to engage when it comes to their health and benefits.
Michael Menerey: Yeah, I think, look, if we think about the traditional member experience with traditional insurance companies, it's pretty poor. NPS scores are relatively low, single digits to teens.
Michael Menerey: It's because you call and you're, you have this 1 800 phone tree and it's horrible experience. And if you talk with one person on, on Monday and you have to call on Tuesday, guess what? You get to go through the phone tree again. And you get to talk with a completely new person who has no idea about the conversation you had yesterday with somebody.
Michael Menerey: And so this is where, you know, I think you have to give credit to a lot of the vendors in the marketplace who were thinking about this 10 years ago. And I mean, you know, certainly your founder had an experience that led him to launch collective health, right? And a lot of it had to do with confusion. And poor member experience, right?
Michael Menerey: And so, a surgery back to what we were saying earlier.
Michael Menerey: And so if the member experience is poor with. It's going to reflect on that employee's perception of their employer, right? Well, my employer has sh ty health insurance, right? I had to deal with so and so and they're terrible, right?
Michael Menerey: So, you know, I think credit to the navigation vendors. You know, who kind of started this all over a decade ago and came in, you know, Collective Health, Accolade, Quantum, who really focused on, we got to do better. We got to deliver a better member experience. And so I'll give a quick example. One of my colleagues was just diagnosed with cancer and she has just had her first round of chemo and radiation on Monday.
Michael Menerey: And getting cancer is devastating, right? I mean, psychologically, so many things going through your mind. How am I going to deal with this? And you talk about member experience. We happen to have a navigation vendor built into our health insurance. And what she said to me is, it's one thing to learn about what these vendors do.
Michael Menerey: It's another to be on the receiving end of those services. And she's like, you would not believe. How they're taking care of me. I have somebody who calls me every day. She is blocking and tackling and doing all the hard stuff to navigate healthcare and make sure the providers are coordinating. She's like, I don't have to do anything.
Michael Menerey: If I had to do this on my own, I don't know what I would do. And so this is my teammate and it's just, I mean, look, it just warmed my heart to like, hear that, you know, like I'm concerned about her, Knowing that she is having an amazing member experience to like help her through this really terrible time.
Michael Menerey: I mean, that's, that should be the North Star. That should be what every employer wants their employees to experience when they're going through, you know, a tough time. Personal healthcare experience. I really think we've come a long ways and there's a lot of great. Companies in the marketplace who are striving to deliver that type of member experience.
Michael Menerey: And I consider collective health in that bucket of vendors who are striving to do better and deliver quality member experience to employees and their dependents.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Yeah. Well, thank you for sharing that story. One, I hate that she's going through that, but for me, even though I work at one of these vendors, when I hear members truly get to experience.
Sasha Yamaguchi: What we all say we do, but like actually happens. And as you're talking, she's talking to this person regularly, six months when she's doing better, that person's probably still going to check in. Like they actually care about what they're doing and they care about the members. And you know, I hear that meeting with our teams, but I appreciate you sharing that because I think we all throw around member experience.
Sasha Yamaguchi: We all throw around care navigation, but when you hear examples of it actually doing what it's supposed to and changing. How employees are being helped. It's, I mean, it's just wonderful. Like, period. It's just what we should be doing. I agree with you. It should be the North Star. People are going through so much.
Sasha Yamaguchi: The least we can do is help them through it, right?
Michael Menerey: 100%. I'll never forget a story. I think I can't remember who told me. Somebody who had cut them off and honked them in the road. And turns out they ended up knowing who it was, right? And that person happened to be going through a lot of stress.
Michael Menerey: You never know what people are dealing with in their own personal lives, right? There's always stuff going on. I have some stuff going on with my daughter, which I won't share here, but it's hard, right? And so I think given that people are naturally dealing with other, just the natural day to day stresses of life, right?
Michael Menerey: It's nice. When they can be offered a resource to just lighten their load a little bit.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Yeah. Ooh, what a way to wrap up. Yeah, I completely agree. I always try to think when I'm at Starbucks, when I'm wherever and somebody's working, it just doesn't look like looks down. I try to make a gesture cause I'm thinking who knows what's going through their mind, what they're dealing with.
Sasha Yamaguchi: And so the honking story, you know, is a good one as well. And it's, it's true. If we can lighten their load on probably their, the biggest thing they're dealing with and take that off their plate or at least help them, I think it's huge. Well, I think that was a wonderful way to wrap up of just talking about, to me, this is how our industry will change over time, right?
Sasha Yamaguchi: More and more of these stories, more and more of these in situations where we're hearing, like the coolest thing is when a member comes up to any of us or an employee in your case, Says, Oh my God, I talked to my navigation, my carrier, whoever it may be. And it was like such a, a nice experience. Like if we can all get that, we're happy.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I always love to end on a little bit of an advice note for anyone listening. And I want to go back to. Something you said when you were talking and introducing yourself. So wife, two kids, you like to cook, you have a dog. I'm sure you work a million hours. You're on conference calls all day like we all are.
Sasha Yamaguchi: What advice would you give somebody who's in your shoes? They have a very busy home life. They have a very busy work life. What tools or what do you do to try to manage it all so that you're not doing everything all the time? I would be curious for you to share with anybody out there. Maybe it's just for me.
Sasha Yamaguchi: Selfishly, because I have three kids, three animals. But share some advice with people listening. Like there's a lot going on. How do you manage your day?
Michael Menerey: Gosh, yeah. Managing the chaos, because it is chaos. You know, I think just over the years, I've learned different tips and tricks and I like to call them little, little Jedi.
Michael Menerey: Mind trick strategies, right? You know, one is, is be grateful. You know, it's hard to be, if you're in a state of gratitude, it's very hard to be angry, upset, frustrated. So I have a practice of writing down three things that I'm grateful for every day. That's one. And I think, you know, it may sound, I mean, it may sound a little contrived, but I mean, at the end of the day, like, you have to take care of your body.
Michael Menerey: To be able to perform on a day in and day out basis and manage the stress, right? And so what does that mean? I used to not sleep that much. Used to be a six hour a night person. I'm an eight hour, at least in bed. I try to get seven hours, but eight hours in bed and I, I think that's important. I think figuring out different ways to manage your stress for me, that's exercise.
Michael Menerey: It's movement. It's also like hobbies. Right? I mean, hobbies are good for the soul, right? So make time for that, whether it be hanging out with friends, whether it be getting outside. My wife likes to garden and hike, but it can't all be about work, right? There has to be some space in your life to nurture your soul.
Michael Menerey: And so anyways, that's, that's it. Some tidbits.
Sasha Yamaguchi: I love those. I think the body one is really important. Take care of ourselves so we can take care of others and our, whatever else going on in the day. Hobbies, could not agree more. I think a lot of people are working, working or doing personal and may not have their own hobby and I love the grateful one.
Sasha Yamaguchi: So yeah. Michael, this was great. I'm thrilled that you joined us. You are such an expert and so knowledgeable and appreciate everything you shared. Let everyone know where they can find you, LinkedIn, if they want to reach out. And I'm excited to have you today. Thank you.
Michael Menerey: Yeah, no, this has been super fun. I appreciate you having me on.
Michael Menerey: You can find me on LinkedIn, Michael Menerey. With Alliant and you know, I'm easy to get a hold of. menerey@alliant.com. There you go.
Sasha Yamaguchi: All right. Well, thank you, Michael. And I know everyone listening is really going to enjoy this episode and learn so much about the industry.
Michael Menerey: Awesome. Thanks for having me.
Producer: This podcast is brought to you by Collective Health, a health benefits solution that guides employees toward healthier lives and companies toward healthier bottom lines. Check us out at collectivehealth.com.