featured posts:

• Neeyamo Event: Payroll Beyond Borders

  Jan 24, 2022, by Elizabeth Rennie

    Last week marked Neeyamo's Payroll Beyond Borders' virtual global payroll industry event. The keynotes were delivered by payroll industry leaders Dan Maddux, Executive Director, American Payroll Association, and Ken Pullar, CEO, CIPP. The event had around 1,200 participants from around the world and was the first global coming together of global payroll industry experts [...]

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• The Changing Role of the Strategic Benefits Leader

  Jan 14, 2022, by Elizabeth Rennie

    Since the start of the pandemic, company benefits have played an increasingly important role in helping organizations protect the safety, wellness, and health of their employees. This is increasingly the case, not only for physical wellness, but organizations now have greater awareness of mental health and financial wellness impacts on their staff given recent challenges and mass res[...]

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• HR Trends & Outlook 2021, Part 1: Core HR

  Jan 12, 2021, by Elizabeth Rennie

    Part 1 by Pete Tiliakos & Liz Rennie This is Part 1 of a 2-part blog presenting an analysis of key trends from NelsonHall's HR Technology & Services team. Part 1 looks at the key outsourcing trends around core HR functions, including cloud HR transformation, payroll, and benefits administration services. Cloud HR Transformation Services The drive to digital has k[...]

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• Benefitfocus Sets Out its Benefits Vision

  Mar 26, 2020, by Elizabeth Rennie

      The recent OnePlace2020 digital conference was an opportunity for Benefitfocus to launch its 2020 strategy and to increase awareness of the benefits marketplace. Its vision is to improve lives with benefits, timely in light of the current global pandemic. Ray August, President and CEO, shed light on the fact that health care costs per employee have grown faster than wa[...]

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• Engaging with Benefits: Spotlight on Benefitfocus

  Nov 19, 2019, by Gary Bragar

    Last week I attended the Benefitfocus Seller Place 2020 conference. Benefitfocus has repositioned itself from a software company to a benefits platform provider with solutions focused on engaging and improving the user experience while helping employers and employees make more informed decisions and reduce cost. Benefitfocus has 25m consumers, serving 150k employers with 15.5m emp[...]

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• Alight Solutions: 2017 Progress Report & 2018 Vision

  Dec 14, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

    It has been 10 months since the announcement that Aon was divesting the businesses within its Outsourcing segment to private equity firm Blackstone, and 6 months since Alight was formally launched as a new company, which makes it an ideal time to review its progress and where it is headed in 2018. By all accounts, it was a smooth transition, with client retention remaining high.&n[...]

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• The Journey for HR Services in 2018: Part 2

  Dec 06, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

    In my last blog, I laid out 2018 predictions for two areas of talent management: recruiting and learning (see here). This blog looks at what to expect over the next year for payroll services and benefits administration. Trending topics in these areas over the last year included cloud, compliance, configuration, and consumerization. Payroll The payroll landscape has shifted away[...]

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• The Rise of Intelligent Automation in Benefits Administration

  Nov 08, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

  Relative to other HR services, the application of intelligent automation in benefits administration is lagging, but is slowly making progress.  With respect to RPA, Conduent and Alight are among the first movers, with both using bots for manual calculations in pension administration. In addition, Alight has deployed bots for low-level transactional work that is typically offshored, and in[...]

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• Benefits Optimization: The Focus of the Participant Experience in Benefits Administration

  Oct 25, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

    Over the last few years, developments around the participant experience for benefits administration services have been focused on helping employees become more effective consumers as they make their benefit selections (the “consumerization” era). In 2016, the next stage of evolution of the participant experience emerged as suppliers shifted their focus to utilization (the[...]

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• The Gig Economy & the Challenge for HR

  Sep 22, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

  The gig economy has been a recent trending topic. While the concept of gig workers is nothing new, the attention being paid to it is, especially since this is an area whose growth has been facilitated by the digital marketplace. Here, I take a quick look at the challenges gig workers present for HR. Gig workers present a challenge on several fronts, especially when it comes to managing[...]

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• A Closer Look at the Modern Approach to Multi-Process HR Services

  Jul 31, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

    This is the second of two articles on the multi-process HR BPS market. NelsonHall’s latest market analysis report on the multi-process HR BPS market recognizes two types of strategies adopted by vendors taking a modern approach to multi-process HR services: intelligent technologies and cloud-based HR services. Here, I take a quick look at both strategies. Intelligent technol[...]

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• Trending Now in HR Services

  Jun 30, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

    As H1 2017 comes to a close, it’s a good time to reflect on recent key activity and where the market is headed for the rest of the year and beyond. Here, I round up what’s trending now in payroll, benefits administration, recruitment, and learning. Payroll The most common theme in the payroll market is global and multi-country activity. NelsonHall estimates tha[...]

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• Equifax Expanding Horizons with Verifications, Workforce Analytics, & ACA Subsidy Management Services

  May 03, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

    Equifax Workforce Solutions’ 2017 client forum was themed “Expanding Horizons”, and here I take a quick look at three areas in which Equifax is expanding its HR solutions.  Expanding Verifications Business Equifax’s verification services business is expanding beyond the U.S., launching first in Canada, followed by the U.K., and then Australia. Curre[...]

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• Facts & Implications of Aon Hewitt’s Sale to Blackstone

  Feb 16, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

  Last week Aon Hewitt announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to sell nearly all the businesses within its Outsourcing segment (including benefits administration, HR BPO, and Workday cloud HR services) to Blackstone. Initially, it may appear that this is a step backwards from some of its prior acquisitions, including Hewitt in 2010 for benefits administration, Exult in 2004 for HR B[...]

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• HRO: A Year in Review & 2017 Preview

  Jan 06, 2017, by NelsonHall Analyst

  Following several years of growth, the HR outsourcing market continues to ride the crest of the wave, and is gearing up for a prosperous 2017 following investments across all service lines. We will shortly be publishing an in-depth blog on HRO predictions for 2017, but first I take a quick look at what happened in 2016 to lay the foundations for things to come, specifically in payroll services[...]

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• A Closer Look at Benefits Administration in H1 2016: Part 3

  Sep 29, 2016, by NelsonHall Analyst

  In the third and final blog in the series examining the benefits administration market, I take a quick look at what health & welfare (H&W) services vendors have done recently to improve the participant experience. Historically, choice within employer-sponsored health plans has been limited, and the need to provide an engaging participant experience was non-existent. Employers’[...]

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• A Closer Look at Benefits Administration in H1 2016: Part 2

  Sep 19, 2016, by NelsonHall Analyst

  NelsonHall’s Targeting Benefits Administration Services market analysis report, which will be published later this month, finds that the top driver for organizations outsourcing benefits administration is to improve the participant experience. Accordingly, both retirement and health & welfare (H&W) services vendors have been investing heavily in their respective areas to enhance [...]

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• A Closer Look at Benefits Administration in H1 2016: Part 1

  Sep 13, 2016, by NelsonHall Analyst

  In this, the first of three blogs on the current benefits administration outsourcing market, I take a brief look at what’s been happening in H1 2016. Benefits administration accounted for ~40% of HRO contract activity in the first half of 2016, with a heavy emphasis on renewals and contract extensions. Approximately 90% of contracts were from private sector organizations, with a stron[...]

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• Approaches to Global Benefits Market Converge

  Apr 07, 2016, by NelsonHall Analyst

  Over the last few years, the global benefits market has continued to evolve as vendors have launched offerings to address the needs of multinationals. Essentially, there have been two main approaches: Providing global brokerage and consulting services Providing a global technology offering with optional local administration services. The global brokerage and consulting model has been [...]

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• ADP Takes Benefits Management Global

  Mar 21, 2016, by Gary Bragar

  At its Meeting of the Minds (MOTM) conference last week, ADP explained its focus on full provision of services, technology, and continuous innovation, and presented recent examples, including delivery of ~10m 1095 forms in the U.S. as part of ACA, deployment of a new ‘user experience’, and the launch of ADP Onboarding. Long-established as a provider of global payroll services, ADP also[...]

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• Fidelity’s Private Health Exchange Offers Holistic Benefits Admin Experience for SMEs

  Feb 05, 2016, by NelsonHall Analyst

  For the last year, Fidelity has quietly been operating Fidelity Health Marketplace, a private benefits exchange, for a small number of SMEs in Massachusetts and New York. Fidelity Health Marketplace is a natural progression for Fidelity, which has been providing H&W services to large market organizations since 1995. Fidelity Health Marketplace is a one-stop shop that assists companies with [...]

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• HRO: 2015 Highlights & the Shape of Things to Come

  Nov 30, 2015, by NelsonHall Analyst

  As the year winds down, it’s a good time to reflect on the significant activities in the HRO market in 2015 and consider the likely shape of things to come in 2016. Overall, HRO contract activity is up ~11% y/y in 2015.  Renewals and contract extensions account for 25% of that activity, vendor changes ~20%, and new deals 55%. Regional and global multi-country contracts continued[...]

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