EP 6 - LIVE Audience: Legend Member’s Meetings

In our second live episode from our San Diego Members' Meetings Andrew Clayton and guest host Jack Longstreth chat with two VP’s of Human Resources: Kim Bauer of Altra Federal Credit Union and Lisa Levanger of Wasatch Property Management Inc. This episode delivers great conversation about how a high-quality self-insured solution can help develop better relationships with employees, drive an employee-centric culture, and improve retention.

Learn more about ParetoHealth:
https://paretohealth.com/

Guest Co-Host:
Jack Longstreth Senior Vice President of Sales at Pareto Captive Services, LLC
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-longstreth-75963b1b/

What is 80/20 with ParetoHealth?

Health insurance, dissected. It’s a take-no-prisoners journey into the heart of health insurance co-hosted by two of its major disruptors. The Andrews (Cavenagh and Clayton of ParetoHealth) give you fresh insights and perspectives. Join them in their conversations with guests who are also transforming an antiquated industry and reshaping the way employers select and implement healthcare benefits.

[00:00:08.650] - Andrew Clayton
Hello, everyone. Andrew Clayton and welcome to today's episode of 80/20 with ParetoHealth. Today we have a special episode, we're going to mix up our format a little bit. We are broadcasting from San Diego, where we are currently hosting our Legendary Members' Meeting.

[00:00:25.340] - Andrew Clayton
It's a special opportunity for us to get together with a couple of members to allow them to share their stories and experiences, their perspectives on being self insured, being a member of the captive.

[00:00:35.470] - Andrew Clayton
We also have a special guest host today. Jack Longstreth from Pareto is joining us as Andrew Cavenagh is mending his broken chicken wing. Special thanks to our two guest members Kim Bauer, who is VP of HR for Altra Federal Credit Union, and Lisa Levanger, who is also VP of HR for Wasatch Property Management. Thank you both very much for joining us.

[00:01:03.950] - Andrew Clayton
We are at our Legend Members' Meetings and we've invited two of our members to join us today. I think Jack can do introductions, but Kim, Lisa, we're really thrilled to have you here. Thanks so much.

[00:01:16.840] - Jack Longstreth
We got Kim Bauer, VP of HR at Altra Federal Credit Union, and Lisa Levanger-

[00:01:22.320] - Andrew Clayton
Kim, do you prefer that Jack introduces you or you tell us a little bit of [inaudible 00:01:24]?

[00:01:27.330] - Jack Longstreth
Yeah, why [crosstalk 00:01:24].

[00:01:27.330] - Kim Bauer
Sure. Yeah. I'm Kim Bauer, I'm the Vice President of Human Resources with Altra Federal Credit Union. We have 500 employees across six different states and we've been in business for 90 years.

[00:01:37.530] - Andrew Clayton
Wow. Awesome. In which states?

[00:01:40.990] - Kim Bauer
Wisconsin, Minnesota, Tennessee, Texas, New Jersey and Colorado are where we have [inaudible 00:01:46].

[00:01:46.030] - Andrew Clayton
Nice.

[00:01:47.250] - Andrew Clayton
Jersey was last on the list? Or not.

[00:01:52.530] - Jack Longstreth
Lisa?

[00:01:53.690] - Lisa Levanger
I'm going to introduce myself?

[00:01:55.030] - Jack Longstreth
Yeah.

[00:01:55.570] - Lisa Levanger
Okay. I'm Lisa Levanger, I'm the VP of HR for the Wasatch Group. What about us? We do all kinds of things. I actually run multiple benefits plans. The group that's inside of the Pareto captive, we have about 700 employees in that group. We've also got some small group plans. It just kind of depends on the day as to who we throw where.

[00:02:18.210] - Andrew Clayton
And what does Wasatch do?

[00:02:19.820] - Lisa Levanger
What does Wasatch do? A little bit of everything. The Wasatch Group, the group that's inside of this captive is mostly real estate. Commercial, residential, we've got some construction companies, we've got some tech groups, software.

[00:02:34.300] - Andrew Clayton
It's been an eventful couple of years for you guys, I imagine.

[00:02:37.390] - Lisa Levanger
It has been. It's been very interesting to see how COVID has impacted our businesses.

[00:02:44.180] - Jack Longstreth
You guys both came from self-funded previously before you joined the captive. Can you talk a little bit about what was the thought process of joining? What was the reasons?

[00:02:55.560] - Lisa Levanger
We actually ended up joining Pareto because we had a large appointment. We got here with a big renewal. Excuse me. Had a hemophilia, we were going to have a laser. That was initially the drive when we started looking at Pareto and the options there.

[00:03:16.830] - Lisa Levanger
We had an interesting situation that we were able to actually carve that off, take that group, put them into the small group market, which made the transition into Pareto a possibility. That was our Story.

[00:03:31.120] - Kim Bauer
We've been self insured for 15 years. Our first experience going self insured wasn't super [inaudible 00:03:39] because of our TPA was a rough TPA experience and then the timing was right to go back fully insured for a little while again, but we moved again, self insured and we've been there ever since then.

[00:03:49.750] - Kim Bauer
We've really just enjoyed the flexibility of what you can do with your plan design and carving things out, and really building a plan how you want to build it. It also allowed us to be pretty innovative with what we've tried to do with our plan and feel like we've been cutting edge with what we've been able to do with our plan.

[00:04:04.020] - Kim Bauer
Why we join Pareto is just to have more of that cost containment standpoint there. Being a smaller employer, we have still a lot of volatility with our renewals, and so we're just hoping to have more pretty steady renewal process here. Then also just credit unions we're all about a cooperative model and we really appreciate the cooperative model of the captive as well.

[00:04:26.070] - Andrew Clayton
Awesome. That's great. Thanks for sharing some of your background and experience. One thing that I think our members share with us lessons learned where, Lisa, the laser. I don't know if I call you by surprise or not, or the possibility of it, but I think employers sometimes think that, hey, we're running great, everything is on the tracks.

[00:04:50.730] - Andrew Clayton
But it can be simple as you're one either heir away or marriage away in terms of adding a dependent to your plan, that can totally change the dynamics of your risk and your risk profile.

[00:05:05.380] - Andrew Clayton
I don't know if there's really a great question in there, but it's the long term benefit, which a lot of our self insured employers look at and say, "Yes, I'm in a good spot now, but that doesn't mean I'm always going to be guaranteed to be in a good spot as I go forward. I want that extra security and protection."

[00:05:21.570] - Lisa Levanger
Which I completely agree with. That was not our first instance with having laser. We've had a few of them in the past. We've been self insured for probably 15, 20 years now. We've always enjoyed playing with our own risk.

[00:05:36.480] - Lisa Levanger
Health insurance, no matter what you do, it's a business. They're out to make money. If you have a bad year, you're going to make it up the next year and whatever your renewal number is. Whereas if you go the self insured route, you can control more of that, more of what's going to happen, you control more of what your expense is going to look like.

[00:05:53.660] - Lisa Levanger
We've been doing it for many years, this was not our first time that we received a laser. Part of the drive for moving into Pareto was the theory that you won't have those lasers anymore. We run a pretty high stop loss. We're at 200,000, so we're taking a lot of the risk on the backside, but it was very nice to know that we were not going to continue to see those lasers coming in the future.

[00:06:19.880] - Andrew Clayton
Yeah, absolutely.

[00:06:22.220] - Jack Longstreth
We're in San Diego. We're here at the Members' Meeting. A big part of this is talking through cost containment and what programs we can do as a group to lower our health insurance cost. You two are sitting with us because you are very innovative on that front. What are some things that you can share with the group that you've done from a cost containment perspective that's worked really well?

[00:06:43.370] - Kim Bauer
I think one of the things that we've had in place for quite some time already has been a wellness program. We've had a wellness program that our employees and their spouses are able to participate within. We really encourage to prevent loneliness in that we give them points for doing those things.

[00:06:57.660] - Kim Bauer
We want to pay them money. We actually have them to come in and do a health assessment. Pay them money to come in and do those with us too, just because we feel like it's really about the early detection and trying to catch things as early as possible.

[00:07:08.910] - Kim Bauer
We also with mental health, I know that was mentioned earlier today as being one of the quicker rising claims for everybody. We've just had a really robust wellness program that we've been fortunate to build on top of the last two years.

[00:07:21.140] - Jack Longstreth
Great. Lisa?

[00:07:24.490] - Lisa Levanger
Actually, we enrolled in Quantum when it first came out. It was a little rocky at the beginning, but I feel like we're in a much better place than we were initially, which has been great. The other pieces we did roll out. Cancer care as well. Over the last year we've seen some results and returns on that. I want to get more information on it. I'm hoping to talk to them while we're here this week.

[00:07:47.230] - Lisa Levanger
The other piece that we're probably a little unconventional in this theory, but we get to know our employees. We have that one-on-one connection with them and those communications. I'm constantly paying attention to where my claims are at and who it is that's driving them.

[00:08:02.460] - Lisa Levanger
Then we can have those conversations and those people are willing to talk to us so that we can help direct them in the correct way. It's very personal, health insurance. Your health is very, very personal to every individual. When I call a number and I talk to someone that I've never met and they're trying to tell me how to run a system or program that's going to impact my health, I'm going to question that.

[00:08:25.680] - Lisa Levanger
But when I'm able to talk to people that I know, that I've built relationships with and they're telling me these people can help me and they're walking me through that and they're holding my hand as I move through it... I touch base with my employees that are going through things.

[00:08:39.500] - Lisa Levanger
We've got employees that are going through cancer right now. I just had a conversation on the phone with one of them the other day asking them how it was going? How were their treatments going? Are they getting the response that they need from the teams that we have in place?

[00:08:50.670] - Lisa Levanger
From these programs and systems so that I'm getting feedback on both sides, and we're able to drive results and hopefully contain costs because we have those relationships.

[00:09:02.450] - Andrew Clayton
You're both employee-centric, right? You've worked really hard to eliminate the barrier, and I've used probably this expression before, the friction between employer and employee. Can you share with some of whether it's communication or outreach programs or engagement that you've done with maybe some leadership folks? But the employees, they help them understand that they need to buy in, they need to lean in and this is a collective effort.

[00:09:29.870] - Kim Bauer
I can take that one. We do every year. Our open enrollment meeting is in person. We're not just giving them materials and say, "Hey, read this. Pick what's best for you. Good luck with that." We really are educating them throughout the year, and it's not just at open enrollment.

[00:09:42.330] - Kim Bauer
We have different touch points throughout the year. We have a weekly blog that goes out from our HR department and there's always a tip in there about benefits. We offer benefits over breakfast sessions. I think that's on a quarterly basis, we just try to have a speaker come in from one of our partners that will talk more about our programs that we have.

[00:10:02.190] - Kim Bauer
Try to keep getting those faces and names put together so that the employees are more comfortable when it does become that time to have to call and say, "Hey, trust us. These are great people that are here for you too."

[00:10:11.980] - Kim Bauer
They've been able to make those different connections throughout the time so that when that scary time in their life happens, they are more comfortable making that outreach.

[00:10:22.490] - Lisa Levanger
We've done a lot of employee service. How do you like to see things, how do you want to be communicated with? We like to do them blind. We don't want people to feel like they can't provide us with the answer to the information because it could be tied back to them, but we take the feedback that they give and then we make it actionable.

[00:10:41.310] - Lisa Levanger
We'll roll it out. We have newsletters that we do, we send out emails. We have websites and all those kinds of information. A lot of it goes out through our HRS as well. We have a full training platform.

[00:10:53.000] - Lisa Levanger
We're creating the trainings, we're communicating with them, we're taking the feedback that they are providing and then we're taking action on it. We're making sure that they know that. We found that that's been very important to our employees. If you don't take action on their feedback, they're going to stop providing it.

[00:11:12.560] - Lisa Levanger
Our open enrollment, we do in person. We've been doing webinars as well for those who can't make it, then we rolled out, it's called Jellyvision, and it's a little interactive AI guide that walks you through the program.

[00:11:24.940] - Lisa Levanger
It will look at your situation individually. We've had great feedback and response on that. People seem to really love that they can go through their individual, what are my expenses going to be? How should I plan for the future? Because you don't always get that chance to sit down one-on-one with someone.

[00:11:39.410] - Lisa Levanger
Some people will come forward and they'll ask, and we can sit down and run through a full scenario, but others do prefer that platform where they can do it on their own.

[00:11:49.760] - Jack Longstreth
Leaving the captive aside for a second, hiring. We find the marketplace today, hiring good talent, keeping good talent is difficult in today's landscape. Are you all doing anything, or can you speak about that from your perspective?

[00:12:05.390] - Lisa Levanger
We have been very focused on employee engagement. Retention, I think is more important than the hiring side. Why do you want to lose good people when the potential on the back side, I guess the evil you know is better than the evil that you don't know.

[00:12:19.390] - Andrew Clayton
They know, they're trained, yeah.

[00:12:23.500] - Lisa Levanger
It makes your workplace a happier place when your employees are engaged and they enjoy what they're doing. This year we rolled out specifically, we're doing quarterly recognition, and we're picking full populations.

[00:12:37.710] - Lisa Levanger
For example, we did quarterly recognition on our maintenance side in first quarter, and we sent out swag, we had shirts and hats, and we did full breakfast spreads, they did recognition at the site level, we text blasted all of our customers, letting them know that it was a recognition and appreciation date for this particular group.

[00:12:57.960] - Lisa Levanger
If you see them, tell them thank you, no, give them a high five, whatever it is. We put it into our newsletters. We also put it across social media platforms so that we could really recognize those individuals.

[00:13:09.220] - Lisa Levanger
Then we did individual recognition of people as well. We've been highly focused on feedback, so we do it clearly verbally, but electronically as well. I was sitting down with an employee the other day. It was interesting because they had a thank you card that I had written them.

[00:13:24.580] - Lisa Levanger
Nothing big, just, "Thank you for putting together the holiday party this last year. That meant the world to this employee that I would take the time to personally write out a thank you card and drop it in the mail.

[00:13:39.570] - Lisa Levanger
That's been more focused than the hiring side probably. Clearly, we've been pushing wages and minimums, and there's been a lot that's happening on that side as well. It's still hard to find employees right now and especially to find good employees that we're focusing much more on the retention than hiring.

[00:13:58.950] - Kim Bauer
I don't think anybody is exempt from the hiring challenges overall. I think all industries are in it, everybody's in that same boat. We're all trying different things and trying to figure out really what's working, what's not working.

[00:14:09.910] - Kim Bauer
I agree it's definitely on the retention side. Just trying to keep those great employees that we have and not losing them to competitors. We're seeing most of our turnover in that three to five-year mark is where they seem to leap.

[00:14:21.820] - Kim Bauer
We're trying to find out more ways how can we keep them better engaged at that earlier standpoint in their careers and looking at career development opportunities. We've always had a lot of different development opportunities but trying to get more structured than that.

[00:14:33.340] - Kim Bauer
If they can see those avenues and not have to come up with their own or have their manager that may or may not be a great coach for them to help coach them do that process, they can take that initiative in their own hands. But truly yeah, the simple things go such a long way. The handwritten thank you, people just don't do that anymore, so when you do things like that, or even saying a simple thank you, it just really goes a long way. That small, specific on-spot recognition is huge.

[00:14:59.720] - Andrew Clayton
You guys are inventive. It's clear that you will try things. It's also clear that your mind is open that some things might work, and you stick with them, some things might not. You pivot, you have good guidance and advice and support. I'm leading that witness here. Do you happen to work with a broker or do you happen to work with a consultant?

[00:15:24.210] - Lisa Levanger
This is based off of the earlier meeting?

[00:15:26.160] - Jack Longstreth
Yes.

[00:15:26.960] - Andrew Clayton
Yes.

[00:15:29.710] - Lisa Levanger
I'm going to say that we work with a partner. In that we're with Diversified and we've been with them for probably eight or nine years now. We're a little crazy. We're in everything.

[00:15:46.970] - Andrew Clayton
Sane is boring.

[00:15:48.260] - Lisa Levanger
Sane is very boring. They've taken that crazy and they understand it and they run with us. It doesn't matter how insane we want to get. I was mentioning earlier that for one year our owner didn't like the renewal that we got and so he decided that he would purchase our stop loss, our reinsurance.

[00:16:05.630] - Lisa Levanger
I sold him reinsurance for I think, 300,000 less than it was going to cost us that year. Almost had a heart attack four or five times that year which would have really impacted what he made. But he did come out a winner and in the end we got a much better renewal the next year.

[00:16:24.400] - Lisa Levanger
Diversified has worked with us through all of those situations. Like, "What can you bring to the table that's unique, that's very forward thinking, cutting edge, because we're willing to try it. If it's something that can better the plan, better the program, better the offerings, reduce the cost, let's talk about it."

[00:16:43.430] - Kim Bauer
I'm not going to say that just to answer just because our consultant is in the room, but we truly do have a great partner in the Insurance Center, and Andrew, just won the APEX Award this morning, so kudos to him for that.

[00:16:56.570] - Kim Bauer
We've been with the Insurance Center for quite a few years and they've really just taken the time to understand us and what our goals are and what we can do. They push us, they keep us on their toes, they give us some ideas. Sometimes we're like, "What are you thinking?" I don't know if we're ready for that, but is sometimes planting the seed and then we'll keep going forward with that.

[00:17:14.090] - Kim Bauer
Maybe in a year or two, but maybe the time isn't quite right right now, but we truly have appreciated their partnership and they're getting to know us and that just really helps us to keep our benefits package elevated to the level that we're at and will keep us growing and going forward in the future.

[00:17:30.360] - Andrew Clayton
One of the things we do at the Members' Meetings is introduce new or new cost containment risk managements or revisit programs that are working for other folks. Whether it's something that the captive provides or something else, do you have anything on the drawing board that you plan to do at your next renewal over the next twelve months?

[00:17:51.090] - Lisa Levanger
Nothing specific at this point just kind of theories. Had an interesting conversation about how high deductible health plans are not necessarily the right way. It's bringing back that theory of PPOs and traditional health care and is it time to pivot and start looking back at that and instead directing care to specific locations based off of cost containment controls.

[00:18:19.150] - Lisa Levanger
I don't know, is it time to look at a change? My brain has been stewing over this one for a couple of months now, so it's something that I want to dive into before we get to renewal, but I don't have any specific plans at this point.

[00:18:30.970] - Andrew Clayton
And eliminating a barrier, right? [crosstalk 00:18:33].

[00:18:33.180] - Lisa Levanger
Exactly.

[00:18:35.950] - Kim Bauer
Okay, we can edit this.

[00:18:48.110] - Andrew Clayton
Yeah, absolutely.

[00:18:48.760] - Kim Bauer
[inaudible 00:18:38] [crosstalk 00:18:40]

[00:18:48.830] - Andrew Clayton
You should tell him what you are doing with your [inaudible 00:18:48] network.

[00:18:48.610] - Kim Bauer
Abosolutely, I can do that. Well, the answer before I had the cue card, I'll start there first and then I'll come back [inaudible 00:18:56]. Truly, a couple of things that we're looking to do is just we did implement so many different new things this year, so I really would love to just take the time to really promote and educate more on what we are doing.

[00:19:09.970] - Kim Bauer
It's like, oh, let's throw something more on top of this here and keep piling on top of it. Specialty meds for all of us are huge pain points as well, so keeping on looking at that, what can we do with that? If there's any changes that we can make, which really for us, the mental health has been a huge challenge.

[00:19:25.540] - Kim Bauer
As I mentioned before, we added in corporate chaplains into our environment about two years ago. They round and they do the daily rounding within each of our branches. Then the next level of the cake, I call it a three-tiered cake, but we went with an EAP that has a more robust EAP program. They can offer some in person counseling, virtual counseling, or they can come on site and do some different counseling.

[00:19:48.860] - Kim Bauer
The third layer that we're added with the help of the Insurance Center here is they've really advocated to help get it as part of our network is just for those really serious mental health challenges that people have.

[00:20:01.500] - Kim Bauer
How can we get them better connected to an expert and get them quickly connected so that they can get to a resolution instead of, here's some drugs, and throw the drugs at it and then nothing ever improves. Their life does not improve.

[00:20:14.100] - Kim Bauer
Looking at some different ways that they can really truly make a difference in their life. Maybe it's a short term pain, but they get those resources, they get them more quickly, and then they can get to their best self again.

[00:20:24.970] - Andrew Clayton
It's so important that the data has shown for the last couple of years, but is concrete in how interconnected mental health and mental health challenges are to overall well being and overall health status plan costs. It's great that you're taking those initiatives.

[00:20:40.740] - Kim Bauer
Thank you.

[00:20:40.310] - Andrew Clayton
Kudos to the Insurance Center for their sponsorship today. Thank you.

[00:20:50.710] - Jack Longstreth
Kim, I think this is your first meeting. Lisa I know you've been to a few, but can you guys talk a little bit about maybe from your perspective, what you're looking forward to for the Members' Meeting? And maybe from your perspective, where has it been valuable to you?

[00:21:07.440] - Kim Bauer
I'm speaking to Nashville last year as a prospective member, and I really loved the energy and all the different sharing and things like that that took place last year, and I love continuing that now as a member this year.

[00:21:19.430] - Kim Bauer
Last year's perspective, that was the driving force to push me over, to be like, yes, this is the way to go. It's like, I really don't know yet. To come and see it in person and to network with everybody was really beneficial. Just to be able to have that opportunity to learn more about it.

[00:21:33.220] - Kim Bauer
Truly, all the members here and learning from each other is the most valuable thing, I think, about the conference and getting those connections. We can see and hear the different challenges that we're all having, and if anybody is coming up with anything that's a good solution for that, that we can maybe take back to our organization is tremendously helpful.

[00:21:51.790] - Lisa Levanger
I like that every year there are new programs that come out. I continue to come back to hear what it is that Pareto's put out there on the table to help with cost containment or to improve outcomes for the population inside of the group. That's why.

[00:22:07.610] - Lisa Levanger
I like the analytical side of it, how do we make things better, and you guys are going through the work of finding it for us and we don't have to, which I appreciate because I don't think that that's necessarily something that is really popular in the health insurance world.

[00:22:22.450] - Lisa Levanger
It's more about how do we make a buck versus how do we come out with the best patient outcomes and the best care options all at a reasonable price, so to speak. But I guess reasonable is relative when you talk about health insurance.

[00:22:39.710] - Andrew Clayton
Yeah, I fully agree. We can spend a lot of time and maybe should spend a little bit more time, but if you analyze the share prices of the large insurance companies, people in the healthcare space, they are doing exceptionally well.

[00:22:59.440] - Andrew Clayton
It's unfortunate that so much of the business is built on the continuation of less than ideal health. I don't know if that's political enough way of saying it, but I'm trying. Is there anything, whether it's captive-related, health care-related, health insurance-related and one nagging thing that might keep you up at night?

[00:23:23.150] - Kim Bauer
For me, the thing that I kind of keep coming back to is just the cost of prescriptions and that there's no controls over that. That would be something where there's all these partners trying to do different things and it's just like it would be really great to see that go to an advocacy level where we can go and make impactful change as the country.

[00:23:38.930] - Kim Bauer
It's really unfortunate to see our claims at the top of the list year after year after year. Just like it's the same conditions, it's the same prescriptions, it's the same everything. Why is it so much more expensive here in the US just because of where we live?

[00:23:52.220] - Kim Bauer
That would be a component that I think would be really interesting to add big amount of decline, but it just was one of those things where it's just like instead of all of us trying to reinvent the wheel, how can we band together to try to make a difference?

[00:24:03.910] - Andrew Clayton
It's not just where we live, it's also where the pharmaceutical executives live. And certain lifestyles we keep accustomed to.

[00:24:12.230] - Lisa Levanger
My answer is the same. Prescription drug costs. You're playing with people's lives, and you do a great job of putting a dollar number on that, which I think is crazy. There's a value to every individual and what they can provide or put back. When you start saying well, this is worth this just because, it makes people feel worthless.

[00:24:37.860] - Lisa Levanger
It makes it very hard, especially from an employer standpoint. When you're sitting there and you're looking at... You guys just talked about this hemophilia drug and two million, two and a half million, it changes someone's life. As an employer, now you've got to swallow that cost, but what merits two and a half million dollars? I don't know.

[00:25:02.150] - Andrew Clayton
Yeah. Certainly not the R&D, nor the production costs, right?

[00:25:05.220] - Lisa Levanger
Yeah.

[00:25:07.250] - Andrew Clayton
There's unfortunately lots of things out there, and it is a tireless game of whack a mole.

[00:25:12.470] - Lisa Levanger
It's a great ROI.

[00:25:13.880] - Andrew Clayton
It is a phenomenal ROI. Speaking of the captive, just for a second, has there been any, I don't want to say unintended benefit or consequence, but any pleasant surprises where you thought you were getting this as part of the community or part of the program or structure, but there was a pleasant surprise in there?

[00:25:34.370] - Lisa Levanger
I don't know if I'm answering your question or if I'm kind of going off on the side, but it's been very pleasant to me to learn about and meet the other people inside of the group. To find that they're like-minded individuals that maybe we're not quite as crazy as we seem.

[00:25:49.790] - Lisa Levanger
Or there are other people that are inside of that level of crazy with us that have the same goals when it comes to health care. That are trying to find that balance between meeting employees' needs and still making it something that an employer can afford to provide.

[00:26:09.470] - Jack Longstreth
And then expanded on that before. I think, from our perspective, it gives the employers confidence, where you see everyone else doing it, and you say to yourself, if they're doing it, I can do it. Which is just unique in this marketplace.

[00:26:22.830] - Lisa Levanger
Yeah. Other people are trying.

[00:26:24.990] - Jack Longstreth
Yeah, exactly.

[00:26:26.190] - Lisa Levanger
You're not the only one fighting this battle. You're not alone, other people feel the same way, so that's been nice.

[00:26:34.170] - Andrew Clayton
We talked about before, you're trying, which you're going to fail successfully on some stuff. You're going to learn lessons, and you're going to say, "Okay, regroup, and now I'm going to do it differently, and I'm going to do better with a better understanding of what I need to do."

[00:26:48.650] - Kim Bauer
I'll be transparent. We looked at a captive model previously before coming to Pareto, and it just, to me, did not seem like the right fit for us. There's a lot of different models that are out there, but it's just really, truly finding what's going to be working best for you.

[00:27:03.100] - Kim Bauer
The thing that I've appreciated most with the Pareto model is just the cost containment measures and metrics that are in here. The other one that we were looking at was just like, Just come and join.

[00:27:13.100] - Kim Bauer
That was my biggest play I saw right away, was, "We have this wellness program. We're trying to do these different things to try to keep our class down. What do you have? We don't have any requirements."

[00:27:24.220] - Kim Bauer
For me, I was right at that point in time, because I'm like, "We're trying all kinds of things. It's like if we have a great claims experience year over year over year, what benefit do we get as being a part of this captive?" All that's working together on those same things just to keep making it better is a great thing with that Pareto captive.

[00:27:45.930] - Andrew Clayton
Anything that you would say to a employer out there that is considering going self insured or considering joining a captive and if they're smart enough, they're fortunate enough to learn a Pareto?

[00:28:03.660] - Lisa Levanger
I think it's the right decision. Unless you want to be one of those people who continues to make those returns in the dividends for the insurance carriers even bigger, you got to take that first step of doing something to make a change. I think it's the right thing to do until enough groups or everyone finally stands up and says enough is enough, we're going to continue down the same path.

[00:28:32.110] - Kim Bauer
I would just say don't be afraid to do it. I think it is a little bit of a daunting idea at first to go on self insured, but with the captive, with Pareto, especially you guys have it where you've got all the programs in the partner spending.

[00:28:45.770] - Kim Bauer
There is no wrong decision. I don't think out of who you have in the mix of was available to be our partners, they're all great partners. It's just as a matter of finding out which partners work best for you, your plan design, your TPA, who are your best partners, and you find that best fit for you and then it will be a great experience.

[00:29:04.240] - Kim Bauer
Being a part of the captive will help you with the stop loss piece of it. That part that could be so volatile for a smaller organization. It really opens the door for a lot of smaller employers to be able to have as an option where they maybe didn't see it as an option before.

[00:29:18.550] - Andrew Clayton
It's great to hear that both of your comments or suggestions to other employers are focused on your health plan improvement, controlling costs, the future of your employees, stop loss is included, but it's the fourth or fifth item that you ticked off.

[00:29:37.910] - Andrew Clayton
We take a lot of pride, there's a lot of pride in us that we're moving that needle for you. Thanks for sharing. Really appreciate you being here today. Kim and Lisa, thanks so much for taking the time. Also on behalf of Pareto and your fellow members, thanks for all the efforts you're putting into control costs and being leaders.

[00:30:00.550] - Kim Bauer
Yeah. Thank you.

[00:30:13.310] - Speaker 5
Thanks for listening to today's episode of 80/20 with ParetoHealth. We love hearing from you. If you have a question or an episode suggestion, please drop us an email at 80/[e-mail].

[00:30:25.500] - Speaker 5
That's [e-mail]. Dive deeper into 80/20 by visiting us at paretohealth.com/podcast. Lastly, make sure you follow us on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify so you don't miss an episode.