Wednesday Workshops

Wednesday, 10:00 am to 11:15 am

Health Care Cost Containment at The Midland Company
Workshop Code: B01W1

Almost 60 percent of Midland's workforce was over-insured. To help employees become more informed benefits consumers - estimate medical costs, model various plan options and select the plans that best meet the needs of their families - Midland deployed Benefits Communications and Decision Support tools. See the dramatic results they achieved in driving adoption of more cost-effective plans and wellness programs. Participants discuss the issues behind health care cost containment and how Web-based solutions can help employees become more informed benefits consumers.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—40/60

"Moving Ahead...Taking Control" Finding a New Direction for Retirement Benefits
Workshop Code: B15W1

Companies everywhere are grappling with how to manage the escalating costs of traditional pension plans while serving an increasingly diverse workforce. Learn how one company managed that challenge, from conducting a year-long, in-depth review of its total rewards program to implementation of the program designed to best balance the priorities of the business and the employees. From strategy development and design to financial analysis, executive approval and comprehensive communications, participants learn the difference between contribution plans and how to motivate employees from passively planning a retirement date to actively building financial resources to take throughout a career.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Developing a Salary Structure
Workshop Code: C01W1

This basic compensation training session is perfect for new professionals or those whose job responsibilities now include developing a new salary structure. Get a step-by-step process of how to build a basic compensation system from scratch, with spreadsheets and charts to help analyze data and connect it to individual compensation structures. This workshop covers job descriptions, the significance of job titles and job families, establishing pay grades and pay ranges, the role of salary surveys and job benchmarking, linking benchmarked jobs to comparable jobs within the organization, and linking a pay-range structure to pay-for-performance merit increases.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—40/60

Global Sales Compensation in 2008: Total Reward Strategies, Tactics and Lessons Learned
Workshop Code: C05W1

As the world seems to get smaller, sales forces of the world's top companies get more complex, with sales jobs becoming the most difficult to fill. As companies work to globalize their total rewards programs for sales, cultural and regulatory variations remain that impact their design and administration. Don't simply "export" host country best practices around the globe. Discover what makes sales compensation programs effective and ineffective around the world, and the top 10 factors that drive global sales compensation programs across geographies, labor markets and cultures in a holistic, strategic global approach.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Advanced Competitive Analyses: Making the Most of Market Data
Workshop Code: C11W1

Technology, globalization and legislation have transformed the world of survey data, giving the savvy compensation professional ample opportunity to work smarter and faster. Participants hear a broad spectrum of analytical approaches, technology tools and philosophies used in all aspects of developing competitive analyses. Using the latest approaches, explore everything from day-to-day market pricing to sophisticated total rewards and incentives. Customize survey results, select peer companies, assess incentive practices and levels, fill in data gaps and work with global data. Find ways to develop more insightful and useful competitive analyses.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—0/100

Variable Pay Trends, Opportunities, Metrics and Challenges
Workshop Code: C18W1

The number of organizations using variable pay and incentive plans for employees below the management level continues to grow. The number of eligible participants and incentive amounts are growing as well. Get a fresh update on variable pay with new research on the role it plays in some of the fastest growing companies from Fortune and Business Week. Best-selling authors, the speakers have served as a barometer for trends, opportunities, and challenges in variable pay. Learn design principles, new measures used by high-performing organizations, ways to improve existing measurement to get the most value from variable pay.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Emerging Trends in Executive Compensation
Workshop Code: E01W1

For the 2008 proxy season, institutional investors are seeking reforms and in-depth analysis on executive compensation matters from companies. With prevalence statistics and actual disclosure examples from SEC filings, participants gain a better understanding of the latest policy guidelines, focusing on pay-for-performance and equity usage. Discover the many changes occurring in executive compensation, including stock ownership guidelines, retirement benefits, deferred compensation, severance and change-in-control arrangements and the impact these are having in the institutional investor community.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Eight Habits of Highly Effective Compensation Committees
Workshop Code: E16W1

Using a case study approach of the most effective practices of compensation committees, this session examines why it is best to provide compensation packages that attract and retain executive talent, align management and shareholder goals, articulate values and strategies that can withstand public scrutiny, and so on. HR leaders do not always have direct access to influence the Board of Directors' compensation committee, but they must understand how they can operate effectively together to achieve an organization's goals.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—80/20

Using Technology and Partnerships to Communicate Total Rewards
Workshop Code: T01W1

When HJ Heinz sold a division to another company, it maintained the same benefits and equity programs to the employees going with the sale. HJ Heinz also developed the Total Compensation Web site in the Heinz total rewards strategy - now THE global source for Heinz compensation communications. By demonstrating the Web site, workshop attendees learn how to best motivate employees with up-to-date and accessible information and learn the advantages to partnering with key stakeholders to enhance the overall value of the information presented and reduce work.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—60/40

A Generational Approach to Total Rewards: One Size Doesn't Fit All
Workshop Code: T07W1

Given the generational differences in today's workforce, the types of rewards and recognition that appeal to each group differ greatly. This presentation explores current and future workforce trends and the reward and work-life programs necessary to compete for talent within the context of four generations of workers. Learn innovative ways to enhance the work experience, as well as practical ideas to apply to compensation and benefit programs. Understand the preferences, communication styles and cultural mores associated with each generation and how labor shortages will impact the ability to attract, motivate and retain talent.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—40/60

Remuneration Innovation. Hallucination or Destination?
Workshop Code: T25W1

Do the world's most innovative organizations do things differently when it comes to rewarding and recognizing their employees? How do they reward their most able and innovative employees? These are a few questions probed in a panel discussion with reward leaders. Join in the lively and thought-provoking discussion to build and sustain a culture of innovation among employees. Understand the extent that reward innovation matters in terms of attracting, motivating and retaining a world-class workforce and influence senior management with the new insight.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Total Rewards Strategies - Understanding High Performance - Behaviors Underpinning the World's Top High-Performance Companies
Workshop Code: T28W1

Accenture's ongoing annual research into high-performing organizations has given it a unique insight into the behaviors that drive consistent top quartile results. Achieving sustained High Performance has necessitated a new relationship between top organizations and those who deliver their business strategy. This workshop explores this new paradigm and its relationship to total rewards. It is an approach to human capital management that tailors people practices and policies to individuals and groups of employees to improve individual and organizational effectiveness. Business leaders have long talked about the importance of treating each customer as a "market of one" by tailoring their products to meet each customer's unique needs. To get maximum performance from their employees, leading companies are now applying that logic to employees, based on the notion that if employees are just as vital to success as customers, then it behooves organizations to start treating employees as they do their customers.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—90/10

Making Flexibility: A Strategic Lever for Corporate Growth
Workshop Code: W09W1

BDO Seidman LLP, one of the country's leading accounting firms, transformed flexibility from a "perk" to a core business strategy critical to future growth. From creating a firm-wide "shared vision" of flexibility through a unique employee and manager-facilitated cascading process, rethinking how "work is done," to conducting national senior leader and partner meetings where the firm's growth objectives were directly linked to the flexibility strategy, participants see an example how to coordinate successful flexibility at the organizational, managerial and employee level.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—60/40

Managing a Multi-Generational Workforce: Moving From Research to Practical Applications
Workshop Code: W11W1

Concerned about how to keep people across the generations engaged and get those with critical skill sets to stay? Discover the growing body of research on the multi-generational workforce and discuss how generational differences can be used as an overlay to gender, ethnic, cultural and other aspects of diversity. Then, move from research to practical applications, using the experience of other organizations. Take emerging total rewards ideas and modify them for a multi-generational workforce.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Engaging Employees in Wellness and The MGM MIRAGE Experience
Workshop Code: W16W1

Workplace Wellness can lower health care costs, improve productivity and reduce absenteeism. But the only way to produce these results is if 60% or more of employees actively participate. So how do employers manage the messages, select and disseminate the most impactful educational content, and support media that will reach the greatest number of employees? Hear how MGM MIRAGE successfully deals with these critical issues. Learn what's working to actively engage all employees in making better lifestyle choices that translate into lower costs, higher productivity and reduced absenteeism. Take away a strategic plan of action.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—60/40

Wednesday, 1:30 pm to 2:45 pm

Basics of Retirement Plans
Workshop Code: B02W2

New to benefits practice or just need a refresher course in retirement benefits? Ever since the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) passed, Congress has tinkered with the rules for qualified retirement plans. The traditional defined benefit pension plan has increasingly gone by the wayside and 401(k) plans are in, with new rules that govern other types of deferred compensation arrangements. Discuss how plans are qualified and the basics of both qualified retirement plans and nonqualified deferred compensation. Understand the requirements to all employer-provided retirement plans.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Total Wealth & Total Health: Corning's Integrated Approach to Managing Health, Safety and Productivity
Workshop Code: B07W2

Get a strategic and practical view of Corning's Total Health initiative, part of the 150-year-old company's overall business strategy. Apply creativity and rigor to human resource strategy with an inside look at the evolution of Corning's efforts and the quantifiable results it has achieved in managing health care costs below industry trend, reducing occupational and non-occupational disability rates and costs, and improving the health status and productivity of the workforce. Learn to develop enthusiasm for wellness and benefits, and apply these steps in aligning strategy, data, operations, communication and evaluation to global operations.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

A & P Consumer Driven Health Plan: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Workshop Code: B09W2

This presentation follows the development of the A & P Consumer Driven Health Care Plan from idea to total replacement. Looking at the company's current workforce demographics and the prior health care plan designs, participants follow the transition from HMOs and PPOs to 100 percent replacement with a CDHP, and the challenges that emerged from the transition. After hearing some of the challenges, participants understand how communication and partnering with a senior management champion ensure that plan replacement can work successfully.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—20/80

Washington Wire: Compensation and Leave Policies From the Perspective of Legislators, Regulators and Courts
Workshop Code: C29W2

Join Timothy Bartl, Assistant General Counsel at HRPA, and Cara Woodson Welch, Director Public Policy at WorldatWork for this Featured Compensation Session, a sharply focused and updated version of the long-standing "What's Cookin' in Congress" presentation. With a timely overview of federal legislative, regulatory and legal developments that are likely to have an impact on the total rewards profession this year. The presenters provide strategic advice to practitioners regarding executive compensation law and policy and other wage-hour issues with an emphasis on 24/7 business culture. The session focuses on how pay discrimination law and legislation implementing mandated paid sick leave, leave for military families, paid FMLA and similar legislation impacts total rewards.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

How Private Equity and Hedge Funds Are Changing Executive Compensation
Workshop Code: E02W2

Today, private equity firms and aggressive hedge funds challenge the typical structure of executive total rewards. Private equity investors demand that security is replaced by risk, budget is replaced by aggressive goals, vesting is replaced by a transaction event, and equity ownership is replaced by true wealth-building opportunities. Understand the differences between hedge funds and traditional investors, why private equity investors approach executive pay so differently, what changes will these investors make in your executive compensation programs, and what non-private equity companies can learn from the way aggressive investors think about executive pay.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Pay-For-Performance: From Buzzword to Reality
Workshop Code: E03W2

Executive pay plans are keeping corporate directors and HR professionals awake at night, and one of the top concerns of compensation committees is aligning pay more closely with performance. Yet the ease with which "pay-for-performance" rolls off the tongue masks the complexity in aligning pay with performance. Discuss how companies address the difficult questions looming behind the buzzword phrase. Several case studies demonstrate how companies successfully apply greater rigor to ensure appropriate performance measurement decisions. With structure and science, participants transform pay-for-performance from concept to reality.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Understanding What Engages Employees Across the Globe
Workshop Code: T02W2

Join this lively panel discussion focused on what engages employees in China, India, Germany and the United States. Recognize their opportunities and challenges when designing a more powerful total rewards strategy. Gain a better understanding of the differences, similarities and key engagement issues in the global labor market, including: workplace and cultural norms; rewards and recognition; benefits; and talent development and training. And walk away with a resource list to conduct further research.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Total Rewards Strategy Design
Workshop Code: T09W2

With an extremely diverse workforce and unique business needs, WaMu needed an innovative process to develop its recent three-year total rewards strategy to attract and retain employees. With significant stakeholder research efforts, including interviews with key WaMu executives, employee surveys and focus groups, leaders identified distinct employee segments and designed the rewards strategy to meet the needs of the groups. Meet the needs of a diverse employee population with a segmented and research-based approach to total rewards.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—60/40

What Kind of Total Rewards Plan is Right for Your Organization?
Workshop Code: T18W2

Take a hands-on, example-based approach to create a tailored flex rewards plan for any organization. Hear the opinions of more than 200,000 employees on what they want in a work environment and experience. A disciplined, data-rich approach to developing a flexible rewards plan gets participants focused on building a flex rewards plan that is connected to your business goals and strategies by delivering what key employee segments actually want.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—80/20

A Need For Speed: Delivering Total Rewards in Emerging Markets
Workshop Code: T26W2

In the rush to take up the strategic opportunities offered by emerging economies, many multinational companies either apply a one-size-fits-all approach to global reward management, or leave the management of reward entirely in the hands of local operations. Maximize the chances of success on the new frontiers of globalization by learning the challenges to overcome. Gain an insider's perspective of reward program design and implementation issues in these fast-paced, exciting and turbulent markets by participating in this panel discussion with consultants from Latin America, Europe and Asia.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

A Culture of Aging: The Total Reward Solution for Workers 50+ and Their Employers
Workshop Code: W04W2

With increasing longevity on their side, baby boomers want to continue working - but not in the same way. Flexible work arrangements, flexible benefits and the programs that support these policies hold the key to the future for many individuals and their employers. Learn how to retain and attract workers age 50+ by creating buy-in, adopting programs and practices that support work-life balance, effective communication and continuous improvement. The newest benefits employers can use to value and reward the contributions of older workers include civic engagement, cognitive fitness, financial literacy and intergenerational learning.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Flexibility - So Much More Than an Arrangement
Workshop Code: W05W2

Often viewed as "accommodation-based" versus "business-based," most workplace flexibility initiatives are either underutilized or clash with the current business culture. But the workforce is changing, and the challenges that are cropping up can be managed by leveraging different flexible work arrangements. Explore the misconceptions about flexibility that could be preventing an organization from realizing its potential. Review the latest research and identify tools that will help strategically pull flexibility into the workplace in this interactive session.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Enhancing Employee Partnerships With On-site Child Care & Elder Care Options
Workshop Code: W19W2

When quality workers are scarce, the concept of employer-employee partnership is crucial. The decision to offer on-site child care services is an avenue to support recruitment, retention and productivity, but implementing an on-site child care center requires buy-in from management and promoting the service to employees. Panelists discuss the impact of child care issues on employees and their co-workers as it relates to absenteeism, reduced productivity and strained working relationships. Get answers to planning this service, as well as elder care programs.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—60/40

Wednesday, 3:15 pm to 4:30 pm

A Practical Guide to Phased Retirement
Workshop Code: B13W3

As more baby boomers become eligible for retirement, the potential loss of key talent can represent a daunting challenge for employers' with significant implications for retaining the right human capital needed to meet business needs. For some employers, a "phased retirement" program represents a potentially valuable tool to help manage this problem. This session showcases the experiences of two organizations that have pursued phased retirement programs and provides a framework for enabling any organization to create its own approach for considering phased retirement in response to this ever-growing challenge.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Medical House Calls - The Newest Employee Benefit
Workshop Code: B17W3

In an industry marked by intense competition for top talent, one of the most innovative and successful benefits Microsoft has incorporated is a new medical house call service. This service not only reduces cost, it provides a competitive edge in recruiting and retaining employees. By redirecting employees who would have otherwise sought care in an ER, Microsoft is saving significant amounts of money. Learn how medical house calls increase quality of care, participation in other programs, and education and morale while reducing organizational costs.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—80/20

How Successful Companies Make Compensation Work for Them
Workshop Code: C03W3

This session looks at a new study that contrasts the pay practices of high-performing companies with other companies, including their competitive pay strategy, base pay management, variable compensation, equity participation and other forms of rewards and recognition. Analyze the relationship between organizational performance, productivity, workforce distribution and compensation practices. Walk away with a model that assesses the competitiveness and efficiency of compensation in the context of business strategy and structure.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—60/40

Sales Compensation in Transition: D&B's Strategy and Experience
Workshop Code: C06W3

Rather than looking at sales compensation as an expense that should be cut, thoughtful managements look for opportunities to invest in sales compensation to achieve increased sales while at the same time reducing the complexity and administrative cost of plan management. Doing so requires a plan of action that involves key functional departments within the business: Sales, Finance, HR/Compensation and IT. This workshop provides the HR/compensation professional with insight into the five most common tools and techniques to align sales compensation plans with sales force productivity and motivation for both short- and long-term results.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Compensation Surveys: Problems and Issues
Workshop Code: C20W3

Listen to the myriad problems and issues that have arisen over the years in managing the survey process in this dynamic session, incorporating anecdotal scenarios from both the participant and survey manager's perspective. Common and unique problems regarding job matching, completing survey input information, compiling and reporting back the data, as well as analyzing survey output are discussed. Become better survey participants to avoid mistakes in analyzing survey data and be more adept at implementing a market pricing strategy in evaluating internal jobs and assuring market competitiveness for an employer.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—0/100

Compensation Success: How Managers Drive Strategic Compensation Programs
Workshop Code: C25W3

For years, outdated, spreadsheet-heavy processes deprived H&R Block managers of a strategic role in the compensation process. It also limited their ability to use compensation as a tool to effectively foster performance-driven relationships with associates and drive greater business success. This session showcases the benefits of giving managers a strategic role in compensation and performance management through H&R Block's model of success. Attendees learn the value of integrating managers to effectively drive pay for performance through associate communications.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—100/0

Compensation Boot Camp: What New Compensation Professionals Need To Do in the First 90 Days
Workshop Code: C30W3

Although compensation may seem daunting to new professionals or those whose responsibilities recently changed, a fresh perspective can improve industry, business strategy and organizational structure. By asking insightful questions of leadership, they can challenge the effectiveness of existing compensation programs. This boot camp, coaching workshop covers basic compensation functions (surveys, job matching and benchmarking, components of pay, salary structures, pay for performance culture) and offers participants a checklist of action steps to reference on the job for their first 90 days.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—30/70

Myths & Realities of Executive Pay
Workshop Code: E05W3

Separate fact from fiction surrounding today's executive pay model. Despite the myths to the contrary, this workshop argues that executive pay is grounded in pay for performance, yielding high returns for shareholders, generating millions of jobs and driving significant U.S. economic growth. Looking at recent research and case studies, participants learn to improve long-term incentive strategies and pay for performance. Discover how high executive pay contributes to high company performance.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—70/30

Through the Looking Glass: Proxy Disclosures - How to Avoid the Challenges
Workshop Code: E08W3

Meet the challenges of proxy disclosure and avoid receiving an SEC Comment on your company. This presentation looks at the new proxy disclosure rules and problems companies have encountered when complying with both the letter and the spirit of the rules last season. Learn best practices to address all key interests and apply the golden rule of proxy disclosure: When in doubt, shout it out.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Human Capital Metrics: A Global Study
Workshop Code: T03W3

Leading global companies take innovative approaches to measure the impact of human capital on their organizations. Gather insights from Towers Perrin's leading research from 2007, A Study of Human Capital Metrics, providing a framework to apply to any organization and drive growth across various regions, industries and strategic imperatives. With the latest data, learn what human capital priorities link to specific business performance and the best practices at progressive multinational organizations.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Total Rewards Challenges and Solutions in Eastern Europe and the Middle East
Workshop Code: T13W3

Significant economic growth drives Eastern Europe with manufacturing and the Middle East with oil and gas revenue. As a result, many Western companies are establishing operations or creating strategic alliances with partners in the region. However, many Western rewards practices don't apply in these different political, social and economic environments. Learn the unique characteristics of these markets and their total rewards challenges, and brainstorm solutions and opportunities for companies to adopt new ways of working to address competitiveness and rising employment costs elsewhere.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

An Opportunity to Communicate: A Survey of Reward Communications Practices
Workshop Code: T22W3

In last year's rewards survey, WorldatWork members identified reward program communications as one of the most important factors impacting program effectiveness. Different approaches to communications about the transparency of the reward program and pay information differently affect the perception of programs and overall organizational performance. Especially for professionals implementing a new rewards plan, learn the best practices and hear persuasive arguments to influence senior management of the importance of investing resources in reward communications.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50

Best Practices in Career Flexibility
Workshop Code: W06W3

Flexible work practices are critically valued by workers, with an impact on retention, work-life culture and a multigenerational workforce. Join a panel of experts sharing best practices and unique delivery methods (and challenges) of career flexibility models across distinct work environments: private industry, higher education and government. With a focus on flexible career on and off ramps, learn how to encourage these arrangements in any organization with discussion points to get the support needed from leadership and action steps for successful implementation.

Focus Level: Strategic/Tactical—50/50