2014 was one for the employee benefits history books! The roll-out of the individual mandate, modified community-rating for individual and small group policies, and the public exchanges.

2015 will be yet another chapter in the revolution of employer-provided health insurance with the employer mandate taking effect and additional compliance and reporting responsibilities placed on employers. Throughout all of this, the overriding themes will continue to be creating and maintaining a culture of health within the workforce and the evolution of technology.

Active shooter incidents are scary. These stories flood the news and make us worry about the safety of our children. Yet despite its overwhelming presence in the media, active shooter incidents are not the highest cause of death in schools.

They are extremely serious matters. Schools should take steps to prevent active shooters and train staff on how to respond should an incident occur. But it is critical not to overlook the often quieter, more frequent causes of school fatalities such as school transportation, homicides, and suicides.

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Katie Tryniecki, Marketing Specialist at Gibson. We hope you enjoy Katie's wisdom and perspective.

“Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.”

Most people associate Vince Lombardi with this line. But in fact, it wasn’t the legendary coach of the Green Bay Packers who first said it. Some attribute it to college coach Red Saunders and others to John Wayne in the 1953 film Trouble Along the Way.

Fall protection for the construction industry has topped the OSHA list of most frequently cited standards year after year. In fact, falls are the leading cause of death in the construction industry with 294 of the 796 fatalities in 2013 being attributed to falls. Yet these fatalities can be prevented. What can you do to protect your employees from fall hazards?

As if the cold weather and snow weren’t enough to deal with, the winter also brings the danger of ice dams. The combination of snow on your roof, the freezing temperatures, and heat escaping from your home can create chunks of ice along edges of your roof. This prevents melted snow from draining off. The backup of water created can then leak into the home and cause significant damage.

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Ron Kitchens, Chief Executive Officer of the Southwest Michigan First Group of Companies. We hope you enjoy Ron’s wisdom and perspective.

We cannot become what we need to be by remaining what we are.
- Max De Pree

In 2015, leaders need to first and foremost do this one thing: take care of themselves.

A few weeks back I was getting my hair done. Multi-tasking like it’s a fashion statement, I was working and talking on the phone almost the entire time. Without going on a tangent about how annoying this must have been for my stylist, I had a great conversation with John Booth at Quintain.

We talked about end-of-year reporting and analytics, logo gifts, shopping portals, inbound tactics, Hubspot strategies, email funnel messages, and growth projections for an expanding office location. When I got off the phone, a few people around me had very confused looks on their faces.

Today we're sharing insight from guest blogger Mary Josephs, Founder & CEO of Verit Advisors and Forbes Contributor with a focus on ESOPs. We hope you enjoy Mary's wisdom and perspective. 

The concept of workplace ownership — “taking ownership,” “owning the problem,” “being the owner of the project,” “you’ve got to really own it,” and other phrases have become well-used office jargon – to my mind lacks a certain something: actual ownership.

Where is today’s property & casualty market and where is it headed in 2015? According to the Insurance Service Office’s (ISO) industry 6-month 2014 results:

• Insurer net written premium growth slowed to 4% from 4.3% in the first-half of 2013.
• Commercial lines insurers’ combined ratio rose 1.8 percentage points in the first-half of 2014 to 95.4%.
• Policyholder surplus rose 9.5% in first-half 2014 keeping it at record levels.

What does this mean in 2015 and what can insurance consumers expect from the marketplace?

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Brad Serf, Principal at Gibson. We hope you enjoy Brad's wisdom and perspective.

Many of us middle aged Hoosiers grew up listening to, and were influenced by, singer songwriter John Mellencamp. With 40 million albums sold worldwide and a career spanning 3 decades, John was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008. At the age of 62, in support of his 22nd full album, Mellencamp will tour once again in 2015 with tour dates booked in 3 of our 4 office locations South Bend, Fort Wayne, and Indianapolis. If I could only get him to play a show in my home town of Plymouth, IN we would have the horse racing equivalent of a Superfecta!