Our Take
Both sides avoid difficult conversations about failed goals, creating a cycle where advisors oversell and HR teams resist change.
Why it matters
With healthcare costs rising 18% annually (per panel data), misaligned advisor-HR relationships block access to alternative strategies that could reduce both costs and employee complaints.
Do this week
HR leaders: Schedule a joint meeting with your benefits advisor and CFO before next renewal to define success metrics together.
Advisors bypass HR to pitch CFOs directly
A BenefitsPRO Broker Expo panel identified specific communication failures between benefits advisors and HR teams that block healthcare cost management. Emma Fox, founder of FoxWatch, found advisors frequently skip HR departments to sell directly to CFOs who control budgets, leaving HR to manage employee complaints without input on plan changes.
Devin Donaldson, employee benefits consultant at USI Insurance Services, reported HR professionals view all benefits advisors as identical because "they are still dealing with the same thing, even though they go through multiple brokers." The pattern: advisors recommend solutions quickly without asking questions to understand company needs.
Stephanie Porrino, CEO of Empower Healthcare Insights, noted both sides avoid confronting trust breakdowns or unmet goals. HR teams assume change is impossible, while advisors present themselves as product sellers rather than strategic partners.
Standard approach blocks alternative cost strategies
The misalignment has financial consequences. Companies default to accepting 18% annual healthcare cost increases (per panel discussion) rather than exploring alternatives that require coordination between finance and HR priorities.
Fox explained the core tension: CFOs want financial outcomes while HR protects employees from benefit disruptions. Without upfront HR involvement, advisor recommendations create "fear and mistrust" that blocks implementation of cost-reduction strategies.
Successful partnerships require moving beyond surface-level enrollment data to examine actual plan claims, pharmacy benefit manager performance, and provider network access. This analysis demands both CFO budget authority and HR operational knowledge.
Define success metrics jointly before renewal
The panel identified specific fixes for both parties. Advisors should lead conversations with empathy for HR workloads beyond benefits renewal and avoid bypassing HR in C-suite discussions. HR teams should challenge assumptions about advisor capabilities and accept that alternative strategies may require operational disruption.
Fox emphasized success definitions must be collaborative: "whether that is the highest quality care or the lowest cost" to move advisors from "solution distributor" to "thought partner." This requires what Porrino called "tolerance checks" on how much change a company can handle.
The most effective partnerships examine claims data and pharmacy benefit details rather than relying on enrollment summaries, according to Donaldson's experience with strategic advisory relationships.