Welcome to the 3rd Edition of the Boxer Advisors Solution Spotlight - Enhancing Financial Literacy
Since 1987, March has been designated as Women's History Month. March 8th is specifically International Women's Day. This day and month are set aside to honor women’s contributions in American history. Women's History Month encourages us to recognize women and their contributions not only in the month of March but year-round.
In honor of Women's History Month and International Women's Day, our March Solution Spotlight will feature Financial Literacy solutions from Boxer Advisors' senior consultant, Ilene Slatko.
Ilene Slatko
DSS Consulting
Boxer Advisors Senior Consultant
Ms. Slatko has extensive experience in the Federal retirement programs and training federal employees. When the previous retirement system (CSRS) was replaced by FERS, Ilene was at the forefront of presentations educating federal employees on their choices. She has been a retirement trainer for agencies throughout the DC area and has worked for notable Washington, DC area investment companies in management and in building organizational depth in financial education. She previously spent over 25 years in the financial industry advising high-net worth individuals.
She has been a keynote speaker at various conferences including the Army Materiel Command Women’s Financial Day, the Delaware Women’s Conference, and is a frequent speaker on financial literacy programs. Ms. Slatko is currently the host of a weekly Roku and Apple TV show called, The *It Show, the first financial program designed specifically for young women. Her newest project, Metamorphosis, is a subscription-based video-on-demand website providing programs that help guide people navigating their pre-retirement and retirement choices. She is currently a columnist for Rethinking 65, an online publication geared towards financial advisors and their baby boomer clients. Ilene is an alumna of Marietta College where she studied Drama, Speech, and English.
Enhancing Financial Literacy
One of the Boxer Advisors’ core areas of expertise is helping clients to more effectively engage and retain high-performing diverse teams of professionals.
Employee engagement refers to the level of emotional commitment and dedication that employees have towards their job and organization. Financial literacy, on the other hand, refers to an individual's ability to understand and manage their financial affairs effectively. When employees have a good level of financial literacy, they are more likely to feel secure and confident in their financial situation, which can lead to higher levels of engagement in their job. Similarly, when employees are engaged in their work, they are more likely to take an interest in their financial well-being and seek out opportunities to improve their financial literacy. Thus, organizations can benefit from investing in both employee engagement and financial literacy programs to create a more motivated and financially responsible workforce.
This month, we feature our financial literacy solutions, as a way to help our clients help their employees feel more financially secure and enhance their level of engagement on the job.
Research shows that happier, engaged employees are often better employees. Happiness is positively correlated with performance quality, innovation, and efficiency. Psychologically strong employees consistently exhibit strong performance.
However, a recent Gallup poll shows that job disengagement is at 67%. On average, between 10% - 25% of variance in an employee’s job performance is due to stress and lack of engagement. What is the cost of this?
At an average salary of $65,000/year, that equates to $75/week of lost productivity. With 10 employees at the average salary, that equates to $750/week or $39,000 per year.
Additionally, in the discussion over absenteeism vs presenteeism –we know that both cost organizations too much money annually; surprisingly, presenteeism costs 3X what absenteeism costs.
58% of disengaged employees report they are stressed over finances. In fact, 23% of workers making $50,000 to $99,999 per year live paycheck-to-paycheck. 9% of those earning more than $100,000 per year are also living paycheck-to-paycheck. Even those making over $150,000 per year report some level of living paycheck-to-paycheck. The majority of adults don’t worry about meeting their daily expenses, but not by a wide margin. In fact, 37% of adults say they’re just getting by financially and 60% of adults don’t believe their retirement savings are on track.
How can we begin to address this?
Providing financial education is a good step. Employees don’t know who to turn to and often end up missing opportunities to save, invest, and plan for their future. Equally as important is to make sure that the financial education you offer includes decision-making skills, many of the above statistics have more to do with poor decision-making than with income.
