Window of opportunity: Turning pension disruption to your advantage

The past two years have turned the world on its head, and pensions are no exception. Some of the impacts have been negative. But others are positive and could open up potentially transformational opportunities.

The negative impacts centred on the sharp falls in corporate revenues and resulting suspension of pension contributions within a number of businesses. 

The opportunities include the acceleration in digital transformation and greater readiness to use new tech-enabled tools. The break in face-to-face engagement during lockdown has encouraged even once diehard technophobes to embrace the digital world and its possibilities.

At a time when retirement saving/drawdown options and their implications have become so complicated as a result of pensions freedom, the digital leap forward is a chance to improve understanding and help employees plan for a secure future. 

This might be the development of a pension dashboard and/or consolidation tools that make it easier for people to gauge how much they’ve saved, project towards their target retirement and judge how much more they need to contribute. This can be aided by the latest interactive visualisation, along with gamification to help engage with younger employees/clients. This might even be a regular conversation individuals have about pensions through their home or smartphone voice assistant. 

The technology is there, and the appetite for it is growing. The question for businesses is how to make it available in the most accessible, user-friendly and helpful ways for employees.

By aligning technology with strategic re-evaluation with better client/employee understanding of pension demands and options, this could be a catalyst for addressing the pension crisis and developing lasting solutions for a world that’s changing before our eyes. 

If you have any comments or would like to discuss any of the issues raised in this blog, please get in touch.