Your 401(k) isn't enough. Now what?

Closing the gap between retirement plan access and employee participation.

Seventy-two percent of private-sector workers have access to a retirement plan. Only fifty-three percent use one. That gap is not a communication problem. It is a design problem, a fiduciary problem, and a financial wellness problem, often all at once.

In this session, Dr. Shari Simpson sits down with two of the country's most respected retirement advisors to examine what separates a plan that exists on paper from one employees actually use. Jeanne Sutton, CFP and CPFA with Strategic Retirement Partners, advises both plan sponsors and individual employees at the same time, a rare position most advisors never hold. Michael Smith, CEFEX-certified fiduciary and Managing Partner of Insight Financial Partners, built his practice after years inside the payroll and recordkeeping machinery most HR leaders never see until something breaks.

Together, they cover the real cost of financial stress in the workforce, the legal exposure buried in routine plan administration, what good fiduciary process actually looks like in practice, and the specific moves HR leaders can make right now to build a plan employees understand and use.

Key Objectives:

• Explain what fiduciary responsibility means in day-to-day practice for an HR leader, including where legal and administrative exposure actually lives beyond the investment lineup.
• Distinguish between financial wellness and retirement readiness, and identify where employer responsibility starts before the 401(k) ever enters the conversation.
• Apply at least one immediate action on both the people side and the plan design side to improve participation and reduce employer risk.