Leaning into Latinx: 4 ways to become more effective

Photo: The Honorable Kathleen Kennedy Townsend keynotes UnidosUS’ 2022 Workforce Summit, Puerto Rico. Ms. Townsend is the Secretary’s Representative on Pensions and Retirement at the Department of Labor where she is leading the Retirement Campaign for President Joe Biden and Secretary Marty Walsh.

It was our pleasure to join the UnidosUS team at their annual Workforce Development Summit, this year hosted in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico (also known as Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico).

Yes, we were excited to go to PR, home to a great deal of history and some pretty incredible people, music, food, and grit, and a place we’d never been.

Hurricane Fiona had just walloped the islands, wiping out crops and parts of the power grid with high winds, heavy rain, and widespread flooding. We found the capital, San Juan, in relatively good condition and it felt right to part of an event contributing to the local economy.

But we digress just a little. Our mission was to join the Honorable Kathleen Kennedy Townsend in a UnidosUS workshop: Boosting Latinx Retirement Security. Ms. Townsend is the Secretary’s Representative on Pensions and Retirement at the Department of Labor where she is leading the Retirement Campaign for President Joe Biden and Secretary Marty Walsh; she’s been on the speaker’s circuit across the US raising awareness on a range of topics related to retirement security, including workplace access, emergency savings, baby bonds, refundable Saver’s Credit, and lifetime income.

Going in, Townsend confirmed this would not be the usual retirement-hyper-focused event. Instead, it was an opportunity to talk with regular folks who don’t think about retirement savings all day long.

If your world is Latinx workforce development, it’s likely that you spend a lot of time thinking about access to jobs, job security, workforce training, housing, and family financial security. But the retirement security of the communities you work with is probably just a glimmer on the radar of all the efforts you must juggle every day – if it’s visible at all.

And so the workforce community provides a good gauge by which to measure how effective communication about retirement security and savings opportunities has been – where those of us who live in this space are hitting the mark, and where we are not.

UnidosUS’ Luis A. Quinones, at left, Senior Director of Adult Education and Workforce Development, opening the 2022 Workforce Development Summit.

While there was strong agreement with the idea that lack of savings is a systemic issue, the discussion by a tight-knit group of workforce experts left us at RSM with a couple of distinct impressions – including future areas of focus for the Latinx communities that are connected to these affiliate organizations:

1.       The challenge begins with the workforce educators and experts. Like most folks, they are generally not financial services experts. In fact, some are uncomfortable with these topics, because they fall well outside the areas on which they focus day to day. This applies both to access offered through employer retirement plans, and to state Auto IRA programs. We need to keep in mind that the experts we may be targeting have many other challenges to focus on and find the ways that this fits into what they need to know to get their work done.

The information we provide will be most useful if it is simple, clear, easy to digest, and relevant. Even simpler, even more clear than what we are using today. It must be frequently available, in small bites, featuring relevant success stories, and in language developed by folks who live and work in these communities.

2.       Design involvement. Financial programs often have just one chance to make a trusted strong impression. What do we need to change in the financial services world in order to use members of covered communities to design offerings, or to be involved in design and language much earlier in the process?

We say the least here, but this generally-unused opportunity may be the number one reason financial offerings lack penetration in key communities in America today.

3.       First-hand experience. Here we’ll focus on Auto IRAs for a moment because they are new, and because they’re most likely to be the opportunity offered to the folks with whom these workforce experts engage. Let’s start by acknowledging that it’s hard to effectively promote or explain something you don't personally experience.

There are two prime ways workforce experts can gain this experience. One, they can become enrolled through their own employer if they work for a small company covered by an Auto IRA. Two, they can work closely with program experts who provide ongoing training and support, essentially “reaching through” the workforce development experts to connect with workers, and in the process increasing familiarity and comfort for both.

4.       And finally, awareness. Again, for Auto IRAs, awareness still seems to one of the biggest impediments to more dialogue about the options when it comes to retirement savings at work. Leadership in this space is fragmented. Information comes from a variety of sources. Without huge ad budgets it may simply take time for generalized, positive, awareness of programs like CalSavers, OregonSaves, Illinois Secure Choice and others to really take root in the Latinx communities they cover and intend to serve well. In the meantime, creative thinking about community engagement may be useful. This may include the “deputization” of community leaders not just by informing them of programs and their benefits, but also by finding ways to give them hands-on experience and a personal story to tell.

Lest it seem like we are ignoring the private sector, we are not. Providers focusing on these communities, through employer plans and otherwise, can leverage all four of these elements to improve retirement product design, communication, use, and effectiveness.

If we want to close the retirement savings gap — access, and use, let’s find ways to use more of the tools in our toolkit.

Thank you to UnidosUS for hosting an excellent, forward-looking forum, and to Kathleen Kennedy Townsend and the Department of Labor for your focus on these issues.

This piece was featured in the November 17, 2022, edition of Retirement Security Matters. For more fresh thinking on retirement savings innovation, check out the newsletter here