New rules, a revised menu of entry categories and a new venue mark the launch of the 2015 Eddy Awards.
Entry forms are online. They must be received by Oct. 17.
This year there is only one entry form and one set of awards. This form should be used by plan sponsors entering on their own; service providers entering generic materials on their own; and plan sponsors and their service providers entering together. In the latter instance, both will receive trophies for a winning entry.
Winners of the Eddy Awards will be announced at P&I's annual East Coast Defined Contribution Conference, to be held March 1-3 at the Trump National Doral in Miami. They also will be honored at an exclusive dessert party.
Since 1995, the Eddy Awards have put a spotlight on plan sponsors and service providers exhibiting the best practices in offering investment education to defined contribution plan participants.
The entry menu has undergone a few changes and adjustments. The 2015 award categories are:
- Initial investment education: Entries should introduce current employees to the investment options of a new or modified plan, or new employees to the investment options of an existing plan.
- Ongoing investment education: Entries should reinforce all or part of earlier investment education efforts or change participant investment behavior.
- Special projects: A spotlight on special investment education and communication programs, with entries as simple as a single postcard or an e-mail, rather than a full campaign.
- Conversions: Entries should illustrate campaigns that explain the transition to a new service provider. This year, the category includes consolidation of record keepers by 403(b) plans.
- Plan transitions: Entries should reflect the investment education and communication — in print and/or online — necessary when employees are eligible to participate in a new defined contribution plan. Eligibility can be a result of events such as mergers, acquisitions and spinoffs, or when a defined benefit plan is frozen and participants are moved to a new or existing DC plan.
- Retirement readiness: This category recognizes organizations doing the best job of educating participants on how much they should save, how to make their savings last and other steps needed for a financially secure retirement.
- Automatic re-enrollment: A category that recognizes plan sponsors that have created effective materials to educate employees about the automatic re-enrollment process and how it can benefit them. This category excludes automatic enrollment.
- Mobile applications: This focuses on games, tools or other applications that work on tablets and/or smartphones; it excludes programs used on computers.
The Eddy Awards integrate print and online in all categories. Thus, a single entry may include not only printed materials like brochures, postcards, table tents and posters but also websites, CDs, e-mails and videos.
Entries will be judged on the effectiveness and completeness of the investment education messages except where noted. Successful entries in all but generic categories must be creative and have strong identification with the sponsor.
Entries must be accompanied by a letter containing evidence of the effectiveness of the program, such as an increase in participation or a change in the average participant asset mix.
For all entries that include online components, the complete website address and a temporary user ID and password, valid through March 10, 2015, must be provided.
Entrants must complete and return an entry form with one set of educational materials. A separate envelope and entry form must be used for each category entered; multiple entries may be boxed together for mailing only.
Please do not mount entries on boards. Entries will be returned only if accompanied by an appropriately sized self-addressed envelope. PowerPoint presentations will not be judged; please do not include them in your entry.
Joint entries must include documentation that the plan sponsor approved the submission. An entry acknowledgement form is available at www.pionline.com/eddy2015.
