Oct 2, 2026 · 18 min · 9 segments
This week, hear a chat with Michael Notte about systems thinking, AI, and the human edge in insurance. Lessons in other industries can translate to software development. Designing benefits and…
Jennifer ReifHost
As a developer, I spend a lot of time thinking about systems and probably many developers do.
And when it comes to compensation and benefits, a lot of us, myself probably included, tend to just look at the salary and move on.
approach? From an employee perspective or as an owner perspective? Because there's two different things.
So as an employer, it's important that your benefit package keeps up with what's happening with your competitors down the street.
that's what I help you trying to provide as best you possibly can now the flip side of that as an employee you're looking for your employer to provide the best benefit package absolutely possible but if an employer doesn't necessarily have that in their budget or they haven't thought about it typically they'll go out on the open market either sign up for a plan themselves and just kind of pick the cheapest one if my employees want it here we go and that opens you up to a whole bunch of compliance potential issues when it comes to the ACA and all kinds of things.
But more importantly, if your employees don't understand what you're doing or what you're offering, then you're really just throwing money into the wind and hoping it catches something.
The biggest expenditures that employers have, one is salary, two, your inventory, three is your benefit package.
It's like, okay, if I can offer better benefits, I can offer them cheaper than what I would do if I was trying to do it on my own with no education on this and no systems in place.
What does that look like for me as an owner and how much talent is going down the street to compete against me now because they actually took the time to work with a broker and develop a winning strategy.
From an employee side, oftentimes you think, well, my company offers insurance.
But when you don't have an understanding of it, you can get really frustrated when you are working with that employer.
There's some things that as an employee, you can fall into some traps of, I got insurance and that means I'm covered for everything.
And all of these things, a couple of things that you've mentioned talking about the first expense for an employer is salary followed by your inventory and your benefits.
As a developer, I spend a lot of time thinking about systems and probably many developers do.
And when it comes to compensation and benefits, a lot of us, myself probably included, tend to just look at the salary and move on.
approach? From an employee perspective or as an owner perspective? Because there's two different things.
So as an employer, it's important that your benefit package keeps up with what's happening with your competitors down the street.
that's what I help you trying to provide as best you possibly can now the flip side of that as an employee you're looking for your employer to provide the best benefit package absolutely possible but if an employer doesn't necessarily have that in their budget or they haven't thought about it typically they'll go out on the open market either sign up for a plan themselves and just kind of pick the cheapest one if my employees want it here we go and that opens you up to a whole bunch of compliance potential issues when it comes to the ACA and all kinds of things.
But more importantly, if your employees don't understand what you're doing or what you're offering, then you're really just throwing money into the wind and hoping it catches something.
The biggest expenditures that employers have, one is salary, two, your inventory, three is your benefit package.
It's like, okay, if I can offer better benefits, I can offer them cheaper than what I would do if I was trying to do it on my own with no education on this and no systems in place.
What does that look like for me as an owner and how much talent is going down the street to compete against me now because they actually took the time to work with a broker and develop a winning strategy.
From an employee side, oftentimes you think, well, my company offers insurance.
But when you don't have an understanding of it, you can get really frustrated when you are working with that employer.
There's some things that as an employee, you can fall into some traps of, I got insurance and that means I'm covered for everything.
And all of these things, a couple of things that you've mentioned talking about the first expense for an employer is salary followed by your inventory and your benefits.
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