Summary
Julie Molloy runs compensation, benefits and recognition as EVP of Total Rewards at LPL Financial, a wealth management firm of roughly 9,500 employees whose entire purpose is helping financial advisors take care of everyone else's money. On this episode of Beyond the Paycheck, she tells host Kelsey Willock what happened when the company turned that purpose inward and gave its own employees free access to an LPL financial advisor. The early numbers are already moving: people who take even one meeting are raising their 401k contributions.

The conversation goes well past the program itself. Julie explains how she builds the internal case for benefits when the spreadsheet refuses to show a clean ROI, walks through a caregiver leave expansion at a prior employer that resonated so well it blew past every financial model her team had built, and names the two shifts she thinks HR is least prepared for: full pay transparency and the expectation that benefits will be personalized the way consumer apps already are. She also traces where her convictions about fair pay came from. She was raised by grandparents who lived on welfare, was the first in her family to attend college, made burgers at Burger King, and took her first grown up paycheck from a KPMG internship straight to the mall.

Chapters
00:00 Welcome and Julie's path through total rewards
02:26 What LPL Financial does and who works there
04:04 Burger King, KPMG, and the first grown up paycheck
05:43 Raised by grandparents on welfare
07:33 A free financial advisor for LPL employees
09:45 Why financial stress follows people to work
11:33 Making the case when the spreadsheet will not
14:25 Small round tables over three day conferences
16:43 The caregiver leave that worked too well
19:00 Pay transparency and personalized benefits

Takeaways
- LPL Financial gives its own employees free access to an LPL financial advisor, and employees who take even a single meeting are already increasing their 401k contributions.
- Julie treats financial well-being as the third leg of well-being alongside mental and physical health, not a nice to have bolted on at the end.
- Benefits investments rarely produce a clean ROI line, so total rewards leaders have to be storytellers first and back the story with engagement, turnover and internal promotion data.
- A caregiver leave expansion at a prior employer resonated so widely that it blew past every financial model, a reminder to pilot benefits changes and build in real financial contingency before going all in.
- The two shifts Julie thinks HR is least ready for are full pay transparency and employees expecting the same personalization from benefits that they already get from consumer apps.

Connect with the Guest
Julie Molloy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/julie-molloy
Company Website: https://www.lpl.com

Sponsor
Aura Finance helps you simplify compensation and benefits planning by bringing everything into one streamlined platform. No more juggling spreadsheets, disconnected tools, or manual calculations. Aura gives you a single place to design, compare, and communicate total rewards packages with confidence.

With AI-powered insights, it takes the guesswork and busywork out of comp decisions, helps you spot pay equity gaps early, and makes it easy to model scenarios that keep your teams engaged and your budgets on track.

See a demo at https://www.aurafinance.com/

Summary
Jay Hart, Global Head of Talent Management at Varex Imaging, joins host Kelsey Willock Jones on Beyond the Paycheck to make a case most HR leaders feel but rarely name: employees never experience HR the way HR is organized. Talent acquisition owns one piece, learning and development another, HR business partners a third, total rewards a fourth, and the employee only ever experiences one employment deal. He walks through a call center where turnover was high and the obvious answer was to pay more aggressively. The more his team listened, the clearer it became that people were not leaving for money, they were leaving because they could not see their careers moving. The fix pulled mentorship, formal education, spot bonuses and relocation into a single nine month cohort program: nobody enrolled left, and employees started asking how to get into the next one. He also tells the one that did not work, an expensive retention package for a team of data scientists who took the money and left anyway, because what they actually wanted was development, flexibility and air cover from leadership. Built for CHROs, total rewards teams and HR leaders who suspect their best programs are reaching employees in pieces.

Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:42 Meet Jay Hart and Varex Imaging
01:53 A 2,500 person global workforce
02:31 Why HR should be industry agnostic
03:49 The cost of fragmented HR programs
06:08 Listening, trust and the steward of culture
08:12 The call center problem pay could not fix
11:04 Making the case without a clear ROI
13:37 The retention package that failed
15:53 Staying current as an HR leader
17:53 What most HR leaders are not ready for
19:39 Where to connect with Jay

Takeaways
- Employees experience one employment deal, not four HR functions, so judge every program by what it adds up to rather than by which team owns it.
- Test the pay hypothesis before funding it. Listening turned a call center turnover problem into a career visibility problem that no market adjustment would have solved.
- Pull the levers together. A nine month cohort that combined mentorship, education, spot bonuses and relocation retained everyone enrolled and created a waiting list for the next one.
- Retention money does not hold people who are leaving for development, flexibility or air cover, because the companies recruiting them will simply pay out whatever you tie them with.
- The manager is the longest lever in the HR toolbox, because employees rarely walk into HR with a problem early enough for HR to fix it.

Connect with the Guest
Jay Hart LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaydhart
Company Website: https://www.vareximaging.com

Sponsor
Aura Finance helps you simplify compensation and benefits planning by bringing everything into one streamlined platform. No more juggling spreadsheets, disconnected tools, or manual calculations. Aura gives you a single place to design, compare, and communicate total rewards packages with confidence.

With AI-powered insights, it takes the guesswork and busywork out of comp decisions, helps you spot pay equity gaps early, and makes it easy to model scenarios that keep your teams engaged and your budgets on track.

See a demo at https://www.aurafinance.com/

• (00:00) - Intro
• (00:42) - Meet Jay Hart and Varex Imaging
• (01:53) - A 2,500 person global workforce
• (02:31) - Why HR should be industry agnostic
• (03:49) - The cost of fragmented HR programs
• (06:08) - Listening, trust and the steward of culture
• (08:12) - The call center problem pay could not fix
• (11:03) - Making the case without a clear ROI
• (13:37) - The retention package that failed
• (15:53) - Staying current as an HR leader
• (17:53) - What most HR leaders are not ready for
• (19:38) - Where to connect with Jay

Summary
Lisa Jacobi, CHRO at COCC, joins host Kelsey Willock Jones on Beyond the Paycheck with a benefits story most HR leaders will recognize: a $40 a month gym reimbursement, fully funded, sitting at 18 percent adoption and quietly serving mostly younger, single, male employees. Her team stopped curating the list of acceptable purchases and moved to lifestyle spending accounts, where the expense is only booked when someone actually uses it. Adoption went to about 95 percent. She also walks through the year COCC announced a bigger profit sharing contribution to a room of 200 people and got silence, which is what pushed the company into paying across three horizons instead of one. Along the way she offers the comparison she keeps in her pocket for skeptical leaders: employees spend more than 2,000 hours a year with their coworkers and about 25 minutes a year with their doctor. Built for CHROs, total rewards teams and benefits leaders who suspect their best-funded program is reaching the wrong half of the company.

Chapters
00:00 Meet Lisa Jacobi and COCC
01:30 Inside a workforce that supports 150 banks
02:43 Selling sneakers at 16 for $4.75 an hour
04:41 What retail taught her about building relationships
06:28 2,000 hours with coworkers, 25 minutes with your doctor
09:03 Why people can be themselves at COCC
11:07 Making the case when the spreadsheet doesn't
14:53 The profit sharing announcement met with crickets
18:31 The healthcare shift she isn't ready for
20:55 The human is in the lead, not in the loop

Takeaways
- An 18 percent adoption rate is a design verdict rather than an engagement problem, so audit who is actually using a benefit before defending its budget.
- Fund optionality instead of curating an approved list, and book the expense only when someone spends it so finance can say yes to covering everyone.
- Pay across three horizons, because the same workforce wants cash now, flexibility soon and compounding later, and not in equal measure.
- A program can be right and still fail if the organization is not ready for it, which is a sequencing problem rather than a content problem.
- People rarely leave over money, so track whether employees feel they can be themselves at work and treat that score as a leading indicator.

Connect with the Guest
Lisa Jacobi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisa-jacobi-shrm-scp-sphr-0636483/
Company Website: https://www.cocc.com

Sponsor
Aura Finance helps you simplify compensation and benefits planning by bringing everything into one streamlined platform. No more juggling spreadsheets, disconnected tools, or manual calculations—Aura gives you a single place to design, compare, and communicate total rewards packages with confidence.

With AI-powered insights, it takes the guesswork and busywork out of comp decisions, helps you spot pay equity gaps early, and makes it easy to model scenarios that keep your teams engaged and your budgets on track.

See a demo at https://www.aurafinance.com/

• (00:00) - Meet Lisa Jacobi and COCC
• (01:30) - Inside a workforce that supports 150 banks
• (02:43) - Selling sneakers at 16 for $4.75 an hour
• (04:41) - What retail taught her about building relationships
• (06:28) - 2,000 hours with coworkers, 25 minutes with your doctor
• (09:03) - Why people can be themselves at COCC
• (11:07) - Making the case when the spreadsheet doesn't
• (14:52) - The profit sharing announcement met with crickets
• (18:31) - The healthcare shift she isn't ready for
• (20:55) - The human is in the lead, not in the loop