Construction/Design/Engineering

Angie Morrison: Construction is one of the most active hiring environments in the country right now. There were 33,000 jobs added in January alone. The industry needs to attract an estimated 349,000 net new workers in 2026 just to keep pace with demand. The competition for skilled labor is intense, wages are climbing, and workforce retention has never mattered more.

That backdrop shapes every conversation I have with construction plan sponsors. At Cerity Partners, we believe the workforce that builds America deserves the same access to comprehensive financial planning as those sitting in the C-suite. The crew foreman who shows up at 5 a.m. and the project manager overseeing a multi-state operation should have a retirement plan that’s actually working for them.

Angie Morrison: A regional construction company recently came to us realizing that their plan was underperforming. After fully implementing our engagement strategy, we saw increased and sustained participation rise from 62% to 97%*. This was a sizeable business with roughly 700 employees and operations across three states. There hadn’t been a fiduciary review in close to a decade and employees had no real access to financial education.

After assessing the opportunity and learning more about the leadership team and the culture they were trying to create through their benefits offering, we built a multi-year strategy around three pillars. No. 1: participant education and engagement delivered on-site at every location; No. 2: a formal governance structure, including a Retirement Committee and Investment Policy Statement; and No. 3: a full plan redesign with automatic enrollment and escalation up to 10%.

Average deferral rates rose to 7.4%. Income replacement scores—measured by participants on track to replace 70% of pre-retirement income—increased by 42% following our engagement**. That kind of outcome requires time, a clear plan, and an advisor whose job is to serve the participants.

Angie Morrison: A lot of plan sponsors don’t think about it until something goes wrong.By then it may be too late and options narrow quickly. As a CFO, I saw this firsthand. The liability for plan decisions doesn’t sit with the recordkeeper, but rather with the employer, personally. If the investment menu hasn’t been reviewed, if there’s no documented process for how decisions were made, if participants retire without adequate savings, those questions come back to the plan sponsor.

A formal governance structure, including a Committee Charter, Investment Policy Statement, and documented reviews, are critical. These aren’t formal for the sake of being formal. They offer real protection.

Angie Morrison: It’s often the most overlooked transition path, especially in construction where family ownership is common. I served as ESOP Administrator before coming to Cerity Partners, so I can speak to the structure, the obligations, and the culture of employee ownership from the inside. For the right company, an ESOP can be a powerful combination of ownership transition, employee benefit, and tax efficiency.

Angie Morrison: That assessing your plan’s health is just a starting point. Plan sponsors are often surprised by what they find. And not because their plan is failing, but because they’ve never had an honest benchmark to compare against.