Chantel Sheaks
Principal, Government Affairs
Buck Consultants
Excellence in Client Service
As principal of government affairs for Buck Consultants, Chantel Sheaks spends a lot of her time following Capitol Hill. It's probably no surprise then that Sheaks spends a lot of her time on healthcare these days, specifically making sense of the 2,400 pages of new legislation for clients, as well as her colleagues at Buck.
"There's a lot of misleading and incorrect information out there around the new healthcare legislation," Sheaks says. "We don't take an official policy position on healthcare reform, but we take the position of educating people. That's going to be one of my biggest challenges not just this year or next, but probably until about 2018."
And Sheaks isn't exaggerating. "I guess you'd call that ultimate job security," Sheaks says. "Clients feel overwhelmed, and there will be an immediate impact on plan design changes, enrollment and administration." And Sheaks says companies have already cut human resources staff to the bone, and plan administrators barely have time to do their own jobs correctly and now they have CFOs, CEO and even employees asking what it all means. They just need some help to put out the fires right now, she says.
Of course, there are other matters on the docket for Sheaks, who joined Buck two years ago from Georgetown University Law Center. She also spends time working on 401(k) policy, disclosure investment advice, executive compensation and pension funding relief, which is an immediate concern for many clients, she says. "To me it was the dream job that I could work on public policy issues on behalf of Buck and on behalf of clients."
Sheaks says she was honored and surprised by the award, especially since her group could be considered overhead. "Sometimes we get overlooked, but we generate revenue in the sense that if we didn't do this, no one would know what's going on," Sheaks says. "We're sort of the brain trust of all that's new."
—Joseph Kornik
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