IAM2383 – Founder Helps Clients Achieve Better Outcomes in their Health Insurance and Employee Benefit Plans

Donovan Ryckis is the award-winning, founder, and CEO of Ethos Benefits, a firm dedicated to advancing fiduciary-driven health insurance insurance strategies for employers nationwide.

Donovan is known for pioneering strategies to eliminate fraud, waste, and abuse in employer healthcare plans, leading to significant savings for both employers and employees.

Donovan co-produces the Business of Benefits Podcast and has created a documentary called It's Not Personal, It's Just Healthcare.

Donovan emphasizes that employers, as leveraged buyers, have the power to negotiate healthcare plans.

He highlights the importance of transparency in their business model, where they openly disclose their compensation, ensuring alignment of interests with their clients.

Donovan underscores the importance of investing in education and health, citing these two areas as the ones he is willing to spend unlimited amounts on.

He advocates business owners not to be afraid of investing in programs or professionals, even if they don't work out as expected.

Website: Ethos Benefits

LinkedIn: Donovan Ryckis

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Donovan Ryckis Teaser 00:00

And if you think of it like a large employer, I mean, they're a leveraged buyer, right? Like if I just go out and get an individual policy, I don't have any kind of leverage in that negotiation.

American employers are leverage buyers in that they can control their supply chain in that cost just like they control every other cost in their business.

It just really starts with asking better questions. And unfortunately that's asking better questions of people like me who offer them that advice.

That's kind of what I saw when I got started. It was very similar to other areas I'd seen in financial services.

Intro 00:33

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview?

If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 01:00

Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast and I have an awesome guest on the show today. I have Donovan Ryckis. Donovan, excited to have you on the show.

Donovan Ryckis 01:08

Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Gresham Harkless 01:09

Yes, absolutely. I'm super excited to have you on because Donovan is doing so many awesome things.

And of course before we jumped into having that awesome conversation, I wanted to read a little bit more about Donovan so you hear about some of those awesome things that he's doing.

And so Donovan is the award winning founder and CEO of Ethos Benefits, a firm dedicated to advancing fiduciary driven health insurance insurance strategies for employers nationwide.

Donovan and his wife and business partner Chelsea have pioneered a revolutionary approach that effectively eliminates fraud, waste and abuse from employer health care plans while increasing savings for both employers and their employees.

A seasoned entrepreneur has created and exited numerous successful companies in a multitude of industries.

Donovan has always looked for ways to improve existing standards and with over a decade of experience as a fiduciary.

Donovan brings transparency, common sense and alignment of interests and the benefits marketplace.

His desire is to have a greater impact on families and hardworking individuals led him to create Ethos.

Donovan's unconventional work in the health insurance industry has placed the power back into the hands of business owners and employees.

As I was saying before this, I always love to have other podcasters on the show. He and his wife had the Business of Benefits podcast.

They also co-produced a documentary called It's Not Personal, It's Just Healthcare, which I think is a phenomenal message.

He's a renowned speaker has talked in many numerous places and I loved kind of hearing and researching before I hopped on this that his mission is to empower employers and employees with the knowledge, tools and strategies to optimize their benefits, costs and enhance their financial security.

So Donovan, you're doing awesome things. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Donovan Ryckis 02:52

Yeah man, I'm hyped, man. You got me buying how great I am after all.

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Gresham Harkless 02:57

Yeah, absolutely. What I always love about reading the bios is that I feel like it's a lot easier than probably accomplishing all the things you've been able to do.

But correct me if I'm wrong. Absolutely. So I guess to kick everything off, let's rewind the clock, hear a little bit more on how you got started with what I call your CEO story.

Donovan Ryckis 03:12

Being younger and growing up, I never could understand the concept of like only being curious about one thing in life.

And that's kind of what started it off from the get go. Like the idea of being any one, profession or it just didn't make sense to me personally. So I think it kind of started from there.

But the current business ethos, benefits I actually got into after already kind of changing my career path which was going from entrepreneur, real estate investor, business owner with a gold's gym, exited the gym, exited some real estate and then didn't really know what to do.

And what I ended up getting into was financial services. Financial services as an industry, it's incredibly broad. What I liked about it is there is no ceiling.

Like you can make as much money as you can find out there. You can work with any type of customer you want.

You just have to figure that out. So I kind of went through some trial and error in financial services where the company had started with, I was working with seniors with people turning 65 and starting Medicare.

And while it was good, good money and you can kind of see how you can build a business, I was like, this is not like my ideal client profile, right? Like these are not the, it's just not the conversation I like to have.

It wasn't a big enough problem for me to solve because it was more, kind of waking up every day repeating the same thing.

So while it's important work, it's good work. You can get paid for it. Well, I was like, I really crave like big, complicated, intimidating problems and I don't want to sell products.

I want to consult and kind of create my own strategies and I want to work with business owners and big companies doing big things.

And in turn, those, those companies pay better as well. So my first go around with that actually was becoming a financial advisor.

So as a financial advisor, and I was actually selling to those companies 401ks and pension plan, which was great.

I was most the way there. I was working with the type of client I wanted to the money was good.

But one day I started to realize, like, the math for employees wasn't really making sense because, employees have two things they need to contribute their money into.

One is their 401k for their own retirement, and the other piece is their healthcare plan for today to make sure them and their family is okay.

But what I was seeing just in general with the market, with my clients, with new prospects I was talking to, is that more employee dollars were going into the healthcare plan than were going into their own savings.

And at the same time, the healthcare plan prices were increasing faster than the money in their 401k could ever hope to.

So they're seeing larger than 10% increases in their health insurance premiums year after year. And it was very quick and very easy to see that, like healthcare is literally robbing American employees of their future.

And in this country, 183 million Americans get their health insurance through their employer.

So kind of seeing that, being a financial advisor for a couple years, I quickly kind of pivoted and came over to the employee benefit side after doing my first case and just realized like, hey, this is the problem.

This is something that I can solve with my own kind of consulting and packaging of things, rather than just doing it the way the market is currently, which is going out to these employers and basically just selling them the same stuff year after year after year and saying there's nothing you can do about it.

Gresham Harkless 07:02

Yeah, well, I appreciate you so much in sharing that. I would love to drill down a little bit more, hear a little bit more on what you're doing with ethos, how exactly it works, how exactly you're making that impact for these employees and these employers frankly too.

Donovan Ryckis 07:14

I think the simplest part of it is like American business owners have been just told this lie, and the lie is that you can't control the cost of health care.

I mean, if you think of it like a large employer, I mean, they're a leveraged buyer, right? Like, if I just go out and get an individual policy, I don't have any kind of leverage in that negotiation or that construction of that plan. I just got to purchase what's there.

But American health employers are, American employers are, leverage buyers and that they can control their supply chain in that cost just like they control every other cost in their business. It just really starts with asking better questions.

And unfortunately that's asking better questions of people like me who offer them that advice. And that's kind of what I saw when I got started.

It was very similar to other areas I'd seen in financial services. Right. It's unfortunately like, show me the incentives and I'll show you the results. Right.

Like, the incentives for people that were offering advice wasn't necessarily aligned with the goals of the employers trying to make better decisions.

So I think it really just starts with asking better questions, looking at like any other part of their business.

And from there we can kind of start to take apart things and make sense of the health care plan rather than just kind of purchasing the same thing every year.

Gresham Harkless 08:31

Yeah. And so I wonder if that's part of what I like to call your secret sauce. Could be for yourself, personally, the business, or combination of both. But is it that?

And I heard this when I was even preparing for this, that data piece and how important that is, is that part of what you feel like is your secret sauce what set you apart and makes you unique?

Donovan Ryckis 08:47

What makes us unique and different, honestly, is just the way we consult and give clients advice.

And that starts with something that would seem really silly. And this might be unique to my industry, but in my industry, traditionally we'd be called a healthcare broker.

And companies have no idea how, when, how much their broker would get paid. Like they don't know how much.

They don't know when it might be more, when it might be less. Is it more for this company, less for that one?

So I think like, that's really like the starting point for our unique proposition is we don't do that.

We disclose 100 of our compensation. It's coming directly from our clients. I think the, the takeaway might be for any business, like you can create it, a win win.

Like they're getting better advice and sometimes it might be more, but they'll very quickly see the payoff.

So just being upfront honest, having that difficult conversation about the compensation is so much easier than you think.

It was something I was scared of at first, like, oh man, I gotta tell them. And like have this conversation as soon as you do it.

They're, I mean, it's not like they weren't thinking about it. Right. So they're, they're grateful that they know what it is.

That you're being upfront about it, that now they understand and they have a peek into like how this industry works.

And from there you can kind of set up the rest of the conversation, the rest of the process in that same spirit, in transparency, in honesty, in alignment. And it just goes from there by doing the difficult part up front.

Gresham Harkless 10:27

Yeah, that makes so much sense. And so I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack.

So this could be like an Apple book or even a habit that you have. What's something you lean on that makes you more effective and efficient?

Donovan Ryckis 10:40

I think the biggest hack overall is like, there's two things I'll spend like any amount of money on. One is any kind of education, training, counseling, coaching, whatever.

And then also anything for my health that I want, if I want three gym memberships, whatever, like, whatever I want, like I'll just do those two things.

If you believe in yourself as a professional, what you do, you have to realize like there's people in other industries that can do that same thing for you.

So that's kind of how I looked at it. Like the value I provide to my employers that they don't understand until they go through it.

There's people that did that same thing for me, with the executives in my company. And yeah, I mean, it's scary, but see if you can make a smaller commitment, maybe a three month commitment for a program, maybe a trial to an educational program.

Invest in education in whichever way that comes and that should always be changing. So first for me it was industry, and then it turned into more relationship or executive coaching or company building coaching.

But it always changes and just don't think you're done. Like it's just gonna be in a different part of your business, but it's not gonna go away.

Gresham Harkless 11:55

Absolutely. So what would you consider to be a little bit more CEO nugget? So this could be like a word of wisdom or piece of advice.

I like to say it might be something you would jump in a time machine and tell your younger business self or potentially tell your favorite client goes.

Donovan Ryckis 12:07

Back to like that investment in either programs or professionals like to help you in the business journey.

And one didn't go the way I had hoped. It was for service, very expensive, and we gave it a couple months and it was just kind of a total debt.

And I was talking to my business partner about it, she was kind of bummed out and I was like, just charge it to the game,  and move on.

Like, that's, that's like a cost of doing business. I would have done it again, now we know that's not one of the things that's going to work for us. There's no college for that.

For building a business in this sector at this time. Like, that's just part of the educational process. So I'd say don't be scared to try and just pull the rip cord early.

If it's not working, move on. It's not the end of the world. You're going to go through dozens of different trials and iterations and variations. So charge it to the game. Don't get upset. Just keep going.

Gresham Harkless 13:09

Absolutely. So now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO.

We're hoping to have different, quote-unquote, CEOs on the show. So, Donovan, what does being a CEO mean to you?

Donovan Ryckis 13:19

It certainly doesn't mean you're always right. I think it means that you have to be curious about everything in your business that's affecting your business, your employees, your industry, what's affecting your clients.

Like, a lot of the times it's. It's being curious and having a little bit of knowledge in dozens and dozens of areas while you're hiring, specialists within your company to handle those things and, and kind of realizing, like, they're better than you at those things because you're.

You're going to be thinly spread. So I kind of view being a CEO as like being a true Renaissance man.

When I was in school, that word, that concept I found really interesting. That was the only thing I ever heard where I'm like, yeah, that's what I want to be like.

I don't want to be a doctor, lawyer, architect, fireman, cop. I was like, I want to be a Renaissance man.

And that's kind of what being a CEO is. It's doing anything from the website SEO to the insurance stuff I'm working on, the employee stuff, the business, right. Like, it's everywhere.

So just understanding that's part of it. And then you. Between that, you have to find out, like, all right, where and how am I going to apply the kind of intensity to certain topics to get them done?

Because also, having that many plates, spinning that many topics can kind of mean you get lost in them.

So being super curious, being thinly spread, and then figuring out where you're going to set your initiatives quarterly to kind of advance while keeping your team happy.

Gresham Harkless 15:06

Absolutely. Well, Donovan, truly appreciate that definition and of course I appreciate your time even more.

So what I wanted to do now was pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners listeners know.

And of course have s people who can get a hold of you, listen to the podcast, find about all the awesome things you and the team are working on.

Donovan Ryckis 15:24

Yeah, probably LinkedIn's the easiest way. So, Donovan Ryckis, Ethos Benefits. Whether you're an executive or maybe you have a company that offers health insurance or even just employee, I've actually had employees like listen to our podcast and like feed it up to their HR, their CFO, their CEO, and we've been able to find solutions.

So health care is something that affects all of us. It sucks. And there is better ways to go about it.

So yeah, feel free to reach out on LinkedIn or listen to the new podcast, which is the Business of Benefits.

Sorry, we just renamed the Business of Benefits on any podcast station, wherever you listen.

Gresham Harkless 16:09

Absolutely. And of course, to make it even easier, we're going to have the links and information in the show notes as well too, to your LinkedIn website. The podcast as well too.

And I truly appreciate everything that you're doing. Of course it makes a big impact for families, for businesses, for organizations in the world as a whole. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Donovan Ryckis 16:25

Thank you.

Outro 16:26

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast, powered by CB Nation and Blue16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co. I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community.

Don't forget to schedule your complimentary digital marketing consultation at Blue16Media.com. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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