Every month, MassBio spotlights a member company and the great work they’re doing to advance the life sciences industry and support the patients we serve. In December, we spoke with Matt McLaughlin, Institutional Consulting Director and Senior Vice President for Morgan Stanley at Work. Matt has over 27 years of institutional consulting experience focusing on corporate retirement plans.
Tell us about your organization, its mission, and current initiatives.
Morgan Stanley at Work is a comprehensive suite of workplace financial solutions built around the understanding that when employees thrive, companies flourish. We believe there’s no better investment your company can make than in your employees. That’s why Morgan Stanley at Work is working with MassBio to offer competitive group retirement programs through the MassBioEdge Benefits Program. Morgan Stanley has negotiated substantial discounts with two top 401(k) recordkeepers on behalf of MassBio member companies to make the process of starting or maintaining a retirement program easier and more efficient for MassBio members.
How do your organization’s activities help patients (and the organizations that help these patients) now and into the future?
Morgan Stanley at Work provides workplace financial solutions to companies and their employees. We believe that there is no greater asset to today’s biotech organizations than their people, which is why we firmly believe that MassBio members and their employees deserve to have the support they need at each step of their financial journeys. Our goal is to provide the resources member companies need to offer first-class retirement plan benefits while allowing them to stay focused on their corporate mission. We believe we can help enable stakeholders in this community to focus on what matters most, preventing, treating, and curing diseases through transformative science and technology.
What do you see as the biggest challenge facing the life sciences industry today?
One of the most difficult challenges we’ve seen with MassBio’s member organizations is the need to attract and retain key talent. Members in the startup or early seed phases are often challenged by establishing and maintaining employee benefit programs with limited resources, while trying to meet the expectations of today’s employees. Unfortunately, this problem doesn’t disappear as organizations grow. Many late-stage biotech organizations suffer from time consuming and costly retirement programs. Morgan Stanley is proud to offer innovative solutions that can seamlessly integrate with payroll and outsource many of the time-consuming administrative tasks. Morgan Stanley will work with member companies every step of the process from establishing a new program, upgrading existing benefits as organizations expand and even communicating and educating employees so that they understand and capitalize on the benefit program.
What’s next for your organization / what are you focused on in the coming year?
Morgan Stanley at Work is extremely pleased to become the third organization in the MassBioEdge Benefits Program. In addition to the robust programs offered by Harvard Pilgrim Healthcare and Guardian, Morgan Stanley will be providing world class retirement benefits. Our goal for the coming year is focused on creating awareness within MassBio of this valuable opportunity and helping members enhance their existing programs.
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