HR Partner Spotlight: Meet Brook Cox, VP of Retirement Plan Consulting at OneDigital Ohio

According to a recent OneDigital value perception survey, one in four employees are thinking about taking a loan from their retirement savings, and more than half say they couldn’t handle a major unexpected expense. 

That’s some pretty heavy stuff. 

Any employer worth their weight of course wants to help ensure their employees are healthy and happy. But when it comes to financial planning, it can be overwhelming for HR consultants and managers to know where to start, or how to pivot adjusting plans to make them more tailored to employee needs.

That’s where Brook Cox comes in. As VP of Retirement Plan Consulting at OneDigital Ohio, Brook has a way of taking something that feels complicated and scary and making you feel… well, good about it. 

He’s got 25+ years of experience under his belt, sure. But what really sets him apart is how he shows up: with real conversations, practical tools, and a deep understanding of what both employers and employees actually need. 

When we asked him what is the best professional advice he’d ever received, he shared a tidbit of wisdom (paraphrased) from a mentor:   

”We may build the best widget ever, but don’t forget that our competitors will build a better widget in the future, what really matters is that helping employers help their employees is a people-based business. PEOPLE MATTER MOST!”  

Our HR consultants think so too. 

Brook has been a huge supporter of the Human Resources Consulting (HRC) side of OneDigital, and we wanted to offer a chance for you to get to know him too. Let us know if you’d like to meet with him to discuss retirement planning.  

Interview With Brook Cox

Brook definitely has a knack for taking an uncomfortable topic (retirement) and making people feel like it’s safe and doable. Here are a few more things you should know about his approach: 

• He has a deep understanding of how complex retirement planning can be for overwhelmed HR consultants and decision-makers, and is there to support them with meaningful, realistic strategies.

• He’s big on measurable results (think participation rates and income replacement) and small actions that lead to long-term wins.

• His definition of success: A life that is balanced on the scales. 

• His key core values: Transparency, bold advocacy, creativity, innovation, and a passion for helping people. 

• He plays guitar in local bands, and his first language was Mandarin (OK, not business-pertinent, but interesting, right?). 

Here’s our conversation with Brook Cox. 

What do you enjoy most about your work and being part of the OneDigital team?  

I enjoy the culture and talent at OneDigital. There are many passionate and talented people here that are all focused on one thing, our clients. I love that!

Can you walk us through how you help businesses and HR consultants with retirement planning — and maybe share a bit more detail about your approach or process?  

Running a plan can be overwhelming, especially for HR teams that are tasked with a lot of different oversight roles. So, I strive to make it easy, actionable, and measurable. For example, I like to start with assessing a team through our 12-point inspection process, this is an easy exercise to gauge where I may need to take action to support my clients.  

The biggest components, I find, that help to drive a successful retirement plan are the employees and their savings rates. I like to focus on the employees and provide small actions that can lead to big results over time through impactful education that meets them where they are in life.  

Finally, I am a big believer in being able to measure success, looking at participation rates, savings rates, and investment performance is important, but I also like to consider income replacement ratios and employee channel engagement rates. As the advisor on a plan, it is vital to show the progress that is being made through meaningful metrics. 

What is a challenge you often face when it comes to supporting HR consultants and organizations? You mentioned that one of the biggest challenges is the ability to go “wide” on benefits, culture, recruiting and more. Can you talk more about this?   

The makeup of HR teams is a lot different than when I started 25+ years ago. There are less hands to help and there’s more risk to consider. HR teams are being tasked with making decisions around many kinds of benefits, recruiting, culture, compliance, etc. Within each one of those benefits, the providers and carriers have gotten more complex and new products are getting rolled out every year. 

To understand all the nuances, you must spend a lot of time. I would guess there is a parallel line between the use of advisors and the added complexity of benefits rising since 2000. There are only so many hours in a day so to continue to move the organization forward a lot of HR professionals must gain a high level of understanding across all the benefits, (wide), but not go too deep in the nuances of each offering. This has made the role of the advisor more critical in supporting these decision-makers, through trust. 

Can you tell us a bit about your career journey to this point? 

I started in financial services in 1998 at a call center. Over the years I have travelled all over the Midwest, living in Chicago and Cincinnati, and covering Michigan. I have probably tried everything from personal planning, tax-exempt institutional support, retention, direct sales, and wholesaling. The one consistent thread through all of this has been working with qualified plans and participants. I discovered my passion is helping to boil down complex financial concepts to understandable and actionable first steps for employees to walk and then run towards financial fitness. 

What’s a great piece of professional or leadership advice you’ve received in your career?  

When I was first emerging into a consulting role, my mentor made sure I understood (paraphrasing), ”We may build the best widget ever, but don’t forget that our competitors will build a better widget in the future, what really matters is that helping employers help their employees is a people-based business. PEOPLE MATTER MOST!”  

So I always think about the “PMM” and put my clients at the center of all my decisions. I have found when you do that, even if something goes bump in the night, you will always be centered on what to focus on.  

What is your vision for this company (or the industry) in the next few years? How do you see it evolving?  

The industry will be different. There is already a long-term shift away from advisors that are “generalists” in the qualified plan space. In the future, we will see more and more employers looking for a specialist that just focuses on the unique aspects of running a retirement plan.  Employers will be looking for high-performing platforms that provide de-risking across both operations and investments, custom portfolio management, reduced manual processes, and yes, AI will start to show up more and more.  

It feels like we are moving towards a pension model in the future that doesn’t come with the heavy burden of cost and administration the traditional pensions have today.  

Based on my experience, I feel that most people aren’t comfortable with making financial decisions, they want to know that when they are ready to retire the monthly checks will continue to come in at a level that can maintain their standard of living. The challenge as advisors is finding a system that can provide for that need.

What emerging trends do you think employers should be paying attention to right now when it comes to retirement benefits?  

I think employers should watch the record-keeper and administration marketplace. I think we will continue to see major consolidation for the next few years and that could impact any employer without them knowing it. Currently, the hot topics in the industry vary, depending on the size of a plan but notably are in-plan retirement income solutions, the growth of using CITs, (Collective Investment Trusts) within a plan, asset managers seeking alternative investment sleeves within funds, and the rise of the pooled employer plans to avoid audit costs.   

Do you have a specific product or service you’ve found to be successful for clients?  

That is the trick with this business. Just when I think I got it figured out I run into a scenario I never considered. So, I would say the service that is most successful is to go into each client with an open mind and not a solution, because I have found every client is different and has unique opportunities to drive success.     

What do you like to do in your downtime? 

When I have free time, I like to spend time with my family, travel, hiking, mountain biking, a little golf, but mostly I enjoy playing the guitar with some local acts.   

When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up? 

I loved the idea of being a jet fighter pilot. My dad was in the Air Force, and I would go to all the air shows on base, and when the Thunderbirds took to the sky, I always thought someday I will do that crazy flying, and when Top Gun came out – forget about it! 

What’s a fun fact about you that not many people know?  

My first language was Mandarin.

Let Brook Help You Discover the Sweet Side of Retirement Planning

We understand that HR consultants and employers face multiple challenges when it comes to retirement planning – but if you talk to the right person, you might just find some innovative solutions just around the corner.

So if you’re looking for a deeper understanding of how you are managing your retirement plan, and learn more about retirement planning options that work for your organization’s needs, OneDigital has some amazing resources – and we’ll start by introducing you to Brook.  

For more information, connect with Brook on LinkedIn or email Colleen. 

Our HR consultants are here to help you with recruiting and more – check out our services here, or contact us to get started!

Want HR tips delivered to your inbox every month? Sign up for the Slice Scoop!

OneDigital® is a registered trademark of Digital Insurance LLC ("OneDigital") and is the marketing name used by Digital Insurance LLC and its affiliates to market their products and services. Each company has financial responsibility for only its own products and services. Investment advisory services offered exclusively through OneDigital Investment Advisors LLC in the United States.