Attendees are given an opportunity to ask the advisors specific questions during and at the end of the presentation. In addition, each attendee is offered a one-on-one private meeting to cover more personal issues, or Wedel's team will work with the employee's current advisor to make sure the employee's financial concerns are addressed.

"We are only there to provide education," he says. In addition, Wedel acknowledges that in many instances he may be providing his competition with new clients, because no one is advised to go to Four Seasons. All services at the EAP workshops are provided free of charge to employees.

"Employers are looking for a competitive advantage to keep good employees," Hobart explains, "and a useful EAP program is one way of doing that."

Wedel says, "The majority of my new business today comes from the introductions given by existing clients. However, over the past 28 years, the introductions to hundreds of business owners, top management, HR directors and employees through the EAP have been significant. The cumulative results of those relationships have had an important impact on my practice."
Gary Schaeffer, a semiretired former senior executive with Guarantee Electrical in St. Louis, is one of those clients Four Seasons gained from an EAP session. Schaeffer signed up for a lunch seminar on finances sponsored by H&H at his company in the early 1990s.

"I had an advisor then, but I was not happy with the firm. [Wedel was still doing the seminars himself at that time.] "I was impressed by the breadth of knowledge Steve had," Schaeffer says.

Schaeffer ended up going to Four Seasons for a review of his finances and has had the firm handle his investments since then. He says he "rode out the recession" without too much damage. "The real estate portion of my investments is coming back and I am now working with Steve on other retirement planning," he says.

Clayton Corporation is one of the St. Louis-area firms that hired H&H for EAP services, including financial planning. Lynn Green, the company's human resources manager, says she would advise other companies to provide similar services. For the "Financial Boot Camp" session, eight employees out of 130 attended. The second session on "Reinventing Retirement" drew 25 and the firm is now getting ready to organize a third session on estate planning.

"We were impressed," Green says. "Our average employee is 47 years old, and the feedback we got is that they appreciated the financial program. We want to do what we can to show we care about our employees."

Green says she engaged a financial planner for herself after hearing the presentations. "The firms that care about their employees are the ones that are going to provide EAP services," Wedel says.

"Employers who use an EAP see their employees as assets to be kept, versus commodities to be consumed, and they have a strong paternalistic attitude toward them," says Hobart.