Beyond Check-the-Box: Fiduciary Governance You Can Defend
A structured, defensible process your team can trust, built to support employers and the advisors who guide them.
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The Fiduciary Governance Conversation Is Changing
Recent litigation has put employer governance practices under a brighter spotlight. Check-the-box fiduciary compliance is no longer enough. Today’s standards demand clear documentation, stronger oversight, and defensible decisions.
For Employers:
- Rising scrutiny around fiduciary responsibilities
- Growing expectations for vendor oversight
- Documentation gaps that increase risk
For Brokers:
- Renewal conversations need clearer, defensible rationale
- Clients expect advisors to help them “prove the process”
- Regulatory blind spots can reflect poorly on the advisor relationship
- Governance gaps often surface during broker-led reviews
Every Governance Journey Looks Different
Some teams need structure—clear templates, a steady cadence and a place to centralize documentation. Others need a partner to guide the process, document discussions, and build a defensible decision trail.
Two Ways to Move Beyond Check-the-Box Governance:
Give Your Team the Structure to do Governance Right
Lumelight Fiduciary Essential is a self-directed, technology-enabled framework that gives you tools to organize governance. It replaces scattered documents and inconsistent practices with a clear, repeatable process.
What employers experience:
- Comprehensive fiduciary toolkit
- On-demand fiduciary training series
- Annual compliance calendar
- Cloud-based document repository
Why brokers love it:
A scalable option that helps clients stay organized, without requiring brokers to do the administrative heavy lifting.
Full-Service Governance for Employers Who Need Expert Support
Our premier Lumelight One Fiduciary Solution adds hands-on facilitation and consultant-led guidance for employers. Our consultants will help employers build a more defensible fiduciary process.
Lumelight One includes everything in Essential, plus:
- Dedicated compliance consultant
- Custom fiduciary committee charter development
- Facilitated fiduciary committee meetings
- Ongoing advisory access
- Executive summaries and audit documentation
Choosing the Right Level of Governance Support
Whether your organization needs structure or hands-on guidance, both Lumelight offerings help you build a governance process that’s organized, consistent and defensible—and built to grow with you. The difference comes down to how much support your team needs along the way.
| Feature / Support | Lumelight Fiduciary Essential | Lumelight One Fiduciary |
|---|---|---|
|
Training |
Nine on-demand fiduciary courses your team completes at its own pace |
Nine on-demand fiduciary courses your team completes at its own pace, with optional consultant Q&A |
|
Governance Documents |
Employer creates charter, policy statement, agendas, and minutes using provided templates |
Consultant drafts, customizes, and finalizes all governance documents |
|
Meeting Support |
Employer prepares agendas and facilitates all committee meetings |
Consultant prepares agendas, attends meetings, and delivers completed minutes |
|
Vendor Oversight Tools |
Templates to evaluate vendors and document rationale |
Templates to evaluate vendors and document rationale |
|
Documentation Storage |
Centralized governance repository for all materials |
Same repository, plus consultant organizes and uploads key documents throughout the year |
|
Ad-Hoc Guidance |
Not included |
Year-round access to a dedicated fiduciary consultant |
|
Best Fit For |
Teams who want structure, consistency, and a self-directed approach |
Employers navigating complexity, scrutiny, or limited internal bandwidth |
|
Broker Benefit |
Scalable structure that helps clients stay organized without increasing advisor workload |
Expert reinforcement that strengthens advisor recommendations in high-stakes scenarios |
Self-Assessment: Which Fiduciary Path Fits Your Organization?
Not every organization needs the same level of governance support. This article helps you determine whether a self-directed structure or full-service expert support is the right fit for your team.
The 2026 Compliance Calendar
Trusted by Employers Strengthening Governance Across Industries
Across industries and plan sizes, employers use Lumelight to bring structure, documentation and defensibility to their fiduciary process. Here are a few examples of what that looks like in practice.
Creating a Defensible Vendor Oversight Process
- Challenge: Vendor renewals lacked documented rationale, and leadership questioned fee structures and compensation transparency.
- How We Helped: Provided evaluation templates, fee documentation tools and a repeatable monitoring cadence through the Essential framework.
- Outcome: Clear, defensible oversight records and stronger decision-making confidence at renewal.
Rebuilding Four Years of Missing Governance Records
- Challenge: An employer discovered four years of incomplete or missing fiduciary documentation during a leadership review.
- How We Helped: Centralized all governance materials and rebuilt historical minutes using structured Lumelight templates.
- Outcome: A complete, defensible audit trail, and a governance process the team could maintain going forward.
Establishing a First-Ever Fiduciary Committee
- Challenge: A growing employer had no formal governance structure, limited documentation and increasing internal scrutiny.
- How We Helped: Provided on-demand training, templates for charters, roles, agendas, and minutes—plus a clear governance roadmap and workflows—to help the team formally establish its fiduciary committee.
- Outcome: A functional governance framework with documented decisions, clearer vendor oversight and stronger readiness for audits.
The Fiduciary Clarity Checklist
A practical checklist to help employers evaluate the strength of their current governance process—what’s in place, what’s missing, and where small improvements can make a big difference.
Co-branding available for advisors.
Build a Fiduciary Process You Can Trust—and Defend
Whether you’re looking for structure, expert support, or both, Lumelight helps teams strengthen governance, document decisions and stand up to scrutiny with confidence.
Explore More Lumelight Services
Strong governance works best alongside strong compliance. Lumelight acts as your full-service partner, supporting the interconnected requirements that shape your plan year.
