Here’s a number everyone interested in retirement should know: 15 per cent.

That’s the amount of income financial experts agree everyone should be saving to ensure they stay on track to retire with dignity.

And it’s not just the experts. Most people know they ought to be saving for retirement, but few are saving enough. What’s behind that disconnect between what people say they want to do and what they actually end up doing?

The gap between plans and performance continues because hitting wellness goals is always hard work. And putting off the big step of saving for retirement isn’t the only area of wellness where Americans procrastinate.

You’ve probably seen the same principle at play when employees resolve to lose weight or stop smoking. Recent studies show that with both of those common goals, big gaps persist between resolution and results:

• The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index last year reported that although 55 per cent of respondents want to lose weight, only 27 per cent of those actually try.

• A 2015 study from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention revealed that although 69 per cent of adult cigarette smokers said they wanted to stop smoking, only 6 per cent of that group actually quit.

Those are big gaps, but there’s another even larger one that’s affecting company pension plans.

Although 93 per cent of Americans in 2014 told surveyors with Capital One ShareBuilder they want to save 10 per cent or more for retirement, only 20 per cent actually do. That’s a 73 per cent gap between the wish and the follow-through!

As is often the case with personal goals, taking better care of money requires employees to lay a solid foundation through basic behaviour change. It isn’t that they plan to fail, but that they fail to plan.

Just as most smokers know they ought to quit, most of your employees know the basic truth that they ought to do be saving more for retirement. But many of them lack the confidence they need to change the longstanding habits preventing them from starting.

The trouble isn’t just with debt, or just with a lack of savings — there’s a lack of big-picture understanding.

The basic failure to budget causes a desperate lifestyle for a lot of the people in your company. And the lack of budgeting knowhow is not limited to those with fewer dollars — it applies across the range of incomes, with top earners often struggling just as much to make ends meet.

A holistic financial wellness programme makes the idea of budgeting accessible to your team by meeting them right where they are, regardless of income or debt levels. No one wins without a written plan and specific goals for their money. You need a programme that is easy to follow, with fun and engaging content. It should guide them step by step along the way to financial wellness.

You can help your employees to have the funds to retire on time if you have such a plan. If it were easy, everybody would do it. It’s not easy, but it is doable.

Launched by Ramsey Solutions, FinancialWellness.com is committed to providing businesses with the information needed to provide a successful financial wellness programme and to change the way employees handle their money for a lifetime.

Dave Ramsey is America’s trusted voice on money and business, and CEO of Ramsey Solutions. He has authored seven bestselling books. The Dave Ramsey Show is heard by more than 11 million listeners each week on more than 550 radio stations and digital outlets. Follow Dave on Twitter at @DaveRamsey and on the web at daveramsey.com.