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Thank you for attending the 2007 Assurex Global commercial Lines Meeting in Houston last month. Your presentation on Best Practices was very informative for our attendees...
by Meg Allwein - Vice President, Partner Services, Assurex Global
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Thomas Nelson Book Review Bloggers
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Pat Alexander, CIC
consultant - coach - mentor
Pat enables insurance agents and brokers to grow and meet their goals. Pat provides information and experience to help turn threatening or unfamiliar situations into opportunities to enhance the client experience leading to better client retention and referrals.
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Reflecting on User Group Meetings
March 9th, 2010
I am on my way to a user group meeting. I have been to many of these over the years. User groups vary in size and the structure of their meetings. Generally they are structured on the premise of providing information and training to their user base. Some user groups do a better job at this than other do. Does this picture look familiar.? Have you ever felt like this during a session or several sessions?
While traveling I got to thinking about what I see and experience at the various user group meetings that I attend. I frequently see agencies send staff that are not well prepared for the meeting. Sometimes an agency owner sends someone just to have a representative attend and be seen. Very often I find people that attend a lot of sessions but never share with anyone else in the agency what they have learned.
So what is your pan for attending the next user group meeting for one of your agency’s products?
- Who will attend?
- What sessions will each person be attending?
- How will information learned at the meeting be shared with the rest of the agency?
I would like your feed back on how your agency would answer these questions. I would also like to hear what you and your agency expect your user group to do for you.
Technorati Tags:
Insurance Agency management system, technology, technology user group meetings.
Should There Be Creativity In An Insurance Agency?
March 2nd, 2010
This article was created after reading “Driven by Distraction – How Twitter and Facebook Make Us More Productive Workers” from the March 2010 WIRED Magazine. I would encourage you to read the entire article.
My prospects and clients often tell me that they want everyone in their agency to do things the same way. That is what they expect me to accomplish when they engage my services. Well, what exactly does that mean? Do they want a bunch of robots that can’t think for themselves? It is very important that an insurance agency has standards, procedures and workflows and that everyone follow them. But these defined standards, procedures and workflows address processes. What about thinking, negotiating, customer service, marketing and a host of other situations that arise everyday?
Continue reading "Should There Be Creativity In An Insurance Agency?" »
Best Practices Documentation
January 25th, 2010
I write a lot about how to define, train, implement and monitor best practices. In talking with agencies that I have worked with I find that one of their biggest challenges is determining the best way to publish their documentation and another is how to keep the information current. This article will discuss the following three topics which I believe address these issues:
1. What is the best way to publish our best practices?
2. How and when do we review and update our best practices?
3. Who edits our best practices?
Continue reading "Best Practices Documentation" »
Insurance Ecosystem Blog Launch
January 11th, 2010
I am pleased to announce the launch today of a new blog Insurance Ecosystem.Com. My vision for this blog is to provide you with communicators that don’t normally blog but have great views and information to share. Each of these individuals has been wooed to blog here because I think they have so much to contribute in their area of expertise. PatAlexander.Com will remain the home base for my voice. I will contribute to this site from time-to-time or enter into the conversation via comments on a particular post.
I am inviting you to sign up to subscription to this new blog. Currently I plan to have new posts for you on Monday, Wednesday and Friday of each week. I have several committed communicators and some thinking about it. If you know of someone that does not regularly blog that you would like to hear, let me know and I will see if I can entice them to join us. If you are a regular blogger, but would like to join in the conversation here with guest posts, let me know.
I believe that the more we have involved in the conversation the better.
Technorati Tags:
Insurance Ecosystem, insurance technology, twitter, blogging, wordpress, intensedebate, insurance technology
My Most Important Noticer & Mentor
December 29th, 2009
I have been reading The Noticer and it has caused me to think a lot about mentoring. By the time I was 21 years old I had been in the insurance business 3 years, but I had no idea where I was going or what a career was. I was so very fortunate while looking for a new job to find Mr. Russell Grace, owner of Russell Grace Insurance.
Continue reading "My Most Important Noticer & Mentor" »
My Love Affair with New York City
December 23rd, 2009
I first visited Manhattan in 1994. A little late to the party I know, but it was my first chance to get there. I was in love the moment we turned onto 5th Avenue. I am always ready to plan a trip to New York. By the time the plane is over Philadelphia, I am patting my foot impatiently on the floor wanting to know how soon we will be landing. Flying over the city and seeing the skyline from LaGuardia just makes me smile. So how do I feed my need when I am not there?
Continue reading "My Love Affair with New York City" »
Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t – by Jim Collins – Book Review
November 25th, 2009
Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t
I first read Good to Great several years ago. When I was an employee of IBTX Risk Services the entire staff was required to read the book. The agency’s culture was based on many of the principles of this book. I return to this book as reference material often.
The portions of the book that I continue to use with my clients are:
1. Good is the enemy of great.
2. Have the right people in the right seat on the bus.
3. Disciplined People, Disciplined Thought & Disciplined Action create “A Culture of Discipline.”
This is another book that I often request that the management of an agency read when they are my client. It contains many valuable lessons. If you have read Good to Great would you please share what you believe are the top lessons of this book. I am always looking for other’s points-of-view.
Technorati Tags:
Good to Great, Jim Collins, insurance agency culture, book review, insurance agency values
Providence in Nashville
November 23rd, 2009
Last week Gene, Jessica(our granddaughter) and I went to Nashville. Jessica and I were attending the Lifework 2.0 Seminar on Thursday. Gene was able to find an old high school friend that everyone said they couldn’t find in Franklin. Thursday night we went to downtown Nashville for dinner and a little karaoke. Now we didn’t know anything about any of the bars in downtown. Jessica got on her iphone and read the reviews and chose Lonnie’s Western Room.
