Agency Growth Insights from 2024

Well, 2024 is in the rearview mirror and 2025 is here. On today's Agent Leader podcast, I have a fantastic roundtable year end conversation with Roger Sitkins, founder and CEO of the Sitkins Group. Carrie Glennon, our senior consultant, and we talk about our three biggest takeaways before we get into next year, or if you're already into next year, in 2025, it's important to diagnose and what we learn and what it means for you and your agency. So enjoy this roundtable discussion with the Sitkins coaches. Welcome to the Agent Leader podcast. This is the podcast for insurance agency leaders to learn, to grow, to develop, to become best version possible agency leaders who lead best version possible insurance agencies. My name is Brent Kelly. I'm your host and it's my pleasure to be with you today. And today is a very, very special episode. If you've got video and you're watching on one of our video channels, you can see that I have a couple great guests with me. I have some of my colleagues on the Sitkins team. I have Roger Sitkins, the founder and CEO of the Sitkins Group. Roger, say hello.

Hello, everybody. And let's make this the best year ever coming into 2025.

And I have Carrie Glennon, our senior consultant. Kerry, say hello.

Hi, everybody. Thanks for tuning in today.

So why this is a special episode is not only because I have some amazing minds with me today, discuss some really important topics, but as coaches, we've talked about what have been our biggest takeaways from 2024. 2024. Now, depending on when you're listening to this, as this podcast comes out, it might be the end of 24, maybe it's the beginning of 25, or whenever you're listening to this, there's going to be some great takeaways. So, by the way, whether you're cozying up to the fireplace with your eggnog or maybe you're on a long road trip on the holiday season, find a way to either pull over if you're driving to take some notes, or certainly if you're cozied up, have your notebook ready to go. We're going to share some really important observations. And the coaches don't even even know some of this, but I was taking notes of some of the overall sessions and programs that we've run in 2024. And the reason why I share this is that we have a super opportunity as coaches to have multiple conversations with multiple agencies across this country. In fact, we now have agencies that are not in this country and to learn from agencies of what's working, what's not working. You know, oftentimes, I know Kerry and Roger will probably nod when I say this, will be speaking to an agency leader, and they'll say something like, I know I'm probably the only one dealing with this, or I know this might be a stupid question. And the reality of it is that we see these trends throughout. So we're going to highlight three key trends and to give some. Some. Some numbers to our learning. This year, we've run 118 sessions. As an organization, that's a lot of sessions and learning lots of things. In different programs, we've had over 1000 participants. Hard to give an exact number because you've done some things off site and on site and virtual. And then we've got, of course, multiple coaching calls with our Sipkins network members. So we're going to take all this knowledge and information and we're going to package it into three of the biggest takeaways. I would like to say, Roger and Carrie, these are the only takeaways. That's not true. There are a lot of takeaways. But looking at what really jumped out, these three became the top of our list. So we're going to share those and go through those. So, Roger Carey, are you ready to dive into this and have a great conversation? All right, let's go. So number one, are you ready? Number one biggest takeaway from 2024 is the myth of internal communication. The myth of internal communication. Now, why do I say the myth of internal. Well, we talk about this in the program. The greatest myth of communication is that it actually occurred. So I want you to think for a minute. As an agency leader, have you ever thought you said something? You. You really thought you said something. And maybe you did say something. You only said it once, but you realized that no one was listening or no one ever executed on the thing that you talked about. That's one thing that we see time and time again with agencies is there's this myth of internal communication. And my belief, and certainly I want to go deeper here with Roger and Carrie is that to have great external communication, right? Most agencies come to us and go, hey, we want to make more sales. We want to grow revenue. We want to increase profit. Amen. Amen. Amen. Those are all parts of external communication, but sometimes they overlook the impact, the importance, and the intentionality of great internal communication. So I want to highlight three areas, and we'll open this up for conversation that I see. And there's More than this, coaches, let me know. But one of the things that we see in internal communication is communication between leaders or leadership team, leadership teams and their entire team. We see issues in sales leaders and managers and their producers, and we'll see issues between sales teams and service teams. So I'm going to highlight three areas there and open this up. And we'll just start with leadership and teams. And Carrie, I want to go to you first. Do you think about the myth of communication in terms of leaders communicating well and clearly with their overall teams? What are some observations you've had in the past year? And you can go further in your past if needed, but what jumps out of here?

You know, one. One thing I hear often when we're going through assessments with, with future members is the leadership team feels they're very aligned. But when I ask this question and you really, you really peel back some layers. So I will ask a team, if I ask each of you to go in a separate room and write down on a piece of paper, here's where we are today, here's where we want to be in three years, and here is how we're going to get there. And then I asked you to all come back in the same room. Would you have written down the same thing on that piece of paper? How well aligned are you if you had to do that exercise? And that's when the conversation really opens up. Oh, I think we can all say where we are. I think high level. We know where we want to go. I don't think any of us have the same idea of how we're going to get there. And that's really very eye opening because it's a, it's a little bit of a myth. Oh, yeah, we're. We're really aligned, but you're really not if you can't. And I'm not saying it has to be exact, but are you even, are you even in the same ballpark when you write that, do that lesson or write that down? So I think that there's a lot of work to be done on leadership team communication and making sure that you could do an exercise and even get close to one another when you're.

When you're.

Not in the same room?

Yeah, I want to get Roger's perspective on this, but I just have to chuckle because I know, Carrie, you've had some of these and I've done these. And, you know, one of our first steps in identifying. Right. A potential member of the Sitkins network and working with them is having some discovery calls. And conversations and we do an assessment. And I can distinctly remember one of the calls where the CFO said, yeah, we're like a two in this area. And someone else is like, oh, I'm glad you went first because I was going to give us a seven or eight, you know, like total different. And obviously think about that. What is the message depending on who and how we're communicating to the team. And you know my joke on this and you've heard me say this before, but you know, in my family, if mom and dad are on totally different pages, the kids know and they will go to the point of least resistance. And oftentimes you see that in agencies as well. So Roger, what are your thoughts in this particular area?

Well, it's so crucial to get everybody communicating. What a surprise. And get everybody on the same page. We're running the same plays, however you want to say it. And I remember one of our best agencies, a long term private client, when we started talking more and more about mission statement, vision statement, critical success factors, et cetera, you know, the few basic things we do exceedingly well all the time. He committed as well as anybody to having a monthly state of the agency meeting. Now that's a lot monthly and some people would prefer to do it every 90 days like you know, the SC Security Exchange Commission. But he committed to doing it and I'll never forget him saying to me, and we gave him of course a suggested agenda for it. He kept fine tuning it and one day on a coaching call, he said, man, those state agency meetings are really working because I'm repeating the message again and again and they know I'm serious. And I said, well, how much prep do you do? He said, I spend three hours getting ready for a one hour meeting. He said, it's the most important meeting I have every month now and we are on the same page. So it's really exciting when it happens. But Kerry's example, you know, that everybody's different. We used to do one. We should probably start this again, coaches. But we would, it's very similar to Carrie's would say draw a picture of your agency if it were an airplane, okay. And some people would. And then I'd say, by the way, where are you in the plane? But just the planes itself. We get, you know, the hard driving agency leader, it'd be a private jet and somebody else would be like a cargo plane. It was unbelievable the difference. But just that whole, the vision of everybody being on the same page and then getting to the point of what are the few basic things we have to do exceedingly well, critical success factors. And when you build that into it now, it's, you know, one of my favorite topics certainly is it comes down to what's your business model. And, and if anybody's listened to the podcast at all, they've heard us talk about this, that your current business model is perfectly designed for you to achieve your current results. Duh. Well, then let's get a new business model. So back to you, Brett.

Yeah, and just a few of the thoughts on this, because it's so important, you know, I think about this, and we talk about this as coaches, that how many insurance agency leaders started off selling insurance and now they're running an agency? And that's very typical, right, because they were successful and stuff. But it's interesting, your, your client doesn't mean that, you know, some of these leaders don't have books of business. We know they do. We have a lot of player coaches. But oftentimes, they often forget their most important client are those people that are on their team. And it becomes the last thing that they often think about and do versus the first thing. And, you know, for an agency to really grow and multiply, you've got to develop people and you have to develop leaders. And to do that, you have to be intentional. And so this idea, and again, the myth of communication that, well, if I'm just around, if I do certain things, it'll just magically happen. It doesn't. And I can tell you, and we all know this, case in point, our highest growing organizations and members that we have the pleasure of working with, and many of them you've heard on this podcast during interviews. If you listen to their interviews closely, they're very intentional in how they communicate with their team. They're very deliberate. So don't overlook that. Agency leaders just start to think about, you know, your new year in 2025. What's my cadence? What is my internal relationship calendar look like with my team members? How often am I clear with my message, or am I just hoping that all the stuff in my head is going to just magically appear to everyone on my team? So it's a super, super important discussion. All right, let's talk about internal communication in terms of sales leaders with producers. Another big issue that we see, certainly internal communication. Carrie, you spent just a few years as a sales leader. You had just a few producers. Is it safe to say that communication and intentional communication with your production team is very important? And what lessons have you learned in this area?

Yeah, so important. Something that I've learned that's very important when it comes to a sales leader communicating with their production team is, I think you use the word very well, Brent, is intentionality. There has to be a very intentional cadence of communication that producers can rely on. I've heard in 2024, I actually heard from more than one agency. They use the term. Well, we have an open door policy. I'm always available to producers. They can come to me anytime. That's not a communication plan. Just because somebody feels that they are available doesn't mean that you are or that they are really coaching their team. It doesn't mean that they're setting the example of intentional communication. It's great to have an open door policy. It's great for your producers to know that you're available. But, but without an intentional plan, an agenda, topics that you know and, and they know they need to discuss things that they need to be held accountable to. And again, accountability isn't, I say this often. Accountability isn't a dirty word. Your best performers want to be held accountable. They know they, they, they perform better in an environment where they're having these conversations where they're, where they're thinking about, okay, where am I percent to goal? What am I doing in regards to pipeline? And most importantly, as a sales leader, when you are communicating on a regular basis, you're very intentional and you have agendas. When you meet with your team, offering to your team, what do you need from me? And leave that very open. Every person needs something different because they're at a different point in their career. They're handling different types of things in their day to day or their week to week. So making sure that you have an intentional cadence of meetings with your producers so that they are getting coaching from, from you, the leader, as well as, as well as making sure that you're there to support them and asking them, what, what is it you need from me? You'll learn some very interesting things. You'll get, you'll, you'll get all different kinds of answers. What do you need from me? I mean, I've jokingly had people say, well, can you put a couch in your office? Because I feel like this is a psychological session, right? This is a therapy session with you. But hey, sometimes people need that. We know that there are highs and lows when you're in sales. You have, you have peaks and valleys and sometimes people just need that ear. And that's okay for you to be that person sometimes. But if you're not really Specifically reaching out or scheduling time that people can count on you, you're missing the boat. And the communication plan just isn't happening. It's not in place. If you just think I'm here, they can reach me whenever. So that's a big lesson learned. And I still see it happening. Brett.

Yeah, and I think one comment on that, Carrie, is, and I don't know if you use this word, but like, part of this, in that communication shows that you care. You know, just think about this idea again, if you come from the production background of, hey, if you need anything, call me or email me to your clients, like, I guess it's better than not responding. But that's kind of what you're saying. Again, it's the intent's okay, but what does it really communicate? And the fact that what do you need from me shows that you care. Like, I care about you. I care about your success. I care about helping you where I can best help you. And to do that, I'm going to be intentional in how I communicate with you. So I think, Carrie, you sum that up really, really well. Because I think know sometimes as leaders, it's, oh, carrying such a touchy feely word, guess what good we live. We're emotional human beings. And I don't know about you, but I respect people that care about me.

I do.

So really important that you touched on that, Carrie. Roger, what's your feedback from this topic?

Well, amen on what Carrie just said, first of all.

Yeah.

And one of the things that Carrie has brought to the team and brought to our, our members, our clients, this whole concept of cohort management. And you alluded to it a little bit, but it's basically, you have to figure out that you've got to treat them differently. I think all too often it's one size fits all. So you've got a producer that's doing 2, 3, 4, $500,000 a year, million dollars a year, new commission income, and another one that's struggling to even meet their goals. And they try to treat them the same and they're not the same. And they don't all, quite frankly, deserve as much time from you. And one of the biggest issues we see is that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. The person that's really struggling, that's not doing what they're not doing, their part of it, and then they suck up the energy from sales leadership. And studies have proven forever that you go to your best producer, the one that you think you need, they can just leave them alone and Put some time in with them, they'll do an extra hundred or two hundred thousand of commission income just because you stroked them. And I remember this long time ago in some leadership training, a psychologist said that people will always protect their stroke source who's ever stroke them. They're going to protect them and they're going to keep their promises. And that's one of the big things that happened this year. And it's not 100%, it's never 100%. But the vast majority of our members from a sales leadership perspective have moved towards the concept of a promise based culture. And it's a two way promise. And the fact that it's not a legal contract, it's a memo of understanding, it's a letter between you and me documenting what we talked about. Because we all know if it wasn't put in writing, if it wasn't documented, it never happened. But to have a discussion whereby we say, hey, it's a two way street here as an agency. Here are the promises we're going to make to you, here are the things we'll do to support you so you can be successful. Conversely, we want you as a producer to, to report back to us, what will you do? And the big thing here is when they get it in writing. Sales and leadership, truly leadership and getting better results is easier as we know, because the leader can say to the producer, well, you know, you're really struggling. You haven't been getting referrals, have you been asking what's been going on? And the producer says no. And then the classic line that people seem to fall in love with, please help me understand why you're not doing what you said you were going to do. And the people that are following that, first of all, it's a great coaching rather than going, you know, work on your numbers. And we all know they have to work on the behaviors. So that to me has been so crucial in it, I think another big thing from a pure leadership perspective. I'm always shocked at the low amount of practice that happens. If you golf, you spend time practicing, you play any sport you practice, if you're playing music, you practice, you practice, practice, practice. And then when we, we ask agencies what percent of your A and B presentations to future ideal clients are rehearsed? Hardly any of them. What sort of low risk practices do you on soft skills during your sales meetings? Hardly any of them. And then we wonder why people are not truly improving their results because they don't have the skill set to do a great job presenting to Do a great job asking.

Just a few seconds.

To remind but not surprisingly successful. The ones that are doing it getting phenomenal results because they're practicing.

You go to sitkins.com bookacallsitkins.com.

Hearing you say that reminds me you've heard me say this in sessions there's provide your there was a customized famous to help you baseball player Lou Brock.

Frustrations challenges his quote.

I love his and I'm going to say state it here. Show me a guy who's afraid to look bad and I'll show you a guy I can beat every time. And, and it, it's amazing to me because we talk in sessions about would you go to a, a concert where the musicians didn't practice? Do baseball teams make it to the World Series by not practicing? If anybody played an instrument, played a sport, they were in a, a dance group or in a. In some so onstage production. Practice, practice, practice. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. This is what we do to get better. To, to be at the top of our game. I don't understand why in business people think that practice is something you don't have to do. And that, that quote to me is it.

It.

It's just it. It epitomizes what and I, you just want to shake people and say it's okay to, to practice because in the within the four walls of your business, this is the safe place to do it. That's why it's called low risk practice because you're doing it in front of people who want to help you get better. That feedback is a gift. So if we're not creating the time to do it, guess what? There's somebody out there and they're going to beat you every time because they're better. Like Lou Brock said.

Absolutely. And I, you know the whole thing about are you practicing enough? Come on. It just, it's crazy. We've talked about this in the podcast before, but it's worth restating here pre Covid in one of our in person events, I think it was the third session and we said the producer. So you know, what did you, what did you get out of here? What was your feed? Because we always want to hear that feedback and we want to know what's working and not working. And the young producer said, well the number one thing I learned, coach, is I will no longer practice my presentations during the actual presentation. Okay. By the way, let me ask the two of you, Brett, all those events we had this year, did we practice?

100. Yeah.

100 and what did we do afterwards?

We debrief every event.

Absolutely. And I'm not bragging.

Yeah.

I'm just saying we do it because we will outwork everybody else as coaches, you know.

Yeah. I just didn't mean to cut you as you said that it did highlight because, I mean, it's interesting because I was going to talk about is just understanding the culture of your agency. And we know that our. Our highest agencies, the culture is. Yeah, we're a culture that practices. We're a culture that is about. Right. It's just. That's just. It isn't like whether we do it. It's who we are now. There's different levels of, you know, we practice this or that or whatever. But it hit me as you said that, like, I don't think anything. And this isn't about us, but it's understanding the concept that pre brief and debrief is just part of what we do. But what's interesting is that as much as we do it and we repeat a lot of sessions, I still learn something like, oh, I missed that. I could have done that better.

I improve.

And you look back and you go, gosh, there are some major improvements that we had this year. But that doesn't happen if you're not consistent.

I have to jump on that one. Okay. Because the reality is, and this is a lesson that I hope people are learning. Why should you practice? Because you owe it to who? Well, you owe it to your own family so you can get. Because you're going to get better. You owe it to your team so the team gets better results. You owe it to your community and your church because now you can help them more. Again, you owe everybody in your team on the service side, they can't make more money if the agency doesn't make more money. And so to me, it's a personal responsibility that I'm going to be at my best version possible when I do this event. And it's the mindset of the great ones. Here's the other problem we all know is you don't have to do any of this, and you'll do okay by most standards, but okay is no longer good enough. So back to you, Brian.

And I'm one of those weird individuals. I know I'm not the only one on this call in particular, but in fact, we know what the best agencies like. We believe that, like, growth is inherent. If you don't grow, you just feel miserable outside of the results. You know, the results are one thing, but just the fact of am I a better version of myself today than I was yesterday. And if you could just be stagnant for years and be okay with that, like there's a problem. Right? There's a problem there. So I think. Let me summarize the internal communication part of this, because we went a lot of directions, which, by the way, is great. But it's just. It's just the idea that, you know, Carrie used the word intentional. Intentional communication. Intentional how we do things intentional about our performance. And one thing that we learned this year and we started in 2024, and we're going to go much deeper in 2025, is to have a true leadership program discussing these very topics. Right. The first thing that our members do before some other things in some of the core programs and we talk about that is understanding leadership, clarity, leadership, communication. Because if the leaders back to carry what you said earlier, if our leaders aren't aligned and communicated in the same way, we have. We have a disjointed agency, and we'll never be our best version possible if we're disjointed. So it's super, super important and a super, super important part of the conversation. All right, I'm going to tie the last part of internal communication coaches, if that's okay, into point number two, because correlate it. All right. One of the key parts of internal communication is sales versus search or sales and service. In fact, it shouldn't be sales versus service, but in too many agencies, it is. And agencies will smile and almost kind of look away when I say not only are sales and service not performing well together, but is there resentment? Yeah, sometimes there's resentment. So this blends in with leadership and intentional communication into topic number two.

Which is.

Which is the power of the zones. The zones for any athlete out there. And this could be a music, too. It could be anything. Like when. When you're in the zone.