Fitness & Focus to Double Agency Revenue with Dick Gibbs

So how important is it that agency leaders model the right attitudes and behaviors that others on your team want to replicate? On today's Agent Leader Podcast, I interviewed Dick Gibbs, who's the CRO and Vice President of Sales for Hartwig Moss in Louisiana. This is an agency that's doubled their revenue in the past six years from just under 5 million to now over 10 million in revenue. And one of the things that I took away from this interview is that culture is contagious, and it starts from the top. Enjoy the show. Welcome to the Agent Leader Podcast. This is the podcast for independent insurance agency leaders to learn to grow, to develop, and ultimately become their best version possible. My name is Brent Kelly. I am your host. Excited to be with you on this podcast episode and absolutely excited to bring on a very special guest. I have Dick Gibbs, who, who is the VP of Sales and the Chief Revenue officer for Hartwood Moss in the great state of Louisiana. He's in New Orleans and so excited to have Dick on with us. He's going to share his experience, his role, some of the things the agency is doing. We've had a long relationship with the agency and always excited to hear some of the updates, the successes, the challenges. And we might just get into the fact that Dick likes to work out and he takes care of himself and it means a lot for the business. So we might get into that because selfishly, I want to know more about some of his tips of what he's doing on there. So first and foremost, Dick, welcome to the podcast.

Brent, appreciate it. Thank you so much for thinking of the agency, thinking of me to participate in this and I've heard some past podcasts and I'm honored. Thank you. Yeah.

Well, I'm glad, Glad to have you. And again, it's going to be a really fun discussion and I want to start off just so the audience knows more about you and of course, the agency. Right. Just give an overview of the agency, you roll within it, things you're proud of, of the agency. So give a. Give a scope so people know more about you and. And the agency.

Appreciate it. Yes. I've been in the industry for 30 plus years. Started on the company side, spent about 15 years with the Hanover, worked my way up to VP of Marketing for the Eastern region. Handled 26 states east of the Mississippi, and prior to this was the best job I've, I've ever had. Had a customer in New Orleans that was up in age and he was the managing general partner of his agency and asked me if I'd be interested in coming to the agency side and taking over his agency, which I've, I did and spent about 11 years with him and had a great run and we eventually sold to Bernard Brown and then I spent three years with Brown and Brown, which was, I'm going to be very, very kind. An education you couldn't put a price tag on. But one of the most demanding, most stressful positions I've ever had held with, with a, a business. And then Hartwig Moss came calling. They had a position for really operations. But I evolved into sales and always had a strong sales background and I drove the revenues and eventually became the chief revenue officer of, of Hartwig Moss. One quick story about Harwick Moss 153 year old agency, a staple of New Orleans, really a staple of the Gulf Coast. And we had one owner and he's very old. No, I'm kidding. It's the fifth generation. He's wearing our fifth generation of, of Hartwig Moss. So we're real proud of that.

Yeah, it's, it is a testament to, you know, the organization, obviously, you know, the family and things you're doing. But I mean, let's face it, every generation it gets a bit more challenging, right. To continue on that legacy. And again, you've got as much as family agency, different generations, different personalities. So I think it's a, it's a huge testament to your team and what you've accomplished there. So I appreciate the background. Dick and I, I mentioned right away at the beginning, you know, just more about you. And if you're not watching a video here, I know a lot of people listen to this podcast, which is great. But as I'm interviewing Dick, if you've got a video, Dick take care. Takes care of his body, his self, physically. We were talking before we started recording here about your daily regimen and I don't want to forget about what you said and not have the audience here because I think there's, there's some real power. Not that people do exactly what you do, I wouldn't say that. But what it means for you and as a leader and your mental and physical preparation. I'd like to hear about some of that. So Dick, go ahead and shock people. Probably like you shocked me of what your daily fitness routine looks like.

Well, let me first tell you how what brought me to that. I played college football. I was 5, 10, 235. I played linebacker. And once you get out of, out of college, you no longer need that weight. You either succumb to it and live that way or you pick up a hobby. And this was before Nike. This was before espn when I got out of college. So anyway, I. I started running. I ran a block, Liked it. Ran another block, liked it. Six months later, I was down to like 185. Just changed my diet a little bit. Back then, that was. That was not in vogue. Sure. It's just something I chose to do, but the last 21 years. And the reason it was 21 is because I missed a calendar date because a flight was delayed so long it went into the next day. So I'm 21 years into running 11 miles every morning and then following up with a. A CrossFit workout. But I do have to tell you, I'm not a huge vitamin taker. I don't do the proteins. I. I just. I burn whatever I eat, and I eat whatever I want. It's just. It's just something that I like to. To be able to do.

Oh, it's. I mean, it's.

I. I have to do the math.

I'll do it later. But I was thinking 21 years times 365 days. And, you know, and again, you know, Dick is located New Orleans. And we were talking about, again, prior to starting the recording about just hurricanes and all the things that go on. And Covid. And I'm thinking you went that many days in a row based on all the other stuff. We didn't get into personal sickness or any of that kind of stuff. So, like, what? I mean, let me ask you this. And this wasn't expected or anything, but it's just fascinating to me, how does that help you do your role as a CRO? Because we've talked to it before. It's a demanding, challenging, hard business. As fruitful as it is, it's challenging. So how does that. How does your personal routine, your fitness, all that goes into that help you in your role and the agency?

Well, before I leave every evening, I write five things down that I got accomplished the next day. As mundane as they might be, I just do it so I'll have a sense of accomplishment the minute I walk into the agency. But I. I handle the personal lines and the. And the commercial lines, account managers I run. I handle all the revenue that needs to be driven into the agency on top of the. Our sales force. And handling 13 sales guys, not meeting their numbers, not making their calls, becomes extremely stressful. Yeah, because you want to do it without being, you know, dictative. You just. I got a great relationship with. With the 60 employees we have, but I'm going to tell you when the day is over. Your stress level is so high, you got to find a way to, to be able to tamper it down. And I find a long run every morning preps you for the day and by 8:30 run comes around, you have zero problem sleeping. You get in bed, you go to sleep. And, and so my whole point is this business brings so much stress and every day, every single day, there's something different. You could have a series of claims of a, a hailstorm that just came out of nowhere. You could have a, an account that drops in your lap that's going to take three AMs and it's going to take two producers to handle, but you got to find the markets for it and there's no hesitation. You, they're looking at you for guidance, they're looking at you for results, and you got to provide it. And when I tell you being able to release all that stress through a long run every morning prepares you for the day to be able to handle it all. Yeah, that's, that's one of my biggest reasons for the being fit. It's not for a beach body. It's not for, I do like to intimidate the guys that date my daughter. Yeah, but, but it's for health vanity and it's certainly for work.

Yeah, well, you know, and again, part, everybody's got their own reasons for stuff, right. And obviously gravitated to running and fitness, which again, I told you before, like, I feel like I take care of myself pretty well and I feel like, oh my gosh, I got a long way to go right to where I need to be. But I will say this, you know, and I talk about this in the podcast and other episodes. You know, your role as a CRO or sales leader, I truly believe, if not is the most difficult role in most agencies.

Right.

You've got these producer demands and my joke is that, you know, leading producers is kind of like nailing jello to a tree. They squiggle a lot.

Right.

There's a lot of moving parts, you care about them, but there's challenges, there's problems, and I want you to do better and all that. And you've got to make sure you're producing right up the chain, so to speak, that you're delivering for the agency and you got all these clients around this. Right. There's just a lot of noise and what I wrote down, Dick, and I don't this is correct or not, but I believe this in leadership. Right. Your job all day is to pour into others, right? Like, I got to pour into you. I got to pour into you. I got to pour into you. And you want to do that. But here's what I can tell you. If you never pour into yourself, there's nothing there to pour, right? And so part of that I think about from a mental approach of what am I reading, who am I hanging out with, who, you know, what, my relationships. And then physically, like, it's really hard to pour into other people's cups when you're tired and you're stressed and all these things which are going to happen. So. So this is my take on this, Dick. You can correct me or challenge me or tell me what you think, but it's like to me, what I hear for you, that physical fitness part as a leader is first pouring into you. Not that you're thinking about that selfishly, but getting yourself to a higher state so that you can help others perform at higher stage. Is that fair?

Very, very fair. Very fair. The only, the only thing I can add to it really quickly is, is everybody that has an issue on that given day gets the same energy level as, as. As any of them. Some of them, it's so important that they get their client taken care of. And then my other, another producer needs. Needs a market right away. Everybody gets the same energy level. And that does. That definitely does take its toll toward the end of the day.

Yeah, yeah, that's great. Great point. Great point. All right, what I'm going to do. And again, this is a wide open conversation, but again, you guys have been in existence for a long time. Like I said, five generation. You mentioned 60 employees. I always like to talk about wins or successes first. Right. And there's. There's been a multitude right. At the agency. But when I think about, you know, where you're at, the question I have for you is what successes really jump out? Because I believe success leaves clues. Certainly, I'm sure it's left clues for you and your agency, but also for all the. The listeners of this podcast, you know, some clues that they might be able to pick up on. So if you would, Dick, share a success or two, what you learned from it, right. And how you capitalized on it.

Well, the generational expertise it was, was one of the. Is a. Is a big plus for the agency. When Robbie took over 20 years ago, 22 years ago, his father was still in business, but he brought in the most modern technology this agency could. Could appreciate at that time. And then we fast forward 20 more years and we Are we have the state of the art informational systems in this agency. We can go totally remote in a matter of minutes. And that, that is a huge success because there's no interruption in obviously writing new business. No interruption in customer service. And when I tell you the customer service experience is the top priority of the agency, having the technology to be able to provide it is second to none. So the generational experience from the fourth generation to the fifth generation has moved this agency so far ahead of where it was from technology to revenues. The revenues jumped tremendously over the last, I don't know, six years from literally roughly 5 million to over 10 million. And it's, and it has a lot to do with just how modern this agency has been brought Tom. We got tailored markets, niche markets. We're huge. We're known for auto dealerships. At one point we wrote just about every dealership, franchise dealership in the metro area, upwards of 40 to 50 auto dealerships. And we became an expert in it. The person that handles that niche literally has 50 years with this agency. Fifth and he's still employed and still doing it, which is a remarkable story. But on top of that, his father spent 48 years with the agency. Between the two of them they got 98 years. Right. That, that is amazing. So, so having tailored niche markets really allows us to get reoccurring revenues, expected revenues and our retention levels in that are just. Are off the chart. Yeah. And then the last one is High touch. High touch relationships has a lot to do with again the customer service experience and being way out in front of our, our accounts. One thing we pulled away from Sitkins was we don't renew accounts. What was the phrase?

Accounts we continue, relationships continue.

That's it. We did pull that away from you guys. In fact, two of our producers that were on participating in, in that six week or eight week event use that today. There's a big takeaway.

Well, huge successes there. I appreciate sharing. I mean obviously I'm making notes here and I mean from a revenue perspective to go from, you know, he said roughly 5 million over 10 million in that amount of time. Six years is pretty darn impressive. And it's interesting as I'm sitting there thinking about this because there are a lot of multi generational agencies, right? I mean at some point they may sell whatever in five generations. The thing that often happens, this is true whether it's a family agency or whatever is the word complacency. But there's this complacency often creeps in. Hey, we're we're good. It's very fascinating to me and impressive that throughout the generations, of course, certainly recently, that even though things were going well, we're always looking for that next level, whether it's technology, high tech, customer touch. Right. Things that you're talking about, being proactive in our relationships or education. Is that. Just curious, how is that fostered within the agency? I mean, is that, is that just part of the DNA and has been. Is it something you continually talk about and communicate? You know, I think there's always that balance of appreciating the past and the legacy because it needs to be appreciated, but not standing on that because we know there's bigger, better things to come and continue to innovate. So again, how is that fostered in the agency? I'm curious.

I'll put that solely on Robbie Moss, the, the President CEO. He's, he's 52 years old and a, A just a staple of the New Orleans metro area. He's involved in so many community activities. He brings work ethic that is. Is man. What is the word? You're. You're infected by it. So, so he's got the biggest book in the agency. He writes the. And he's very competitive. Yeah, so. So being competitive makes everybody else better because they want to compete. A sales guy that's not competitive probably doesn't belong here and, and probably is not going to be too successful. But back to my main point, it's, it's directed from Robbie, from his work ethic, from his drive, his energy level. And he's got a way of expecting things by showing huge appreciation even before you, you show the success of what he expected. So he's there. He's a mentor. He's. He's always available. So I put a lot of onus on him driving what our, our culture. Culture is.

Yeah, well, I think, and thanks so much for sharing that because I think, you know, one of the things, and I talk about this in the podcast, probably frequently actually, but one of my favorite phrases from John Maxwell, leadership expert, is that everything rises and falls on leadership. And you know, when I hear that like, well, that's, that's a lot. In fact, we talked about that in a recent leadership program, Dick, you attended with us. And everything rises and falls on leadership. And part of that is the modeling aspect. And even if it's different roles, I'm just sitting there thinking, boy, if I show up at Hartwood Moss and Robbie's out there modeling, you know, appreciation, hard work out there making things happen. Dick, you may not say this for yourself but I know that Dick's up at 3:30 running 11 miles and doing his thing and going to crossfit and head energy throughout. Like that's who we are. Y, like right. Like that's, that's, that's who we are as an agency and there becomes an expectation. So I think often times. Interesting. There's a lot of ways I believe that culture is built and I know culture is a buzzword but I think sometimes it's like we'll just talk about it, which is great. But let's live it first.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No question. The takeaway from Robbie's involvement and his hands on but not dictative way of running the agency is his contacts and the amount of business that comes in through his centers of influences that turn into referrals and those turn into referrals. He is able, he truly is able to feed our sales staff to where it can. That, that's a double edged sword because you can become complacent and lazy because you know it's coming in. Sure. But the, the business that he brings in comes with a huge expectation because they're related to his friendships, to, to his centers of influences. So we have to, we have got to be able to offer the results that are expected. So if they're complacent, they're not going to be able to do this whole point is they're not. When we get a referral from the top, it goes to a producer. It's going from soup to nuts. Comp managers involved, everybody meets the new client. So it's, you know, you pull a textbook out and try to find that chapter. It's probably not there. Yeah. But it's, it's all in, in the body language and the leadership. Yeah.

Hey there, agent leader Brent Kelly here want to take just a few seconds to remind you that now is the time to create your true best version possible agency. If you go to sitkins.com bookacallsitkins.com bookacall we'll get to know more about your agency, conduct an agency assessment and provide your agency with a customized plan to help you avoid some of the pitfalls, frustrations, challenges and roadblocks to get your agency to true ultimate freedom and become its best version possible. It all starts by going to sitkins.com bookacall. Love that for so many reasons. And again, every agency leader in your role is a bit different. But I, you know, we talk about whether it's a producer who's kind of on their way out right near the end of the career or could be an agency principal or whatever. And it's like, well, maybe they don't. Again, every situation is different. But, you know, maybe they don't want to do all the work for every account. But they often have so many key relationships. Like at a minimum, they're out there just making rain. I mean they're rainmakers and open up these opportunities and doors and build these relationships. And you take that and you replicate it and replicate it and replicate it. Pretty amazing things can happen. So that. That's fantastic. No doubt. Let me flip it a little bit here and talk about some of the challenges. Every agency's got challenges. I'm sure if I ask you to name the challenges, you can probably write down a list of for the agency. Right. Because that's just the way it goes in this business. But I like to hear that could just share, you know, maybe a top challenge or two or whatever it is that you're dealing with and either how you've faced it or how you're facing it today. What does that look like?

I've been asked this many times with the challenge is. And it's. It's balancing the growth. Growth and profitability. That balance is very difficult while managing the client expectation. So. So client retention versus new business acquisitions. We. We got maintaining the highest retention levels we can while bringing in a level of new business that. That the producers are challenged with every year as part of their. Their goals and objectives and balancing that and getting them to not just them but getting the agency profitable, getting the growth expectations at least nearly met. All factors into to me to. On my desk the biggest challenge because you got revenue size. We don't pay commissions on certain accounts. But these accounts are so important to the producer that we have to have a discussion about it. That's my biggest challenge.

Yeah.

The others subsets are the technology. We've got to stay above and ahead of everybody else with technology. Carry relationships that is like huge in. In New Orleans because many of the carriers are. Are either pulling back or. Or terminating contracts because of. Of reinsurance. Because the reinsurance are saying we're no longer doing business in Louisiana not because the agency's bad, but because of economics. So we've got to keep our relationships as solid as possible. And I'll tell you, Brent, how we do this. Robby and I sit on a lot of advisory boards for our areas. We get relationships built so strong that they ask us to sit on these. And when I tell you how far that goes when they're making decisions to pull back in different areas of. Of New Orleans, the state, the Gulf South.

Yeah.

Goes a long way. So while it doesn't generate any revenue, it generates future revenues because you're keeping the contracts.

Yes.

The carry relationships to me, other than the customer service experience are the two most important. If you don't have the customer, you can't eat. If you don't have the relationships with the companies, you can't write the business.

Yeah.

So. So I take that extremely serious and that is on my plate. That is a responsibility of mine. So we figure it out. The biggest challenge is making sure we keep those relationships strong and we have markets to. To be able to use.

Yeah. I want to go a little deeper in that because it is so crucial. Right. It's so important. And you know, even as we teach in our programs with producers, sales leaders, whatever, that there's, you know, five key relations.