Standards Over Intentions: Discipline That Drives Predictable Growth

Foreign. To the Agent Leader podcast. This is the podcast for independent insurance agency leaders to think bigger, to challenge the status quo, and ultimately strive to become the best version possible. So excited to be with you on this episode. This will be me, myself and I talking about something that has been probably one of the most important conversations I've had, not only in our trainings that we do with our private client members, but in the coaching sessions, the one on one coaching sessions. And that is talking about standards. What is your agency standard or standards? Do you know them, do you own them, do you execute them? And are you accountable for them? So here's what I want to start with. Just overall, why does this conversation matter to you? Why should it matter to you? Well, I guess ultimately that's up to you. But here's what I want to start off with. Standards will shape your agency's culture and your agency's behaviors. Now, oftentimes I'll hear from agency leaders and agency teams some form of question of, hey, what should I do? Now, of course, that would depend on whether you are a producer, you're a service team professional, an agency leader, a sales leader, but in essence of in this particular area, what's the best thing I do or what should I do? And what I love about standards is it's going to begin to change the paradigm a little bit from what should I do to what, what do I stand for? Right? What do I stand for? What is it all about? And of course, those standards will help you make key decisions as you move forward. In fact, the idea of having standards, although it does require some work and thought, will actually make your life, your decision making, much easier. So standard shape behaviors and behaviors create your results. In fact, at Sitkins, we talk all the time with our members about beliefs drive behaviors, behaviors drive results. Well, standards to me, align with your beliefs, right? What do you stand for? So the behaviors that we have actually create the results. And a question that I would ask you, I ask myself, I ask our agency partners to think about from a leadership perspective is this, does the behavior in our agency align with the standards we've created or the standards that we desire? Now, hopefully you've created them, but if not, like, what does that look like? Do the current behaviors in our agency, do they align with the standards that we want or the standards that we have? Now, again, this all starts mindset. Now let me give you an example because I think that leadership standards can either be intentional or too often, they're accidental. Right? Intentional is that we're very clear in what they are, we're clear on how we do these things based on those standards. And, and we execute and we're accountable in these areas. The, in the accidental is oops, what happened. Right. And of course then we try to figure out the standards after the fact or at least figure out, okay, does it make sense? Should we have done this differently? Why? And of course we're reactive versus proactive. So let me give a few examples here. Number one, standards. Do you have standards around your agency's business model, both strategic and financial? Now, I'm not going to get in the weeds here. We could do a whole session on this and I've done some conversations about your, your business model. And if you listen to this podcast in the past, one of the phrases that we find is so powerful and so true is that your current business model is perfectly designed for you to achieve your current results. Your current business model is perfectly designed for you to achieve your current results. So whatever results you're getting right now is indicative of your business model. And too often when I ask agencies initially on some conversations are tell me about your strategic and or financial business model. Now, they may have some ideas of goals, but as far as the model, how they set things up, it's typically more around hope. I wish, I think we might, we're considering it could be, it might be. As Harry Carey once said it is. All right, so some of you will get that joke. Others have no idea what I'm talking about. But is your business model intentional or accidental? Right. Intentional. Is that it is defined, that it is clear that it is. And I've talked before about clarity. Where are we today? Where do we want to go? How are we going to get there? There's no perfect business model, but there certainly can be and should be an intentional business model. What about a standard or standards around the client experience? Now again, a lot of rabbit holes I could dive into here, but give you one example. Oftentimes agencies will say, you know, we've got pretty good retention. I'll say, well, tell me about your experience. Tell me about what you provide the clients. What does the renewal cycle look like? Now we talk about continuations. I'll get that in a minute. But they typically talk around a 90 day renewal dance. That's the term that we use right? Around 90 days we start kicking off this stuff and then we do our work and whatever. And so there isn't really a defined standard other than what we're going to get it done before the X date or certainly where we can have conversations that aren't that close to the X date. The difference would be a continuation model. Now again, this is something that we teach and preach, but talking about a standard, our standard is that on this tier of clients we have defined expectations. We've documented those expectations internally and externally, and we deliver on those expectations through a stewardship or promise report. Now again, I'm not going to get in all the details of that, but that's a difference between a standard. This is our standard versus well, we do some renewal stuff and we do it pretty well. Now, as I mentioned on a previous podcast, if you don't do any of that, you still can get through. Right? Because good enough, unfortunately, is often okay in the agency world that we live in. All right, what about producers and producers roles? Give it give you an idea of standards versus just accidental. An accidental standard is, hey, go sell some stuff, go get out in the marketplace, go get your feet wet, go pick up the phone, go do whatever, right? Just be busy being busy and we'll see what sticks. Obviously an intentional standard is that we understand the relationship between sales and service. We've defined the producer's role. In fact, we talk about the producer doing four things and this is where we're going to focus. And of course we're going to have accountability behind that to make sure that we have producers doing producer stuff 80% of the time. That would be the difference. Like this is our standard or well, I hope they do some stuff. A selling system, same type of thing. Do you have a name defined selling system that would be an intentional standard or do you fall into the look, copy, quote, pray, you know, we'll look at your policies, we'll copy your policies, we'll get some quotes and we'll pray that, you know, we're the lowest price or that we pray that you don't take this back to your incumbent versus this is our defined process. This is a standard intentionally that we walk our clients through that not only allow us to keep our clients back to retention, but but certainly find new opportunities and give them a unique experience that they've not gotten before. Capacity. I think capacity is a huge thing in agency sales and service capacity. If we don't have standards around capacity, what typically it looks like is a bunch of people doing a lot of things, maybe or maybe not for the right reasons, maybe or maybe not at the right time, maybe or maybe not with the right people. Maybe, maybe, maybe, or maybe not with the right situation. And we got a lot of people doing lots of things. But it doesn't mean we're intentional on how we're driving the business forward. And what typically happens is that service people get overwhelmed, salespeople get too busy and we're in the crazy cycle versus an intentional standard that we are going to identify the key tiers of our agency business. We're going to align, allocate our people to those right tiers and we're going to deliver an excellence based on those tiers. Right. That's the difference between working and. You've heard this a million times. Working, working harder. Which every agency should work hard versus working smarter or working with intention, accountability, the A word. Right. If we don't have standards or we're not intentional, well, we hope and we think they might do things, our people, our team. Of course, the intentional standard is we've got the same goal. We have defined roles around that. Again, we have promise making and promise keeping based internally on to make sure that we are being intentional with our actions, not just doing a bunch of stuff. And then the last thing I want to share here, and again, I know I gave several examples, but these are examples of intentional standards versus accidental intentional standards would be that we are going to have a development and training program for our most important asset, our people. And that could look a number of different ways. But as I believe at my core, and I want to share with you as an agency leader, do you get up every day saying how can I help grow and develop my number one asset in my organization, which is my people? Or do you say, gosh, I hope they figure stuff out, I'm busy, things are going on. So let's take this a little bit further and talk about what do standards, what do they really mean? Right? What do standards really mean? Well, here are a few things that jump out at me and this is important. If you're taking notes, here's a big one. Standards are about non optional behaviors. Non optional behaviors. Now an example that I love to use is professional sports. Now there are no perfect professional sports teams, but I have seen, and maybe you have as well, you probably have where there might be an individual, same individual, who was in one organization, one team that gets traded to another team and all of a sudden not just their results, which is part of it, but you can see their behaviors change. Why did they just suddenly have a, you know, like this, oh, eureka moment, like, my gosh, now I'm going to do this. Well, it's possible, but what's what? Much more likely. And we often hear from those individuals that have gone through that experience is, well, I went from a place that quite frankly didn't have any standards and I kind of did what I wanted and then I went to a place that had non optional standards. This is how we do it here. Remember I said earlier, not about what you do, it's what do we stand for. And if you stand for something, there will be non optional behaviors behind it. Otherwise you don't really stand for it. In fact, I heard this a while back that if you don't stand for something, you fall for everything. And I think that's true. Clear expectations, right? What does standards really mean? It means that we have clarity in our team's expectations. One of the tools we developed over the last couple years has been a two way promise. And the reason why we have a two way promise, well, there's multiple things probably, but one of the big ones is this, is that accountability too often is looked at as a one way street. Right? I'm the big bad boss or leader or manager and because of that you're going to do all the things I'm going to say. See, non optional behaviors. I told you, right? It's like as a dad, clean your room. Why? Because I told you so. Now can that work? Yeah, to a degree. For most of you, you're responsible for their paychecks, right? There's some power there, but that's not great leadership influence, right? And that's not going to last very long. So what I love about a two way promise is there are things as agency leadership team, for example, that we must and will promise to you and we have to be accountable for these things to you. Give you an example. As an agency, it's our goal, our role to provide the tools and the resources to help you be successful. Now again, you can determine what those are. Every agency is different. So if we're going to provide the tools, the resources, support some structure, whatever it may be, then you as an individual need to provide these key behaviors. Right now this is a conversation and I will tell you when we have a two way promise. When we have the conversation, it sounds and feels much different than here's a list of to do things you have to do, do them or else, which by the way, typically nothing ever happens anyway, right? So this idea of clear expectations, not just from their side of things, if you're leading or managing a team, but what are the clear expectations for you as a leadership team, that is about standards. And standards to me are not only about one person but about both sides. It is about again Mutual respect and trust across platforms. What else do standards mean? Well, to me, standards are about consistency and reinforcement. This is the cadence of accountability. Standards aren't something that we talk about in January and we come back to it in December, right? Standards are. Again, these are the critical few things that we do as an agency that are not optional. And we're going to talk about them again and again and again and again. And the fourth thing I want to share here of what standards mean. To me, standards mean leadership models. I mentioned this a bit on the two way promise, but it is imperative for you as an agency leader that, not that you're doing the same responsibilities or roles of your team, obviously not necessarily, nor should you be, but you do need to model the key behaviors. And this could certainly in terms of how you show up, how you communicate, right? How you show appreciation, respect and trust to those around you. Again, I'm just throwing out some examples, but you model that people are watching you whether you like it or not. How do they show up? How do they respond? I mean, are they abundant? Are they scarcity? So all these things are important when you think about setting the standard for you as a leader. So why do standards slip? Because this is something that comes up all the time like, well, we created a standard or two or we talked about some things. Why do standards slip? And as you're listening here, ask yourself, am I, are we guilty of some of these things? I know I have been right as a leader. So here's some reasons why standards slip. Number one, growth creates complexity. The agency leaders that we're working with personally are not agencies that typically have been the same revenue for years and years and years now. Maybe they've had some growth. But again, these are agencies that are always looking for a higher level. They're typically in a growth mode where looking for higher levels of growth or more effectiveness or efficiency in key areas to improve that more predictable control type of growth. But here's the thing. As you grow as an agency, it does increase complexity. It just does. More tools, more resources, obviously in many cases more people. And if you ever played the game of telephone as a kid, we realized the further you get away from the initial source, sometimes the more distorted the message gets. So why do standards slip? Well, because now we have, you know, just for example, the CEO who talks to the president, who talks to the executive leader who talks to blank, blank. And down the line we go multiple voices, multiple channels, multiple ways for the message to get distorted. So again, for you as an agency leader, you have to be extremely clear and extremely consistent with your entire team on what are the key standards, what are, why are they important? And of course, what it means for everyone in the organization in conjunction with this standard slip. Because leaders get busy. That's the reality. I know anybody listening right now goes, if I ask you, how was your day? You're probably going to have like crazy busy, all kinds of stuff. I get it, right? This leadership stuff isn't easy. But part of this comes back to priority. And if you truly believe that your number one role and responsibility is to grow and develop your number one asset, your people, this can't be an afterthought. It's gotta be, if not the first thing, a continual thing that comes up in your conversations with yourself, with your internal leadership team and obviously as you communicate with your entire team. Why else do standards slip? Well, standards slip because oftentimes short term thinking overrides long term discipline. Urgency is more important than the, than the important thing. So urgency exceeds importance. We go fast, but we forget about how far we want to go. We're thinking in terms of weeks and months versus what does this look like a year from now? Right? Because there needs to be a discipline around that, a cadence. And I think a big area too is that we often see that scarcity gets in the way of abundance. I used those words earlier, that we're so worried about holding onto things and keeping on to things that we have that we don't take the time to really think strategically about what it could mean. What would standards really mean for our agency? Because if you're caught up in the short term, if you're caught up in going fast, if you're caught up in scarcity and just trying to hang on, standards, quite frankly aren't going to be that important or they're certainly could slip. All right, so I have a couple of questions for you. I want you to think about this and obviously you don't need to report to me, nor could you, nor should you report to me. But a couple of questions I want to ask you for you as an agency leader, this is your self assessment. Where do you believe in your agency? You've seen standards slip. Now again, maybe these standards have not been officially defined, but they're just part of, they have been part of your culture, maybe some form of your DNA, or maybe you do have defined standards and you haven't been able to live up to them in certain ways, which, that's okay. First step of learning is awareness. So just ask yourself where as an agency have we allowed certain standards to slip? What does that look like? And then in conjunction with that question, what behaviors in our agency today are being normalized? What behaviors are being normalized in our agency? One of the things that we speak of all the time. In fact, we just kicked off our producer camp, our newest producer camp this week. We talked to the producers about this. W I n what is normal and what have you allowed to become normal for producers? It could be, I've allowed the fact that I only prospect once every couple weeks as normal. I may allow the fact that, you know, I only get outside the office and do, you know, proactive sales and relationship building. 20% of the time, that's just become normal. Right? And as these things seep in, they really do embed in the agency culture. So I just ask you again, as an agency, what behaviors? This could be leadership. This could be sales. This could be service. What behaviors have we allowed, we tolerated to become normal? Really, really important questions for you to consider as an agency leader. All right, so here's what I want to share with you as well. Standards that you set often become clear when you have outside voices and outside people to look at things. So I do want to ask you if you are an agency who are looking to uplevel your standards, looking for an outside perspective. One of the best ways of doing that is to book an initial call with our agency, with our organization, it's. Go to sitkins.com bookacall this is not about pressure. This is about perspective. Just to know more about your agency, maybe some challenges and struggles you're dealing with, and at that point to see if there's a fit for us to have future conversations. But we love to understand and hear from agencies of where they're at, their perspective, and maybe an area they're stuck. So again, go to sitkins.com bookacall no pressure, just perspective. I'd love to have that conversation with you. All right, as I wrap this up, again, we've talked about standards today on this episode. Best version possible. Leadership is based on. On standards. We think about the top agencies that have organic growth rates of 12, 14, 16, 18, 20%. They're out there, right? And high levels of profit margins. And their revenue per employee is exceeding 300,000 revenue per employee, which is one of our metrics. I can tell you those things aren't built on hopes or wishes or wants. They're built on standards. They this is how our agency operates. Because there are certain things that we simply stand for. It's in our DNA. It's who we are. Because great agencies, best version possible agencies don't happen by accident. Maybe you can get lucky for six months, maybe a year, but as Warren Buffett says so, well, when the tide rolls out, we'll know who's been swimming naked. And I know for some agencies I've talked to in the last couple months, they're starting to see that some of the market conditions and inflation factors that have helped boost numbers the last couple years may not be there. Moving Forward and so it's about intentional action, right as you move forward in your agency. So wishing you agency all the best. Look at your standards, define your standards. And I said before, if you have questions, please reach out to myself, my team, we're happy to help you in any way possible. And with that, I wish your agency all the best and your success. Thanks for listening. 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 that 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.