Stop Overlooking Your Service Team

Welcome back to the Agent Leader Podcast. This is the podcast for insurance agency leaders to raise the bar, to challenge your thinking, and to ultimately become a best version possible leader who leads a best version possible agency. My name is Brent Kelly. I'm your host, and today I wanna talk about something that I believe is one of the most, if not the most overlooked opportunities in the entire independent insurance agency system. You ready for this? It's the development of your team, your entire team, not just your producers, not just your sales leaders, not just your executive leadership team. I'm talking about the entire Team, and especially you probably noticed what I haven't mentioned yet, your service team. Now, let me start off this podcast by asking you, the agent leader, a question. When you think about your agency's growth strategy, next 90 days, next year, next 3 years, when you think about your agency's growth strategy, who do you think about first? Well, probably your producers. Right? Maybe your sales leaders, maybe your business development team. And guess what? Understandably so. Certainly important to have your producers and sales leaders and anybody in business development as part of your growth strategy. But what about the people who are responsible for serving your clients, strengthening those relationships, protecting revenue, creating an exceptional client experience? What about those account managers? Account execs, service reps, service professionals, whatever name you give them, but those that are serving the clients that you're bringing in to your agency. They're part of the agency, but when it comes to growth and development and strategy, eh, don't worry about it. We'll let you know when we get that all figured out. Now, don't get me wrong here. I know that agency leaders, they know how important their service teams are. In fact, I'll often hear leaders talk about their service teams as the backbone of their agency. And guess what? I agree, right? The agency doesn't stand or sit upright without a backbone. In fact, my analogy is that the producers, the sales leaders, those that are driving revenue growth are like the muscle of the agency. You want to grow and develop muscle. It's important. But if you don't have a backbone, the muscle doesn't work real well. So here's the idea of the podcast today. If your service team is truly the backbone of your agency, and by the way, if you don't believe that it is, you probably shouldn't invest the next 10 minutes into this podcast. But if you do believe your service team is truly the backbone of your agency, why aren't you investing in their development with the same intentionality That you're investing into the sales team. Now, quick side note here. Hopefully you're investing into your team, your sales team and your sales leaders. But if you're investing into your sales team, do you have the same intentionality of growth and development for your service team? Because here's what I know. You cannot build a high performance agency without building a high performance team. Now that sounds pretty silly when I say it out loud. In fact, it's so silly, I'm gonna say it twice. You can't build a high-performance agency without building a high-performance team, and you can't build a high-performance team without alignment. And I've talked about alignment in several episodes of this podcast, but I'm gonna go through some key areas to help you, the agent leader, determine where you can best grow and develop communicate with the backbone of your agency at a higher level, the service team. All right. First of all is this, you need to understand, and I guess I can't make you believe anything, but I hope this is something that becomes more, uh, important and impactful to you, that your service team is part of your growth engine. One of the biggest mistakes I see agencies make is they separate sales and service when it comes to their growth strategy. Okay. Not only even not included, but they're just separate. Now think about the traditional model. Producers are responsible for generating revenue. Service teams are responsible for servicing the business and leadership. Well, they're responsible for managing the operation, but that's not how a true high-performance agency should operate. Now, let me be really clear here for a second, because sometimes I'm like, wait a second, right? You, you talk about in your programs that Sales and service are different and all this kind of, of course, everyone, leadership, sales, and service has different roles and responsibilities, but they should all be working toward the same outcomes. One of the things that we've shared many times on this podcast, same goal with an appreciation, respect, and trust of the different roles. High performance teams don't necessarily do the same things. In fact, they don't do the same things. They work together to accomplish The same things. Now think about the impact your service team has on your agency every single day. There's so many areas here, just a few to think about. They influence client retention. Of course, they influence the overall client experience. Of course, they identify opportunities to round out accounts and strengthen relationships. They help create additional capacity for producers. It's a huge part and a role they play. And they play a critical role in your agency's ability to generate sustainable organic growth. And every agency, I sure hope, growth agencies want sustainable organic growth. In fact, in many agencies, probably yours, the service team has significantly more interaction with clients than the producers do. Again, we teach the producers have proactive deposits in areas. Of course, depends on the complexity of the account, but overall, Service team has much more interaction with clients than the producers do. So a follow-up question to that is, why would we ever exclude them from our growth and development strategy, from skill development, for improvement, for client communication? You know, I've said many times that organic growth isn't simply about writing more new business. It's about retaining the right clients, expanding exist— existing relationships, improving capacity, And creating greater value. And your service team is absolutely essential to making that happen. Your producers, we know this, they open the door to relationships, but your service team plays a critical role in keeping the door open and creating additional opportunities for growth. That's why we have to stop thinking about service as simply a department, or the, the service department's over there, or that's the collection of cubicles, or whatever the case may be. The service team, the service department, Is not isolated. It's not siloed. It needs for a high-growth agency to be part of your agency's growth engine. All right. Second area I wanna focus on today. Alignment is what separates good teams from high-performance teams. Now, here's where I believe the real opportunity exists for growth agencies. It is about alignment. You know, one of the things that we continue to hear Again, this is just what we hear. That's all I could do is on this podcast, assure we hear from agencies that become part of our growth and development plan around the Sitkins Network is our team is finally communicating on the same page. And we talk about building a best version possible agency. We talk about the 4 disciplines. I've talked about this in the podcast, clarify, align, execute, and optimize. And there's a reason why alignment comes before execution, because you can have really talented people throughout your agency, but if those people aren't aligned, you're never gonna maximize the collective potential. You can have outstanding producers, you could have exceptional account managers, and we see that. You could have great leadership, but if they're all operating independently with different expectations, different priorities, different standards, you're gonna experience frustration, inefficiency, and missed opportunities. In fact, uh, so many of the agencies that I have the pleasure of talking with, Initially, they're really smart people. They're really hardworking people, but they're really misaligned people. And as they grow and you add more people, it becomes more and more misaligned. Yes, they're looking for structure and processes, but those structure and processes need to be aligned, right? That requires alignment. Now, one of the biggest obstacles to alignment is communication. And when we're working with our service teams through the training programs, one frustration comes up again and again and again and again. I ask in this first session and the next session and the ongoing session all the way to the end, what is it? It is a lack of communication. Now, this could be lots of stuff, but let's talk about it, particularly a lack of communication from the agency leaders and producers. Now, I don't say this to say that agency leaders and producers are malicious in non-communication or lack of communication, but I think this happens because we just get busy and we're not focused. So examples, a producer makes a commitment to a client, but they don't involve the service team or they don't communicate that to the service team. What happens? Well, promises are broken oftentimes, or frustration builds. Resentment happens. An account manager may discover something about a relationship that the producer shouldn't know, but doesn't communicate that information. Maybe they feel like, ah, it's not that big of a deal. I don't wanna interrupt them. I don't know what the case is, but it doesn't get communicated. Leadership will maybe introduce a new strategy, a new initiative, but the service team doesn't really understand why it's important, how it impacts Their responsibilities? How does it fit into these processes that we've installed? All right, we started, we stopped, we started, we stopped. Or you might even see the producer and service team have completely different expectations. Who's responsible for what, when, why, how? And then we wonder why people become frustrated. We wonder why agencies, in particular sales and service, have inefficiencies. We wonder why there's tension. You know, one of the things that I see is sometimes not even miscommunication, but actual resentment and tension. Now, here's what I want agency leaders to understand. You cannot expect team alignment if you tolerate communication breakdowns, right? Well, I, I want us to all be aligned, yet we tolerate communication breakdowns. I'll give one specific example. And again, I'm not gonna teach all of the foundations and functions that we talk about when it comes to high-performance teams and high-performance team models between sales and service. But if leadership doesn't understand that concept, if they don't back up the team concept, they don't back up the account managers in particular, right? Then guess what? You're tolerating communication breakdown. And when communication consistently breaks down between sales and service, it's not simply a sales problem. It's not simply a service problem. Are you ready for this, leaders? It's a leadership problem. Because leaders are responsible for creating the environment, the expectations, the processes, and accountability necessary for high-performance teams to succeed. And that means we have to intentionally bring our teams together. Now, I don't mean just physically together, although that's a good thing, right? If you've got remote offices and we find times to bring people together. I'm talking more importantly about bringing teams together strategically. They need to understand where the agency is going. What does success actually look like? What standards are expected? And is this universal? Is this just certain people? And a big part, and this is where I see the frustration with service teams when I run conversations or have meetings with them, is how do their individual, individual responsibilities connect to the rest of the team? Yeah. Right? That's alignment. And alignment changes everything. It really is all about alignment. But as I stated here, it is the leader's responsibility to drive and foster that alignment. All right. The third thing I want to talk about, 3 words all start with the letter E. So pretty simple. Equip, empower, educate. So how do we develop high-performance teams? So I want to challenge you on these 3 things. Equip. Empower, educate. I love to borrow these words. I heard these from John Maxwell trainings. I love it cuz it's simple. 3 E's: equip, empower, educate. Well, let's talk about first about equip, and these are questions for you to think about, the agency leader. Please note, none of this are you gonna be perfect in. I just wanna challenge your thinking around these areas. So let's talk about equipping your people. Are you giving your service teams The tools, the resources, the processes and systems necessary to perform at the highest level? Are your workflows clearly defined? Are the responsibilities documented? And are your sales and service teams operating with consistent expectations? Going back to the high-performance team and high-performance team meeting, like, are there expectations consistent that are required? In our model, every single week, sales and service meet with a deliberate agenda. The account executive or account manager sets up the meeting, right? They set up the agenda. The producer needs to be there prepared and present, right? Those are things that the agency leader needs to help foster and drive. Because just hoping that things are gonna happen, of course, is not a strategy. And high-performance teams don't operate on, on assumptions. They operate With clarity. Now, next I mentioned empower. You gotta empower your people. Your service professionals shouldn't simply be task processors. They should be trusted relationship professionals. We've gotta empower people. By the way, that means you give up some of your power. You transfer some of that. They need the confidence, they need the authority and accountability to make decisions, to solve problems and contribute Meaningful ideas. And perhaps most importantly, they need to feel that their voice matters. Now, again, this can be all across the board. Some teams are really, really good at this and some are absolutely broken. But my question and my challenge to you is, how well are you empowering your service team today? You know, I even think about the sales-service dynamic. We talk about not just having a service handoff, but a service hand up, right? That producers aren't just saying, well, here's your service person, but here's who they are. Here's what they do. Here's why it matters. And here's how the relationship is gonna be upleveled because of this person or persons that are now part of this overall experience. Because some of the best ideas for improving client relationships, retention, capacity, and client experience will come directly from the people that interact with your clients every day. As an agency leader, you have a lot of responsibilities. One of the best things that you can do is to find some time throughout the quarter or a month, certainly intentional time to truly listen to your service team. Are you involving them? Are you empowering them? Or are you simply telling them what to do? Now, this doesn't mean you have to take every, every single idea that your service team gives you, but they are working. Every single day with clients. To be able to have these conversations, you can communicate with them, is incredibly important. And not just to tell them what you think, but to listen to what they say. There's a wealth of knowledge there. I've talked about equip. I talked about empower. Let's talk about educate, educating your team. Now, I wanna make an important distinction here. Training and development are not the exact same thing. Right? Training teaches someone how to perform a task. It's part of it. What we really focus on and what I really want to foster here is development. Development helps someone increase their capabilities, helps improve and increase their confidence, their understanding, and their overall contribution to themselves, to their department, and the overall agency. Technical training. We don't really do that. Now, Is that to say it's not important? Of course not. Technical training is absolutely essential. Coverage knowledge, carrier system workflows, documentation processes all matter. But if that's the only thing that your service team is receiving, you're missing an enormous opportunity. And we teach service team members how to document workflows and processes and how to use the AMS. But do your service professionals understand your agency's growth strategy? Do they understand your ideal client profile? Do they understand the importance of account rounding? Do they understand the importance of ongoing skill development and communication with clients? Do they understand how retention, revenue per employee, operating profit all impact the overall success of the agency? Do they understand the points of differentiation? They might even know it better than your sales team. Sometimes we just don't talk about it. Because here's what I believe. When people understand why the strategy matters, they're far more capable of contributing to how the strategy gets executed. In fact, one of the first sessions we talk about in our Account Manager Fit program is the idea that there's culture and there's process. And too often we focus only on the process, the thing that you do. And as leaders, we do not spend enough time talking about Why we're doing it. If we spend more time talking about the why, because we've included our team, our entire team on strategic objectives and standards, the what becomes much more easy to buy into, right? That's how you begin developing a true high-performance team. Now, please understand this too. When I talk about involving the service team, I'm not suggesting that every service professional Should or need to become a salesperson. No, not at all. I'm suggesting that every service professional needs to understand how their role contributes to the overall agency growth, client success, and agency performance. And that's a huge difference. 4th thing I wanna talk about, this should be the last thing, okay, is developing the entire team. And this is our approach, and I, I do wanna spend a moment or 2 talking about it because it is something that we are incredibly passionate about. Here at the Sitkins Group, we believe that building a best version possible agency requires intentionally developing the entire team, not just the producers. We have a great producer camp, not just a leadership team. We have a ton of leadership opportunities. I'm talking about everyone. And that's why the service team and the development of the service team is intentionally integrated into our Sitkins network. We do this through our AMFIT, Account Manager Fitness Program, our training. We help account managers and service professionals develop the skills, the confidence, the processes, and capabilities to perform at higher levels. We have quarterly joint sales and service meetings, so we don't just do a training and they're okay, that's it. Every quarter we get sales and service together to talk about what they're fostering in terms of communication and clarity and reminding them of certain principles because we do not want Sales and service operating in separate silos. You know, uh, one thing that we've experienced firsthand, and we've done our best to bring in account managers, but over the last 6 or 7 years, we've been extremely intentional with this. But I can't tell you how many times we've had producers go through a producer camp and go, wow, this is really important information. And their service team goes, what? And then they can't figure out why execution is such a difficult Issue? Well, because we haven't coordinated or communicated the key points. We want teams to learn together, to communicate together, to align expectations together, and ultimately to execute the strategies together. All right? We do this through ongoing training, development, and resources because we know that attending a training session is not the same thing as building a high-performance culture. It requires ongoing reinforcement. It requires a leadership commitment. Our objective isn't to simply develop better producers or better account managers. Yes, we want agencies to do that. It's to help agencies develop better teams. It's to help you and your agency develop teams that communicate, that collaborate, that understand and appreciate their roles, that embrace accountability because none of us are perfect. And teams that are aligned around creating exceptional client experiences And of course, outstanding agency results, because you cannot create a best version possible agency without helping your people become, you got it, their best version possible. Now, as I wrap up this podcast today, I want to leave you with a challenge. All right. I want every podcast to have some form of a challenge. And this challenge is for you, the agency leader. I mean, this is the Agent Leader Podcast, right? So I'm gonna ask you 3 questions, and these are really important questions, thinking questions, strategy questions to get you to challenge your thinking, raise the bar, and become a better leader. First question, are we investing in the development of our service team with the same intentionality that we invest in our sales team? And I don't mean just technical training, but professional Development, communication skills, relationship management, agency strategy, and overall contribution to growth. Question number 2, are our sales and service teams truly aligned? Do they understand their respective responsibilities? Are expectations clearly defined? Do they communicate proactively? Are they working towards shared outcomes or are they simply operating in the same agency? Because there is a big difference between working in the same organization as working as a team. And my third and final question is this: does every person in our agency understand how they contribute to our success? Does every person in our agency understand how they Contribute to our success. It can be really easy, in particular for service teams. They just go to work every day and they show up and they do the task, they do the thing, and they maybe do it really, really well. But at the end of the day, they're like, I don't really know how what I do fits into where we're going. I think it does. I hope it does. I don't really know. And any human being that is doing work that isn't sure how that work contributes to a long-term goal or strategy or vision or mission, I'm telling you what, doesn't work as well, right? I'm not talking about each person, each service person, just knowing their job description or just their daily responsibilities, but the contribution to the bigger picture. And here's one simple action I would encourage you to take. All right. Sit down with your service team. Just ask questions and listen. Hey, listen. Hey, listen. You all doing great work, right? And if they're not doing great work, say, you're all doing work. Okay. I don't know. Right. But like, sit down with them. Ask some questions. Hey, what are we doing or failing to do as leaders and the production team that's making it harder for you to deliver an exceptional client experience? What are we doing or failing to do as leaders and producers that's making it harder for you to deliver an exceptional client experience? You know why we don't like asking those questions? Because you might hear things you don't like. Get comfortable being uncomfortable. By the way, not only are you gonna hear things that are gonna make you better, they are gonna feel so valued that you asked. Okay? So ask that question. And then listen. Really listen. Don't become defensive. Don't make excuses. Simply listen and then look for the opportunities to improve. Now, this doesn't mean you're going to be able to act on every single thing you hear, but you might hear a few things that go, oh wow, now there's 3 or 4 or 5 of these things. There might be something there. And after you listen, And you look for those opportunities and you kind of foster your thoughts together and look for the key, key areas, then take action. Because high-performance teams aren't created through motivational speeches or an occasional training event. We're gonna go out to dinner. It's great. They're created through intentional leadership, through clear expectations, through consistent communication, through continuous development and shared accountability. And here's the bottom line. You can't build a high-performance agency with a high-performance sales team and an underdeveloped or underappreciated service team. It takes everyone working together. It takes everyone moving in the same direction that all have a shared commitment to excellence. A collection of high-performing individuals doesn't automatically create a high-performance team, but when you combine talented people with clear expectations, intentional development, you have open communication, And true alignment. Woo! That's when you begin to create something special. And that's how you build your best version possible agency. Hey, thanks as always for joining me on the Agent Leader Podcast. Again, if you wanna learn more about us and what we do, go to sitkins.com. Just go to sitkins.com. You'll see some information there. Again, we are looking for high-performing agencies that know there's even a higher And until next time, keep leading, keep developing your people, and keep pursuing that best version possible. I wish you all the best in your success. Thanks. Today's episode is brought to you by Rough Notes Magazine. Since 1878, Rough Notes has helped independent insurance professionals stay informed, sharpen their leadership, and grow their agency. From industry trends and technology to marketing and specialty lines, Rough Notes delivers practical insights that you can put to work. They also offer Rough Notes Advantage, giving agencies additional tools and resources to help them compete and grow. Visit them at roughnotes.com. 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/bookacall, sitkins.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.