Five Reasons You Don't Need a Coach

Brent Kelly:

Welcome to The Agent Leader Podcast. My name is Brent Kelly. I am your host, and it is my pleasure to be with you on this episode. Today, agency leaders out there, I'm going to challenge you a little bit. In fact, I may challenge you quite a bit, and I want to do this. It's part of my passion, my mission, our mission of an organization. My mission of this podcast is to help you, the agency leader, gain clarity, consistency, and make a commitment to become your best version possible. If we're going to provide a clarity, consistency, and a commitment to become your best version possible, that requires that I challenge you.

That requires that maybe on this episode, this podcast, I may ruffle some feathers. I'm good with that. I'm good with that because we believe in what we do. We believe in the value we bring to the agency marketplace. I also know that every time there's transformation or change done in my own life or in the agencies or insurance professionals that I work with, it's because they were challenged to do things and maybe think a bit uncomfortably, to do things that may be outside of the norm. Today, I'm going to share with you, the title of this podcast is Five Reasons Your Agency Doesn't Need a Coach. Five Reasons Your Agency Doesn't Need a Coach.

Now, I think probably if you know me at all or listen to podcasts, you know that coaching, consulting, working with agency, agency development is what I do, what we do at The Sitkins Group. Certainly this is a bit of a play on words in the sense of, I'm going to challenge you. The people that say, "Well, I don't really need a coach. I don't really need mentorship in this area. I really don't need a network of other professionals that are going to challenge me and encourage me in different ways." Now, I know you as an agency leader are probably involved in a number of different things, and I understand that and I respect that.

But I do want to challenge you today about, well, I don't really need a coach. By the way, is this a bit self-serving? Probably. Probably. But that really honestly isn't my intention. If by listening to this podcast someone says, "You know what? I want to learn more about Sitkins," then great, you can go to sitkins.com/experience and you can learn about how we work with agencies. It may or may not be a fit for you. There's a number of factors that are involved, but go to sitkins.com/experience. But you may also want to work with a different kind of coach or somebody else in a different specialty.

What we work with agencies is around talent development, certainly in the aspect is as I speak on this podcast around agency leadership. We certainly want to educate. We want to empower. We want equip agency professionals with an entire agency to strive for more, to work on their skills, to work on processes, to instill better and reinforce attitudes that are part of the culture of the agency. But there are a lot of coaches that do similar things and different things that help agencies. In fact, some of our best agencies work with a number of people in different areas, whether it's technology or automation.

It could be something more personalized to a certain skillset. That's great. What I believe is the greatest investment that you can make is an investment into yourself. The greatest investment you can make as an agency leader is an investment into your team. Why? Done right, there's always a return, but you got to make the investment. Today, again, I want to share with you five reasons why your agency doesn't need a coach. Why don't you need a coach? I think about this actually was inspired a bit by Lewis Howes. Lewis Howes, if you haven't heard that name, runs a very successful podcast in a business.

This podcast is called The School of Greatness. You may want to add that to your list of shows that you listen to outside of The Agent Leader Podcast, of course. The School of Greatness Podcast. He has written a new book about greatness and what greatness looks like. I think it's really interesting, because we think of greatness as always success and all this kind of stuff and revenue. That's a big part of it obviously, but there's more that goes into it. Lewis talks so much about coaching and the best people he's worked with and thousands of people, and the same is true with the agencies and professionals we've worked with.

They have a coach. They have people that challenge them when they need to be challenged. They encourage them when they need encouragement. You have these conversations that if you ever ask yourself, "Gosh, am I the only person? Are we the only agency dealing with this?" Probably not. It helps you to learn from others' mistakes. It helps you to be able to accelerate certain areas or maybe you're running into roadblocks. But I love that Lewis Howes talks about this. He says so many people that do desire to be successful, one of the things that holds them back is they have a lone wolf mentality.

If it is to be, it's up to me. I think to a degree that spirit is great. The fact that there's ambition and drive in that. But lone wolf, no one ever accomplished anything great alone. I hope you've got a great agency team around you and some support systems. But the more people and the more ideas that will inspire you and engage you and challenge you, well, guess what? The faster and higher you will grow personally and professionally. We certainly see that with our agencies. Again, it's not all about the numbers, but the numbers are important. We always say numbers are the outcome of behaviors and strategies that you put in your agency.

Numbers are the outcome. You can't manage numbers. You can manage the behaviors and strategies. A lot of these things that I'll be talking about to a degree, there's going to be a mix of five reasons why you don't need a coach. Some of them are around behaviors and strategies. Some of them are mindset. Some of them are a bit of an outcome as well. But just to reiterate, and I shared this on a previous podcast, it is important. It's interesting, success leaves clues. We look at some of the top agencies that we have the privilege and honor to work with and be an agency growth partner. Their numbers over the past three years have been incredible. Why?

Based on behaviors and strategies that they've instilled in their agency over a three-year period. Same agencies, we tracked them over a three-year period. The agency average, 33% growth in revenue, 38% growth and profitability, and of course, that leads to agency valuation. Whether you want to sell your agency or not, agency valuation is critical. Used in a 10X multiple, we saw an 80% growth in agency valuation. Why? Behaviors and strategies that drive those numbers. Let's talk about this because a lot of agencies will say, "Well, I don't really need that. We're doing okay." Again, by the way, I never would force anybody, nor can I, to hire a coach, but I do want to get you to think.

Part of this is to be a bit, I said I'll ruffle some feathers, be a bit prolific and not be vanilla. I'm not going to tell you everything you may want to hear. I want to challenge you in different ways. You may agree, you may disagree, but I would challenge you to think about these five areas and how your agency is doing in these specific areas or how your agency would be impacted, so to speak, in these five different areas. Here's the first thing if you're taking notes at home. Number one, you're immune to the outside forces in the world. You're immune to anything on the outside forces of the world.

Now, what could that include? Well, certainly I would say, first and foremost, immune to the economy, immune to things that happen in the marketplace. By the way, these things, I'm sure you've already felt and seen. Now, the problem with outside forces is they can be a force for good and/or evil. You could have outside forces that actually help propel your agency. We've had many of those conversations. You may be dealing with that now where you have market conditions that harden the market and you're in a position where you're able to retain a number of clients but get huge increases.

We joke that the insurance industry is one of the only areas, only industries you can coast uphill, and you can to a degree with market conditions. The point is, is that a lasting tactic? Well, no. In fact, one of the things that I've had conversations with agencies over the past couple weeks has become a bit of a mantra. It comes back to some of my sports days and working with coaches as an athlete was they would say things like, "Brent, you have to control the controllables." Control the controllables. You don't have the ability to control some things that will impact you. Market conditions, you don't have direct control.

They will impact you. It's like walking outside. If it's raining outside, you don't control that. It does impact you. Now, the question is, how do you respond? What are you doing? What are the things that you can control, both different sides, it's good or bad, to help your agency, to help yourself prosper. One of my favorite quotes, a very enlightening quote comes from Warren Buffett who said this, "When the tide rolls out, we'll know who's been swimming naked." If you've been experiencing some increases in growth because of market conditions, and by the way many agencies have, I don't think that would be prolific for me to say, there's a lot of truth to that, that's great.

Take advantage of it. Make as much money as you can in the meantime. But know that at some point, when the tide rolls out, we'll know who's been swimming naked. We'll know who doesn't have some of the foundational behaviors and strategies in place when the next thing happens. By the way, what's going to happen in the economy in the next few years? We're already seeing some things, right? Part of this is if your agency is completely immune to outside forces, including the economy and marketing conditions and others, you don't need a coach. You're fine. Number one. That's number one.

Number two, you're waiting to sell out. I talked about agency evaluation. It's important whether you want to sell or not sell, but this is something that we'll either hear directly, in some cases, not too often, but sometimes a bit indirectly. In essence, hey, listen, Brent, I've got five years, three years, one year, whatever. Could be shorter, could be longer. That at some point we know all the offers that are coming in. We know that the acquisition market, merger market is still fast and furious. Will it slow down? Maybe a little, but it's going to be around. If obviously you run an agency, you probably get numerous solicitations maybe even every day, certainly every week.

But this idea that I'm going to wait until I sell out. Hey, eventually I'll sell at some point, we'll figure it out, and I'm going to be okay. If that's where your mindset is and you really believe that, then you absolutely don't need a coach. Obviously, I'm going to challenge this. I had a friend of mine, and this is just my thinking working with agencies. I think most of you will relate to this. I had a friend of mine who had worked in a corporate job for a long period of time, and we were having a conversation over dinner. I was just talking to this person and asking how things were going. You know what happens and you're complaining about the job and it's tough, don't like the boss.

I don't know, but I'm going to get through it. I'm going to get through it. I'm going to get through it. Those kind of things that you'd hear. I'd say, "Well, wait, what's the long-term plan? What are you wanting to do?" It's like, "Well," this person said to me, I'll never forget this, "I have about six years left until I qualify for early retirement, so I'm just going to wait it out for the next six years." Now, I understand that there's financial impact to this, there's families involved and different stuff, but just hearing that, it broke my heart. I mean, it honestly did. I'm thinking time is so precious. Time is so limited. We say that.

It's a bit cliche, but it's true. Things move quickly. Life on this earth is very short when you really stop and think about it. For six years, in essence what this person said to me is that I'm going to be average. I'm going to be unsatisfied. I'm going to be unfulfilled. But at the end of the six years, we'll figure out what happens, so that happens then was sad. Maybe it's not a direct correlation of what I'm getting to for agencies, but there's some truth to this. The culture isn't great. Our producers really aren't producing like they should. There really isn't much accountability. We don't really have a clear vision.

We really haven't acknowledged the client experience at the highest level. We really haven't developed a sales playbook or set offense that we should to differentiate in the marketplace. I could go on and on and on and on. But you know what? Good is good enough. Eventually we'll get to the end and I'll sell for a good amount of money. Great. I mean, if that's where you are, then you certainly don't need a coach. Part of this too, obviously there's a financial impact, at what cost? Certainly a cost of your time and your energy and your effort. The only diminishing asset we have is time, but a financial cost.

I mean, I talked about agency evaluation and what we see with our agencies. The multiples out there are still really big and they'll continue to be pretty large I think for a long period of time. You could look at different studies on that. But basically, even if you use a 10X multiple, which is pretty darn and low at this point, every $100,000 of unrealized profit in your agency, which is based around culture and strategies and behaviors of things I talked about, is a million dollars in lost agency valuation. Every $100,000 is at least, I'm sure it's more than that in most cases, is a million dollars in agency valuation.

At what cost do you want to be complacent for one year, three years, five years, or beyond? If you're waiting just to sell out, guess what? You don't need a coach. There's no reason to. That's number two. Number three, this is my passion project, number three, and I will be very straightforward with agencies when I have initial conversations. This is it. If you believe that your team is not worth investing in, then you don't need a coach.

If you don't believe that the people, the resources in your office or remote or wherever they are, but they're part of your agency team, if you don't believe they're truly worthy in your investment and just a general investment of time, energy, effort in skill development, in growth personally, professionally, in growth in how we do things, in growth around culture, all these things we get into that are so important in team development, then you don't need a coach. If you've listed this podcast for any length of time, I talk about leadership. I believe the number one job of an agency leader, number one, number one job, not seven or 10, the number one job of an agency leader is to develop your people.

Develop your people. There is not a magic development button that happens. Now, here's what happens and where we fool ourselves. You're going to have a few people, and again, depending on the size of your agency, it could be one, it could be several, that they're just extremely self-motivated and that's who they are. I would hope that I'm one of those people that if I worked for an agency, whether you develop me or not, I'm going to find ways to develop myself. But here's the thing about this, even the best, they want more development. They want more accountability. They want more resources and tools and skills that can help them enhance their career.

Your sevens or eights or nines out of 10 on your team could be an all nines or 10s if only they had more opportunities to develop at an even higher level. By the way, that's a huge capacity for growth in your agency as well. Sometimes our best performers get overlooked. Why? Because the squeaky wheel gets the grease, right? The squeaky wheel gets the grease. Pam and Joe and Jenny and whatever, I'm making up names here, I mean, they're pretty darn good and they're going to be okay without me. I'm going to leave them alone. By the way, they probably want to be left alone to a degree. But guess what they also really want?

They want to be acknowledged, appreciated, and challenged to go even higher. I mean, think about the best athletes, the best performers, the best musicians. Well, they're already really good. They want more. Is it because they're just ego hungry maniacs? No, it's because it's the highest expression of themselves. To not do that, not be challenged is why these type of people leave your agency. Well, we just couldn't support them. Maybe there's a reality there, I could have a whole different topic on that.

We know what's going on with lift outs and different things, but I would have to challenge you is have you given them a true compelling vision and reason to stay, that we're going to develop and challenge you at the highest level? Long-term growth is available here. That's the top end. Of course, then you've got some maybe middle people in your office, so to speak, that they're dying for some coaching. They need it. They just don't really get it. And then you have some maybe poorer performers that you're allowing to hang on for a long period of time because guess what? It's all the same anyway. Guess what?

The average to above average performers get very frustrated with when you allow poor performers to be treated just like they are. Hey, no one's really required to develop. No one really has accountability. No one really has to be challenged here. They're all the same. What is the culture that you're building an agency? Again, I knew I'd go on a bit of a rant there, but it's important. I believe in it. I just think that anybody that's part of your organization is worthy of your time, energy, and effort to develop at the highest level you know how. And certainly coaches and groups and organizations can be a big part of that.

That's a big part of what we do with agencies. Again, this may be self-serving, but it's true. Listen, you as an agency leader run your agency and your team runs your agency and you lead and it's your culture. But if we can help educate and we can help equip you as leaders in your team and help empower them to do more and be part of that, well, then let's do that because there's so much more that's possible if only we could do this. That's number three. Number four reason why you don't need a coach, because you are truly the competition that is feared in your marketplace. You are like the top of the top.

That if your agency is on an account, no one else ever wants to touch it. If you walk into account, the incumbent and others that are around and go, "Oh no!" If you're at that level, at that highest level, that you are an indispensable risk partner, that top two or 3%, you probably don't... By the way, I'm going to say, you probably don't need a coach. Those are the agencies that still have a coach, which is always interesting to me as well. But hey, if you're there, you probably technically, for the sake of this podcast, don't need one. Now, what are some things to think about? This is something we talk about all the time.

Does your agency, does your department, do your producers, your high performance teams, do they truly understand the points of differentiation that make them unique and compelling? Can they tell a compelling story? Do you have a compelling story? Do you have an agency playbook or set offense that does truly differentiate you and separate you in the marketplace to be that category one? Excuse me. Back to the talent development, are you reinforcing the skills? Are you doing practice within the agency that they're so good at what they do? In fact, all those skills that you have in your agency, your team has gotten so good, they could teach it to other people.

That's when you get to that highest level, the ultimate competitive advantage and preparation practice, things we talk about all the time. That's when agencies become truly the competition that's feared, because they understand their differentiation, their values, what makes them unique. They've got a unique selling proposition and they can tell it very, very well because they have a playbook and a process that's built into that. They continue to refine and develop the skills with the people to communicate it at the highest level. If you got all that, you probably don't need a coach, which leads me to number five.

Number five, why don't you need a coach? Because you're getting incredible results. I'll say the same thing I said in the last one. It's interesting, the agencies that get the most incredible results continue to look for other ways to improve because there's always another level. But if you're getting incredible results, and I wrote some things down, these are some of the top things we see. I mean, some of the best agencies. We had the pleasure of seeing some of this with our agencies we work with. If you get a revenue per employee of 275,000 and higher. If you've got overflowing pipelines, more opportunities than there is time from your sales pipeline overall because you're earning asking for referrals.

You have a true future ideal client marketing system in place. Every client you get comes from referral. You get a referral from every client. That's a philosophy I've talked about that before. It's pretty powerful. If you have an 80% or higher on your conversion and your closing ratio. We have agencies that are doing very close to this, if not over this. Conversion ratio is that first appointment that goes to the next appointment on larger accounts. That you've done a great job of identifying future ideal clients, telling that compelling story, qualifying that account and moving it to the second appointment or the next appointment.

80% higher on closing ratio. Some of that comes back to opening the sale correctly with a true proven process that we're qualifying, we're asking the right question, underwriting risk-based questions. We're opening, excuse me, new files, getting to think differently. That from the first conversation, we just continue to separate ourselves from everybody else. We're very different in how we approach things. The biggest thing we see that agencies that don't close sales very well is because they haven't done a very good job upfront of opening or engaging that relationship effectively. Establishing rules of the game upfront.

If you've got 15% or higher organic growth rate. Now, we know with some of the market conditions, we've had agencies that have been able to attain close to that. I get that, but long-term, over year after year, 15% plus organic growth rate and/or 25% profitability numbers, excluding contingency. The profitability of agency is 25% or higher. In fact, a term that we use is growth fit, which is a combination of organic growth percentage and profitability percentage of an agency, excluding contingency. The goal in agencies you work with is 40 or higher, which means you have, in this example, 15% higher organic growth rate, 25% higher profitability.

Here's the thing, I'm just throwing out some numbers for you, but most agencies settle at good enough. Our numbers are pretty good. And by the way, if you're happy with stuff on things, good for you. Agencies, I want you to be fulfilled. I want you to have freedom in your life. That's what we aspire to for agencies. But it's just interesting to me that the best agencies, the agencies that achieve these numbers, it comes back to strategies and behaviors, it's a mindset of good is the enemy of the best version possible. It's not the fact that we shouldn't be grateful for what we have in what we're doing.

Absolutely. It's the fact that are you waking up every day with passion and conviction of what's next for me and my team? What's next for our agency that we can accomplish to do great things? Because guess what? There's a book I read years ago called Thou Shall Prosper by Rabbi Daniel Lapin. It's a great book, Thou Shall Prosper. One of the things that he said, he's got a number of principles in that book that he talked about, is that so often we don't realize what that end result of dollars really means. He said dollars are simply a certificate of appreciation. It's a certificate of appreciation that you've done a great job.

You've served people with excellence. You've served others with excellence. That includes your clients. That certainly includes your team members. That the more dollars that our clients are paying us, the more dollars that we can pay our team members are all parts of certificates appreciation. Life's way more than money. 100% agree with that. But money is a great indicator is if we're doing the right things at the highest level. I wanted to share this with you today, a bit of some rants in there, but it does come from my heart. It also comes from what we see in the marketplace and working with agencies, talking to agencies every week.

Listen, I love what the independent insurance agency industry, what it represents, and how we serve people. There's so many good people. I just wouldn't feel I would be doing my job and I want to go to this podcast to share some of the frustrations we see, not because we're mad at agency leaders, because we see what's possible. When you can see it, you certainly can't achieve it. That's a bit cliche, but it's true. If you want to learn more about what we do at Sitkins, love to have a conversation. You certainly can go to our site. But if you go to sitkins.com/experience, it shares our best version possible experience roadmap, how we engage with agencies, what that looks like.

I've said it before, I'll say it again, we're not a fit for everybody, but we are looking for agencies that are growth minded. We're looking for agencies that are hungry for the next level of success, agencies that are hungry to learn new things, to share new ideas. We have an expanding network of agencies that are collaborating and communicating. We're going to be having onsite events. We certainly have virtual programs that we continue run. We do personalized coaching with the agencies. We do assessments for your agencies to help you and your agency see what's possible so you can go achieve what's possible.

Appreciate you being a listener of The Agent Leader Podcast. I haven't asked this for a while either. If this podcast is helpful for you and your agency and I've challenged you, inspired you, maybe given you a nugget to think about, an action item to go do in any of the podcasts that I've done, whether it's me, with Roger Sitkins, with a guest, we appreciated review. We continue to want to grow this podcast, share with others, and get the information out. Appreciate you. Wish you all the best in your success. Thanks for listening.