Blog Layout

What Digital Transformation, Talent Cliffs, Exotic Drinks and James Bond have Taught Us About The Most Trustworthy Way to Manage Our Agency Relationships

By Combined Ratio Solutions November 15th, 2021


It ain’t over ‘til it’s over.”

 You can’t argue with American baseball legend Yogi Berra who first said this phrase about baseball's 1973 National League pennant race. It wasn’t over for Yogi, and it’s not all over for us, and it’s not the end, but it may be the end of the beginning, as a famous statesman once said (Statesmen? Sportsmen?…we’ve got the lot!) 


So, what’s all over? Well, this blog series for starters, but don’t worry we’ve got plenty left to say and say it we will. You might ask “why do we feel the need to share our opinions, observations and thoughts with you?” We’ll come back to that.


Combined Ratio Solutions builds software solutions that help Carriers create and manage strong insurance-based relationships. Our six-part blog series highlighted the inability of insurers to identify their best agency producers and how to recognize what they do that makes them the best. Sales, marketing and underwriting professionals are key to you working successfully with your agents and brokers. “What” they do remains something of a mystery in many carriers. Some of that information is distributed around your existing systems. Our Agency Engagement Platform, CRS Impact help Carriers do three things:


1.     Identify – give you line of sight to the best performing producers.

2.     Gain Insight – into the most effective ways to manage relationships, with the right blend of digital and physical activities.

3.     Improve – sales engagement consistently through the adoption of winning behaviors.


We’ve covered some ground in the last six months by examining how the modern carrier protects and grows its revenues. We’ve looked at some threats. We’ve looked over the talent cliff, and into the abyss of digital transformation - the irresistible force, as it wages war with the immoveable object; peoples’ unwillingness to accept change. We’ve discussed subjects like obsession and denial with leading insurance executives including Mike Mazzuca and the “go to” Frank Sentner. We always talk about balance and have encouraged you to look at the idea of the “Combined Ratio” in a different way. A ratio resulting from how you combine people and technology, data and relationships, tangibles and intangibles that steer the middle course enabling you to come up with the ratio that helps you succeed in your broker and agency business.

We hung some of our ideas on icons like James Bond and used themes that involved exotic cocktails. That’s our attempt to use metaphors and tell stories (with some levity and humor) to communicate our ideas through the clutter of the noise we’re all confronted with on a daily basis. These ideas reveal some of who we are (that’s us being honest again), and while it might not be everyone’s “cup of tea” we’re real people and we retain a sense of humor. We’re capable of seriousness when it’s demanded, and we enjoy the perspective (and yes – clarity) that levity and humor can provide.

Why do we feel compelled to share these opinions and observations with you? There’s a few reasons; 


One is to see if you agree with us. If you do, that’s a good foundation from which to have more discussions. 

 Second, it goes back to idea of trust. Which is built on Ability and Character (as you will recall). Part of character is honesty and that’s what we’re being with you in this blog. We’re sharing our honest opinion on the challenges we see in how carriers manage relationships and our judgement that relationships matter, intangible skills are important, experienced professionals are leaving the business (and their knowledge is leaving with them), technology is part (but not all) of the answer, current deployed technologies (like the big CRM’s) can’t solve the problem and that a balanced approach in all these areas is what is needed.


The Combined Ratio – What Was In It For You

Before we draw a line under this blog series, let’s just remind you of those thoughts we’d had about how those ideas impact your team. The Combined Ratio was what we concluded all the blogs with, and was our way of summing it up, or breaking it down. 


1.     Overall, it’s about finding the right balance. In this case the combining of people and technology into the right ratios that leverage the best of technology with the trust of your word and the value of your relationship. We’re looking through the lens of what your teams actually do that makes their results consistently the best in this regard. Institutionalized “know-how” has value. Capturing it, analyzing it, and leveraging it is the challenge.


2.     Codify the behaviors we identify as “moving the needle,” “making the difference,” so that as our senior relationship veterans “age-out,” or say “I’m out” and hit the ranks of the recently retired, we’re not left high and dry, but have a digital blueprint that helps their replacements manage our agency relationships at least as well as their predecessors.


3.     While we clearly need technology to succeed in the last point, don’t get carried away by the Digital Transformation torrent. It’s about identifying sensible technology, thoughtfully deploying it and carefully combining it with the attributes of experience and sales and marketing “know-how” that will have the most impact. Carriers need to acknowledge the power and role of human relationships (the soft skills know-how) and figure out how to combine that with the technology side.


One of our favorite thoughts, and it was the one we used to close out the last blog which bought us full circle with Trust, Risk, and the tool we use the mitigate risk itself – insurance. “If we do find ourselves in a world so automated that we depend solely on machines and algorithms to make decisions about who we trust, that’s a world devoid of uncertainty.” Rachel Botsman – Who Can You Trust” A world devoid of uncertainty means a world without risk. No risk means I have nothing to insure. Yet, as we said previously, if we’ve established nothing else in this blog, surely it is that if we buy the definition of “trust” being “a confident relationship with the future”, isn’t that exactly what insurance does? Help us establish that confident relationship with the future making insurance a tool delivering trust. You’re not in the Insurance business (P&C or anything else), you’re in the trust business. That might not be news to some of you, but you’ll need to keep the idea front and center especially in a world (as we reminded you previously), where trust has been shaken more vigorously than that vodka-martini. Cheers!



By Dmitry Zhgarev 11 Oct, 2021
B y Combined Ratio Solutions O ctober  11 th , 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions 08 Sep, 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions September 8th, 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions 19 Aug, 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions August 19th, 2021 
By Dmitry Zhgarev 17 Jul, 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions July 17th, 2021 
By Combined Ratio Solutions 15 Jun, 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions June 11th, 2021
Finding the Right Ratio
By CRS 25 May, 2021
By Combined Ratio Solutions May 20th, 2021
By CRS 29 Jan, 2021
What Is a Combined Ratio and why is it our company name?
By CRS 26 Jan, 2021
A Closer Look at the Errors
By CRS 19 Jan, 2021
Our Thoughts on Deloitte's 2021 Insurance Outlook
By Dmitry Zhgarev 08 Nov, 2020
Combined Ratio Solutions Co-Founders Michael Jones, Chief Executive Officer and Luke Magnan, Chief Operating Officer spoke with MetroHartford Alliance Content Manager Nan Price about their experience launching an InsurTech startup and the importance of locating their business in Hartford. NAN PRICE: Give us a little context about when and why you launched the company. MIKE JONES: Luke and I had spent 20 years working in various facets of the insurance industry on the agency and carrier side. We had both segued into the technology side, where we met around 2012 when we were working on similar project at the same organization. As that company was getting acquired, we saw an opportunity for us to build our own company focusing on the insurance industry, which we had been part of our lives for so long. Honestly, we thought we knew what we were going to focus on and we started down that path. As we started to expose our vision to the marketplace, we received positive feedback but we found there was another business problem that really needed solving, where there was a big gap in offerings. So, we pivoted pretty quickly. We’ve been working on that concept for the last couple of years. Then, in January of 2018, we formally started the company. LUKE MAGNAN: Mike and I come from software companies that service the insurance industry. When we started thinking about going out on our own, we made a very conscious decision that we didn’t want to be a different type of software startup. We saw a different path forward and we decided early on that we weren’t going to walk down the investment or accelerator path. We wanted to be a profit-generating company as soon as possible. So, we started the services side of our business to do that and to fund the software side. That approach enabled us to do some things I think other startup companies aren’t able to do, like finding our office space in Hartford and hiring people in Hartford and paying them good salaries. NAN: Mike, you mentioned pivoting. Did the company experience any other pivots as a result of COVID-19? MIKE: Because of what we do as a services practice, we help insurers with a lot of their technology needs. So, we’re well equipped to operate remotely. Even pre-COVID-19, that’s how we communicated with our customers. With the pandemic, we found that our customers needed an added level of help when they were constrained by remote work and the demands that come along with managing people virtually. They’ve leaned on us a lot more because they know we have the capacity and expertise to coach them through managing their teams. So, in one respect we’re thriving through COVID-19 because of the nature of what we do for our customers. However, we have products we were planning to aggressively get out into the marketplace pre-COVID-19 and the pandemic slowed us down. It made it a harder sale. A lot of times in our industry, you can make a big splash when you announce your product and its value and benefits at big conferences and tradeshows. Well, all of that went away, so we did need to pivot our strategy there. And, while we had planned to be in the marketplace in March, the pandemic enabled us to pump the brakes a bit and be a little more introspective about where we were going to position our product and the value it would provide. NAN: We all know Hartford is “The Insurance Capital of The World.” As an InsurTech company, was that part of reason to locate in Hartford? LUKE: We had some time before we needed to have a formal headquarters somewhere. Mike lives in Central Massachusetts and I live outside of Hartford, where I grew up. My first job was downtown at The Hartford. I spent a couple of years of living downtown and then I got my graduate degree at UConn Hartford downtown and I worked for Insurity, which is also in downtown Hartford. So, I had this sense for Hartford and a real desire to set up shop here. MIKE: When we were deciding where we wanted to locate, we contemplated Boston, Worcester, and Hartford. As the non-Hartford resident, I’ve been impressed with the strong network community here. From a leadership perspective, I was impressed by the accessibility to have our voices Heard. We were able to meet with Mayor Bronin to discuss what our business would look like in Hartford. I don’t think we would have that experience if we went to Boston—and probably not in Worcester either. LUKE: When Mike and I had the conversation about where to locate, Hartford won. There were two separate trains of thought. One is, like you said, Hartford is “The Insurance Capital of The World.” This is where big insurance companies are and there’s a history of insurance operations starting and being successful here. It’s something Hartford does and there’s a certain cache to being in Hartford. Mike and I spend a lot of time working with the European market and some big London-based insurers. Hartford is very much a big part of the map for them. So, having a Hartford address was significant. The second thing is there’s also certainly a lot of talent here in Hartford. These big insurers have a lot of employees on both the business and the technology side. That makes it easy to tap into industry expertise. MIKE: We’re excited about being in the community and in the insurance scene. We see that there’s a renaissance happening in Hartford in the insurance industry. Right now, we’re actively recruiting for some more talent and we’ve been impressed with the types of resumes we’re seeing. NAN: Where do you see the benefits of becoming involved with the MetroHartford Alliance and the Hartford Chamber of Commerce? MIKE: It’s given us insight into where to find the networks we should be tied into. Admittedly, we know these networks are accessible. But our involvement with the Alliance and the Hartford Chamber provides opportunities for introductions to people from all types of industries, not just insurance. It’s been a huge help for us to leverage those networks. LUKE: With regard to the Hartford Chamber, at the end of the day, a rising tide lifts all boats. The more businesses that are successful in Hartford, the more talent comes in, the more young people come to live here. All of those things only help our proposition. So, being a member of the Chamber is an easy way to help contribute to that. Learn more about Combined Ratio Solutions www.combinedratio.com | LinkedIn 
More Posts
Share by: