Performance Management of Self-Employed Agents

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1 Performance Management of Self-Employed Agents Managing agents is not easy. But for many of our insurance clients it is very important. The agents hold the key to increasing income from existing clients and to winning new clients. Agents can be the way the company delivers customer intimacy or be a barrier to customer intimacy. In the past insurance companies often took the view that, provided the results were good (right volumes, right margins, right compliance), the activity of agents and agencies did not really matter. It was almost part of the deal: as long as you deliver the result we will leave you alone. You get your freedom. We get our result. But today s major economic, demographic, regulatory and technological changes make it essential for insurance companies to focus not just on results (the outcomes, the lagging indicators ) but also on activity (the inputs, the leading indicators ). This is particularly important in our multi-channel environment where a decision to buy may be influenced by media campaigns driving responses, outbound telephone calls, internet presence (both B2C and C2C) as well as local sales activity. Many companies want to move to a more hands-on, more scientific, more professional approach to managing their distribution to move (in short) towards a greater level of performance management. This may involve more accurate and regular use of a CRM system. It may be a question of tracking responses to avoid duplicating effort and irritating prospects. It may require a defined sales approach as part of a multi-channel campaign. This all seems reasonable from the insurance company s perspective. But it causes alarm bells to ring within agencies. It raises questions about client ownership (who owns the relationship?) and ignites agents fears that the company is trying to steal my customers (a strange but very prevalent view!). Agents are often angry that the company is trying to control them, to remove the very freedom that made them want to be agents rather than employees. They do not want the increased workload that performance management seems to bring and they do not believe that performance management will help them sell more. In short, if it is sometimes difficult to introduce performance management to an employed sales force it is much more difficult to implement it for agents.

2 So what should insurance companies do? Just put the idea away in the filing cabinet under too difficult? Just accept the status quo? Water down the proposals so that they cause no offense but don t achieve anything either? Take an aggressive position that alienates even the best agents and drives them into the arms of the competition? There must be a better answer than these! Based on our experience of working with insurance companies across a wide range of channels (over half the world s top 25 insurers have engaged Mercuri International) we believe there are certain keys to success: 1. Base decisions on real information, not on what you think you know Agents are salespeople. They express their opinions strongly. So do the owner-managers of agencies. So do those involved in distribution management whether in the field or in head office; whether in marketing, sales, risk, underwriting or finance. Try and get at the true picture or at least understand the range of opinions. How many agents are motivated by success and financial gain and therefore willing to work harder to win more business; and how many are satisfied with their income but would be very motivated by ideas that would allow them to achieve the same result but for less effort? Before embarking on a performance management program it is vital to know what people think; what they believe really matters what motivates them; what are the obstacles; what are the rewards they are looking for. One tool for doing this would be to segment your agents into four different categories as shown in Figure 1 below and then design different approaches to get the best out of each group. CONTINUED

3 Low Performance High May be convinced by other high performers successes. Be patient. Make the case. Beware of avoiding challenge. Just do it! If they don t comply how much do you lose if they leave? Check your contracts! Co-operative High Performers Start with these and prove your case Co-operative Low Performers. Often willing to try new ideas. Chance for impressive changes Low Co-operation High FIGURE 1 2. Make it easy However valuable the performance management process you introduce, it will not be used if it is not easy and quick. This is true for most salespeople but even truer for agents. Most want to be agents partly for the freedom it gives them (whether that is the freedom to go fishing on a Friday afternoon or to simply not have the boss looking over their shoulder). So if you need agents to capture data say for a CRM system or an account plan - then try to minimise the work involved. Ask yourself if you really need that piece of data. Look at ways of making data entry easy web access, form design etc. Consider who is the best person to provide the information it may be best done by an office-based employee rather than a field-based agent. Consider the need to train people to do what you want, making sure that they are able to do the required task. I remember being shown a beautiful, elegant, sophisticated account planning tool built in Excel. It was very clever. I asked how many distributors were using it none! Keep things as simple and easy as possible.

4 3. Show the benefits It is amazing how, if people believe that a task will make their job easier, more rewarding or more enjoyable, they will find a way to carry it out. I was talking to a product manager responsible for distributing asset finance through a distribution channel. The distributors swore that the product was unsaleable and inappropriate for the relationships they managed. The Sales VP worked with the CFO to change the reward system in a way that did not reduce economic profit but which increased the reward to the distribution sales force. With no change in marketing support and with no extra training sales went up by 25% over the next 6 months. So look for ways to make your performance management initiative attractive. It may involve making the business case, perhaps by using a pilot group and a control group to demonstrate improved results. Maybe you can reward compliance, providing more marketing support or even more leads to agents who do what you want. You could consider a retrospective hike in commission (for example based on completing relationship plans or information returns to a certain standard). Whatever you do, ensure that agents and agency owners can see that it is in their interests to comply. 4. Demonstrate Trust It may seem unfair, but most agents believe that any new way of working brought in by the company is designed to cheat them. If the big issue in your distribution network is who owns the customer then don t go behind the agents backs by using information from a CRM for a direct marketing campaign. Be transparent. If that is what you plan to do then be open about it and demonstrate how it can help them. 5. Take the managers with you Don t try to bring in performance management without the commitment of managers. You will succeed or fail to the extent that you win over the managers whether these are employees of the company, owner-managers of their own agencies or managers employed by the agency principals. Sometimes even if the company cannot be directive with its agents, the owner-managers can. But they will only do this if (as above) they believe it is in their best interest for example the changes proposed will not involve extra work and will provide significant payback. It is usually worth taking the management into your confidence early in the process.

5 6. Be ready to enforce as well as encourage If you are serious about introducing performance management with your distribution channel then you will need to be willing to enforce it if needed. The credibility of your initiative will need to be maintained by demonstrating that you mean what you say. This is particularly important if you need to maintain the commitment of those who are finding the new demands onerous. Possible sanctions include holding back leads from those who do not provide accurate data, withdrawal of marketing support or (depending on contractual terms) termination of the agency. Whatever sanctions you use, agents need to believe there are negative consequences for non-compliance. Another necessary step will be to check the accuracy of data being input. If agents do not think that their data is being checked they may start cutting corners, so some form of check will be essential. Of course it will always be better to encourage than to enforce: so although you need to be ready to be strong if required, concentrate on making your performance management easy to use, productive for all concerned, engaging for your managers and based on hard facts. This paper is one of the SellWell series on sales, sales leadership, customer service and relationship management in the financial and professional services sector. Mercuri International works with 34 of Europe s top 40 financial institutions and over 400 financial businesses around the world.