Have You Ever Took an Extended Vacation, Burned Out...

[shawnmwalker]

The First problem of Burning out. I have something to look forward to every month. a three day weekend. a Guy trip to do guy stuff. A mountain biking excursion. I always have something on the schedule to look forward to. to work towards.

The second problem: Hiring. That is a problem. I again fall in line with Ins1822. go with a warm referral. When we hire it is usually a warm referral. The existing employee that refers says, "Don't make me regret this!" Pay the right amount.

 

[goillini52]

Kind of a Segway is have you guys continually made poor hiring decisions. I feel like people interview well and seem good but once in the insurance world they either drag down my retention because they don't go above and beyond in customer service or they can't sell and my new business suffers. It's driving me insane to find quality people.

I have one amazing office manager and I'm scared she is going to leave because I can't find quality staff so she gets over worked but she does make around 55-60k a year with commissions.

Since you've struck out, why not let your amazing office manager try hiring and see if she does any better than you.

 

[todd02]

Some of the best employees I've seen in insurance agencies have come from family/friend/network referral. Try mailing/calling/emailing your entire network. Clearly spell out the compensation & job description.

I'm an amazing salesman..but I'm not a good manager/trainer of people. Most very successful agencies tend to be ran by the latter. Training & motivating people is an art form & I'm just not good at it.

My approach is "shut your mouth & write business you pu$" and that hasn't worked well. But really...It's an art form. The best of the best are constantly training, motivating, rewarding, team building blah blah blah god i hate that crap i just want to sell!!!!!

Prob is once your book grows it becomes more of this opposed to writing business like a beast. ahhhhhh the progression of the life as an agency owner.

sucks ehh?

This is exactly my problem, in the last 5 yrs I've only found one employee who works their ass off. My office manager. It's really coming down to people in the work force are lazy as F***. They just want to sit back and collect a paycheck. And I'm not a motivator I'm a do'er. I can train and teach but I don't micro manage. I feel like if I have to be an adult day care provider I'd rather just fire them and keep looking for another girl like my office manager.


Do you think a base salary of 42,500 plus 50% commissions is on the higher end payscale (Texas) for an office manager who works their ass off? She also gets between 1-2% of entire agencies renewals as a retention bonus. She doesn't get renewals on what she writes due to the salary. Her first year I almost broke even on her total compensation for what she brought in to the agency. Amazing.