RHS 191 - AMA: Leading a Remote Team, Training Programs & Advice to My Younger Self

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Speaker 5 In a crude laboratory in the basement of his home.

Speaker 6 Hello, everyone, welcome back to the show.

Speaker 1 Today we have a special episode, Ask Me Anything episode that if you guys enjoy i would love to do more of these it's kind of a q a format uh recently asked all of you to submit questions about you know really anything that you wanted to know or wanted me to answer uh got a whole bunch of questions which was awesome appreciate everyone who submitted questions i pulled out uh I think three or four questions that I'm going to address on today's episode that I just thought were interesting and engaging and that would add some value to you guys.

Speaker 1 But if you enjoy this format, let me know and we'll do more of these. And you can always submit questions.

Speaker 1 I've kind of been trying to dial in my social media usage just because I'm super busy with Rogue Risk and other things that are going on.

Speaker 1 So the best place to connect with me would actually be Instagram. I just find it to be super easy to manage and respond to people and I like to share images and different stuff.

Speaker 1 So I am Ryan underscore Hanley, H-I-N-L-E-Y on Instagram. So go there, follow me, ask questions, whatever.

Speaker 1 I also post a ton of updates and different stuff that we're learning at Rogue or in general thoughts. And I've just been using that platform quite a bit to grow and share.

Speaker 1 And it's really the best place to connect with me. So go to Instagram.
If you have questions, leave the questions there.

Speaker 1 And then if we start building up a regular flow of questions, we'll do more of these Ask Me Anything episodes. But in the meantime, I got some great questions I want to go through.

Speaker 1 A couple of them. are general and a couple are specific to the insurance industry.

Speaker 1 So for those of you who listen to the show that are part of the insurance industry, you're going to get some stuff specifically for you.

Speaker 1 For those of you who are not, you're going to get a ton of great kind of insights, or hopefully, a ton of great insights. I have to actually answer the questions, and you have to enjoy them.

Speaker 1 But not everything is insurance-focused. Some of it is, you know, kind of ubiquitous to business in general.
So,

Speaker 1 we'll get to all those in just a second.

Speaker 1 Guys, a couple, couple big announcements for you before we get there. The podcast is going to be moving off of, starting in September, is going to be moving off of the agency intelligence main feed.

Speaker 1 So, if you are listening to this in the agency intelligence main feed, then I would encourage you to subscribe to my specific feed, my specific kind of whether it's iTunes or Spotify or whatever.

Speaker 1 Otherwise, you will stop hearing the show. So, we're going to be going to only my feed.
It's not going to be pushed out through that kind of feed that has all the shows in the agency

Speaker 1 in the

Speaker 1 podcast network feed it's just going to be my feed so if you want to continue to get the show if you want to continue continue to listen to the episodes we have a tremendous tremendous fall schedule guests uh different different kind of content formats we're going to be coming out and testing and trying to really deliver a tremendous amount of value to you guys through this format um as uh you know we're learning a ton at rogue i want to share that stuff with you um also have some amazing guests lined up and uh if you want that stuff starting in september uh got to be subscribed wherever you listen to your podcast to the Ryan Hanley show feed.

Speaker 1 If you're listening to this through the agency intelligence feed starting in September, that will be done. You will no longer be able to get it there.
Great.

Speaker 1 Guys, and the last thing is, you know, I said on the last episode, I'm not doing sponsorships anymore. That is 100% the case.

Speaker 1 I'm doing that so I can mostly, one, I just don't have time to manage sponsors, but mostly I want to focus specifically on value to you.

Speaker 1 I want to focus on sharing content, sharing ideas that helps you grow, that helps you

Speaker 1 just live the life that you want to live as much as I can provide you with solutions, heuristics, values, people that you should follow who can provide you those things.

Speaker 1 But if you do get value from this show, what I would appreciate more than anything is just sharing the show, right? Sharing the show in whatever way you think. makes sense.

Speaker 1 Tell somebody about it, text it to somebody, email it to somebody, share it with your team, push it out into social media.

Speaker 1 And if you're feeling super froggy, ratings and reviews on iTunes really help. I checked the other day.

Speaker 1 You know, we have 91

Speaker 1 ratings and a 4.9% rating on iTunes for this show, but we haven't had a new rating or review since 2021.

Speaker 1 I think some of that has to do with people listening to this show on the agency intelligence feed and not. my feed and specifically.

Speaker 1 But if you're feeling super froggy and you want to jump over there and leave a rating and review of the show, that helps as well.

Speaker 1 Because as I I reach out to guests that aren't in the insurance industry, that are outside of my main industry, they look at that stuff.

Speaker 1 as a validation point for whether or not they're willing to come on the show.

Speaker 1 So the more ratings and reviews you have, obviously the more positive ratings and reviews you have, and the more current ratings and reviews that you have, it helps me reach out to more interesting guests from outside the insurance industry, bring them in, have them share their expertise, thoughts, whatever with you guys.

Speaker 1 So would very much appreciate that.

Speaker 1 So, okay, so that's kind of the business. Share, leave a rating review would be tremendous.
If you're not into either one of those things, then just listen. And I appreciate you for that.

Speaker 1 Also, I guess very last housekeeping update: I am going to start sharing the video recordings of the conversations that I have as well. And if you're watching this and

Speaker 1 for some reason, or if you're listening to this, and some for some reason want to watch, I'll have this, the video version of this

Speaker 1 up on

Speaker 1 YouTube as well. So if you go to, we're at YouTube, just search Ryan Hanley, you'll find me.

Speaker 1 And if you don't, it's Ryan M. My middle name is Michael, Ryan M.
Hanley on YouTube. So like youtube.com slash at Ryan M.
Hanley is is my YouTube.

Speaker 1 So I will have the the videos and recordings up on YouTube as well, just because people have been asking for that.

Speaker 1 There's some segment, you know, of the listeners and stuff that that like to listen or like to watch on YouTube for for whatever reason um uh no judgment just they like to do that so we're gonna start uh providing value there as well okay so with all that uh let's get to these questions

Speaker 1 um like i said i got three or four of them um and let's see where do we want to start so let's let's uh this first question is,

Speaker 1 hey, brother, what's the best tips around leading and being engaged remotely? I live in Florida and we're scaling our team out through North Carolina and other states.

Speaker 1 And I find it sometimes to, it's sometimes tough to be apart when you're not in the office. And that is an absolutely tremendous question.
So remote leadership is incredibly difficult.

Speaker 1 There are many things that you have to think about. Most notably is that

Speaker 1 it is very easy for even high-performers to feel like they're on an island. And I'll tell you, I feel this way sometimes.
You know what I mean? I work from home a lot.

Speaker 1 We do have a co-working space here in the greater Albany area. Technically, it's in Troy.
It's been our kind of headquarters

Speaker 1 since the first day that Rogue existed. And we have a couple shared office spaces that we rent that are specifically ours.
And that's kind of a good place.

Speaker 1 But there's only four of us here in the Albany area. The rest of our 20,

Speaker 1 if you count our VAs, 25-person team is spread throughout the entire country and the world, obviously, with some of the VAs. And, you know, that

Speaker 1 is a dynamic that's very interesting. Now, what I'll tell you is during COVID, during anything like that,

Speaker 1 we weren't impacted at all. Like, it meant, like, obviously the businesses we were working with, there were a lot of impacts to society.

Speaker 1 But like, in terms of our day-to-day activity, COVID had a zero impact by being remote and by being native remote. Like we're natively remote as a company.

Speaker 1 But the biggest thing we have to watch, particularly as leaders, is

Speaker 1 this sense of being on an island. And you could look at a high performer and say, geez, they're doing great.

Speaker 1 You know, they're fine.

Speaker 1 I'm going to kind of ignore them or give them space or

Speaker 1 whatever and focus on the people who are having problems or are problems. Now,

Speaker 1 you you obviously, it's our nature to give the squeaky wheel the grease. But if we only focus on our highest performing or our

Speaker 1 problem children, I guess you could say, as leaders, then what happens is our high performers will start to deteriorate.

Speaker 1 And the reason for that is they feel alone and they maybe don't feel appreciated.

Speaker 1 They feel like they're not getting attention because even if we're very good at what we do, we still have this narrative that is constantly going on in our head. So

Speaker 1 we use Slack heavily. Slack's very big.

Speaker 1 We also include, we do regular, every third week, we do an all-hands meeting.

Speaker 1 Each department has their own meetings regularly scheduled, right? So regularly scheduled meetings, very important. I hate over meeting.

Speaker 1 You gotta be, this is gotta find a balance here, but making sure the entire team gets together, making sure that each individual unit gets together.

Speaker 1 And then the other part is as a leader, randomly reaching out to people is huge, particularly if you're using a tool like Slack or Teams or whatever.

Speaker 1 I just like tools that work, so that's why I use Slack instead of Teams.

Speaker 1 But, you know, just random, hey, how's it going? What do you, what are you up to?

Speaker 1 What's working for you this week?

Speaker 1 Any big wins this week? Anything I can take off your plate for you? Is there somebody I need to connect with you on the team? What's happening? How's it going? You're doing a great job.

Speaker 1 Like, just these little drop-ins to your team members randomly go a very long way it shows that you care all right additionally um you creating some sort of company culture uh creating swag like we found when we created uh swag items t-shirts you know whatever that that was had a uh that had a great impact because now people are wearing them in zoom calls they feel like they're part of something even if they're working from home you're wearing your company logo you know be it a polo or a sweatshirt or t-shirt uh that goes a very long way.

Speaker 1 Like some of these things that maybe a company, you know, people will say, Well, a company your size doesn't need that stuff, or why are you wasting money on that?

Speaker 1 It's not a waste of money if it's pulling people together, right? If it's making them feel like they're part of something bigger.

Speaker 1 Because when you're in an office, you always feel like you're part of something bigger, right? It kind of smacks you in the face every day.

Speaker 1 When you're working remotely, it is it is very, it is very easy to feel like your contribution is not appreciated or your contribution is not being noticed, etc.

Speaker 1 And we as leaders have to be very, very active.

Speaker 1 So, when I'm doing, like, so during our all-hands meeting, I'll usually take the first five to 15 minutes, depending on what I want to say, and do like a little monologue.

Speaker 1 And that monologue will include shout-outs to team members that I think are doing great, maybe a story from the week. I'll share big wins.

Speaker 1 I'll share how different departments, different departments have done things that I think are exceptional or interesting or some big task that they knocked down.

Speaker 1 But we have to be over over the top with pulling people in. Because when we feel like we're on an island, what we do is a lot of negativity starts to seep into our head.

Speaker 1 We start to tell ourselves stories about, man, they don't appreciate me or man, I'm working so hard and no one even knows I'm doing it or

Speaker 1 why am I killing myself for this company or nothing, you know, this

Speaker 1 certain process doesn't work, but no one wants to hear it. And the answer is, you know, a lot of times, if we're not intentional about these things, that could be true.

Speaker 1 We could be overlooking that person. And what we don't want is for anyone to feel like they're alone, right?

Speaker 1 That is the key to remote leadership is do everything you can to let every team member on your team know that they are not alone.

Speaker 1 And depending on the size of your company, that's going to be more difficult for, say, the CEO. You may have to really push this cultural thing down to your next management layer so that they're also

Speaker 1 touching everyone and making sure they're checking in when you're in an office you can just walk by everyone's desk hey how's it going little chit chat a little water cooler stuff maybe company picnic once a month very very easy in a remote environment we have to be super intentional about touch points about reaching out about bringing people together uh little contests little you know sometimes we do picture contests where people share like you know, a picture from their weekend or,

Speaker 1 you know, whatever. Stuff like that draws people in and it allows them to understand our culture.

Speaker 1 And as the top level leader, whoever, you know, if you're the CEO of that company, you have to over share.

Speaker 1 You have to over, even if it's not in your disposition, you have to over share because the opposite,

Speaker 1 if you, if you, if you are kind of quiet and, and keeping to yourself as a CEO and you're like, you know, I need to get my work done.

Speaker 1 Yes, I get that part.

Speaker 1 But when you run a remote company, you can't work in isolation as a leader. People People feel like you don't exist.
They lose touch with the company. You are a linchpin.
You have to be there.

Speaker 1 You have to be vocal and you have to be intentional about it. So

Speaker 1 hopefully that helped. Hopefully there's some good tidbits in there.
Remote leadership is very difficult.

Speaker 1 Leadership in general is very difficult. But remote leadership is

Speaker 1 remote leadership is a challenge. And it takes, and the best thing I can say is be intentional about making sure no one feels alone.

Speaker 1 If you do that, the tactics specific to how you do that are gonna be your company, your brand, your culture, what you want. But if you are intentional about making your people not feel alone,

Speaker 1 you will get a lot of runway out of that. And as long as you're sincere about it, it'll be very good.
Okay, so that's the first question. Thank you for that.
That was tremendous.

Speaker 1 Let's go on to our second question here. This one is specific about training.
How did you create, set up, and monitor the effectiveness of your training program?

Speaker 1 We desperately need to hire CSRs, but I want us to at least have a training framework in place. So, this question has two parts.

Speaker 1 I'm going to tell you what we do today, and I'm going to tell you what we are currently building right this second. So, we

Speaker 1 today

Speaker 1 have someone on our team who is dedicated to training, and they come in and they do like one-on-one kind of hold someone's hand through the processes.

Speaker 1 We will send people out to, I really like Hartford's account manager training. So, we'll use third-party trainings through carriers, use those as well when necessary, depending on where the person is.

Speaker 1 But today, it is a lot of one-on-one, obviously virtual, but one-on-one walking through tools, talking, asking questions. Those first couple weeks are

Speaker 1 very

Speaker 1 kind of driven by that one-on-one relationship with the individual in our company who is responsible for training new team members.

Speaker 1 That being said, and we've created some SOPs and different different resources.

Speaker 1 I've shared with a lot of people the one-call close PDF that we have. We take them through things like that,

Speaker 1 whatever. So that's been good.
As far as how do we track or manage it, it's mostly done by

Speaker 1 that individual who is the head of training. And her job, you know, is really to say this person's ready.
And if someone's struggling, then they come to her and she figures out a solution.

Speaker 1 It's very customized to that individual person. It's very labor-intensive.

Speaker 1 And while it works,

Speaker 1 it tends to be, you know, it's not uniform and

Speaker 1 it tends to be very dependent on the person. And then you might find out that that person doesn't know as much as they said they know.
And there's a lot of challenges to that.

Speaker 1 So what we are currently building is

Speaker 1 that same training professional while still doing that with the employees today is building out essentially, I think we're going to use, we might use

Speaker 1 teachable or another one of the uh kind of coursework programs like you would buy a sas

Speaker 1 course or whatever um we're going to use that but we're going to internalize it and basically build out moduled program that is specific to rogue risk that that new uh sales professionals csrs to start will go through and then we'll build out trainings for other departments in the company as we see fit but but what i want to be able to do is take every single individual who comes to this company and walk them through a uniform process that talks about our culture, talks about the products we sell, talks about the tools we use, and then depending on their position, breaks down very specific skills, processes, et cetera, to that position.

Speaker 1 And this is teaching them kind of the rogue way. Like this is our digital producer school.
And

Speaker 1 we are doing this

Speaker 1 because,

Speaker 1 you know, we've kind of picked now to do it. One, we didn't have the processes.
This last year of our existence has been a lot of process documentation, a lot of

Speaker 1 fixing processes that had been broke and we were kind of just like had bubblegum and band-aids. We are kind of formally fixing those processes and then documenting them.

Speaker 1 And it's now time to kind of put that into something that we can train at scale. Because, you know, the whole goal of Rogue has never been to have five or I think we have eight producers today.

Speaker 1 we're hiring two or three more in the not too distant future but the goal is to someday have 100 producers here and and and to get there and to have everyone be on page one if if someone goes through our training program and they don't like what we are i want to know like immediately i want them to there to be no questions what we're about how we operate and what it means to be uh an uh a team member here at rogue risk and then and if they don't like that if that doesn't make sense to them, if they don't connect with that concept, then they can just pull the ripcord themselves, right?

Speaker 1 I mean, a big part of a successful relationship is that a lot of times people take a job hoping it's going to work.

Speaker 1 I want them to get so much information up front that they know it's going to work for them, right? That's that's a big part of it and aspirational today, but uh, that is where we're going.

Speaker 1 I think that a formalized, consistent process that people can go to that is specific and unique to Rogue Risk or whatever, you know, in case, in this case, whatever your agency is.

Speaker 1 And these tools are relatively low cost.

Speaker 1 You know, I think we're, I think we pay like less than $100 a month and we can send as many people through it as we want.

Speaker 1 This, this training and the uniformity of this training when you're growing at scale is incredibly important.

Speaker 1 And,

Speaker 1 you know, so that's kind of how we're doing it. We're literally going to make it like a, you know, someday probably have a subdomain, school.rogrisk.com.

Speaker 1 And then when we get a new employee they can go through it or if a current employee is having an issue they can log in and walk through that module again learn how to do that thing or someone moves positions all that training is already set up and people know exactly what they should be doing how they should be doing it and there's no questions around that uh this is going back to our first question and it's why i've asked that first question or answered that first question first around remote work in a remote work environment where you know most agencies train people like you sit next to the best csr or the best producer and you shadow them, right?

Speaker 1 That's that, which is an incredible way to learn, not scalable, but incredibly effective.

Speaker 1 What

Speaker 1 the reality of a remote work environment is that you just don't have that ability.

Speaker 1 Like, you know, we're today not at a place where we can fly people in to some centralized location and get tons of training.

Speaker 1 We don't have a headquarters like that, nor do I necessarily see us building up enough

Speaker 1 human capital mass in any particular location that that would make sense.

Speaker 1 So in order to have a similar impact and effect at scale with a remote environment, we need a digital tool, a digital training platform.

Speaker 1 And after evaluation, you know, we came up with one of these course tools and we're just gonna build it out. And then there'll be quizzes at the end of each module.

Speaker 1 So we know the person is at least at least downloaded some of that information into their brain. And then we can track the completion of that.

Speaker 1 And, you know, hopefully someday I'd love for people who've gone through kind of the rogue producer school to

Speaker 1 almost look at it as a badge of honor because they learned

Speaker 1 this type of production, digital production.

Speaker 1 I would like to,

Speaker 1 we're in the process of creating a best in class for digital production. There's, you know, there's, you know, Mick Hunt's new platform, Patty.

Speaker 1 There's Killing Commercial. There are other sales trainers out there who have amazing programs for the things that they're great at.

Speaker 1 But I would put our digital sales process up against just about anybody. That's certainly what we do best.
And we want to be the best in the world at everything we do. So,

Speaker 1 and training is a big part of that, not just to do it, but because there is no way to model out results if you don't know what people are capable of and how long does it take to validate and all this kind of stuff comes from consistent and proper training.

Speaker 1 And that's why we've prioritized this task in the business. So, that's how we're doing it.
Hope that helps.

Speaker 1 And when that's done, I'll talk more about it. Happy to answer any questions you guys have about that.

Speaker 1 I want to answer one more question. This one will be specific to the insurance industry.

Speaker 1 And then we have

Speaker 1 kind of a final question that is not related to the insurance industry that I'm happy to answer as well.

Speaker 1 What's up, guys? Sorry to take you away from the episode, but as you know, we do not run ads on this show. And in exchange for that, I need your help.

Speaker 1 If you're loving this episode, if you enjoy this podcast, whether you're watching on YouTube or you're listening on your favorite podcast platform, I would love for you to subscribe, share.

Speaker 1 Comment if you're on YouTube, leave a rating review if you're on Spotify or Apple iTunes, et cetera. This helps the show grow.
It helps me bring more guests in.

Speaker 1 We have a tremendous lineup of people coming in, men and women who've done incredible things sharing their stories around peak performance, leadership, growth, sales, the things that are going to help you grow as a person and grow your business.

Speaker 1 But they all check out comments, ratings, reviews. They check out all this information before they come on.

Speaker 1 So as I reach out to more and more people and want to bring them in and share their stories with you, I need your help. Share the show, subscribe if you're not subscribed.

Speaker 1 And I'd love for you to leave a comment about the show because I read all the comments. Or if you're on Apple or Spotify, leave a rating review of this show.

Speaker 1 I love you for listening to this show, and I hope you enjoy it listening as much as I do, creating the show for you. All right, I'm out of here.
Peace. Let's get back to the episode.
So

Speaker 1 the last question has to do, well, I'll just read the question.

Speaker 1 As an underwriter in the commercial insurance space, I'm really, and I mean really, in all caps, interested in the agency side of the world. What makes agents tick?

Speaker 1 How can I be a better underwriter and best partner to work with to help them land large accounts with my agents, et cetera? Underwriters in general get a bad rap on social media, it seems.

Speaker 1 I would love to get a professional mentor in the agency space that could share knowledge and dialogue with me and help me up the agency platform ladder to learn more about that side of the business.

Speaker 1 One that could help me to grow in my role as a production underwriter and agency manager.

Speaker 1 How would you suggest I go about doing this? Any ideas? Would an agent out there be willing to mentor me or is this a totally ridiculous idea? All right. One, this is not a ridiculous idea.

Speaker 1 It's a great idea. I I love, you know, one of the, one of the biggest roadblocks in production is underwriter relationships.
Now,

Speaker 1 there are some carriers that are very good at underwriter relationships. Two that come to mind for me are Cincinnati and Acadia.

Speaker 1 You know, both have an underwriter first culture. Both have underwriter, both

Speaker 1 operate in a way in which underwriters can actually make decisions.

Speaker 1 Unfortunately, so often, underwriters have had their their ability to actually make decisions outside of what the technology tells them to do.

Speaker 1 It's frustrating, right? Like you go through a portal and maybe you get a decline on an account that you otherwise think shouldn't be declined.

Speaker 1 And then come to find out, so you go to the underwriter and you're like, why is this being declined? I don't understand. This is a great account, et cetera.

Speaker 1 Assuming that it is, the underwriter will basically tell you most of the time that their hands are tied. If the portal says no, the answer is no.

Speaker 1 Well, then, you know, what's the underwriter doing there? And I think that's, I think that the power that has been taken away from underwriters is a big part of

Speaker 1 what's behind this question, is that agency owners and agency professionals in general feel very frustrated by underwriters who seemingly are there to tell them no, right?

Speaker 1 If you want to make friends with an agent, Help them get to yes,

Speaker 1 right? It's a completely, and I'll tell you, for most of the underwriters that I've worked with in my life, this is not the way that they address most problems, right?

Speaker 1 They're like, well, I can't do this because, and I can't do this because, and I can't do this because, and you're like, oh my God, you're just telling me no. Like, what, you know, no, no, no, no.

Speaker 1 And it's like, that doesn't help me. I don't grow as a professional.
I don't grow as a producer or an agency owner hearing all these no's. Like, how do I get to yes? Teach me how I get to yes.

Speaker 1 That's that type of mentality, we call it inside of Rogue being of service.

Speaker 1 I'm always talking and training the team around the ideas of being of service.

Speaker 1 The idea of being of service essentially just means like

Speaker 1 operate from a helpful standpoint. Instead of saying, if someone as an underwriter, if an agent calls you with a risk, instead of just going, no, we can't do this because of this, go,

Speaker 1 here's...

Speaker 1 Here's how I could do this risk. Here's what this could look like.
I could write just the GL, and then, but you got to go someplace else for the comp and the commercial auto.

Speaker 1 But I'd love to get on the GL in case our underwriting changes someday. And that would be a great account for me.
So, let's get a yes on the GL and then maybe you place the rest with someone else.

Speaker 1 Or, or,

Speaker 1 man, you know, there's this one aspect of this submission that is really tough for me. Is there a possibility that they would actually not do this? Or would they put a gate on this?

Speaker 1 Or what if they fixed up this particular part of the building? Or,

Speaker 1 you know, I'm seeing this on their website. Is this actually true? Right.
Like,

Speaker 1 I'm sure every producer can relate to this concept.

Speaker 1 I had

Speaker 1 a really nice size construction account come in about a year and a half ago when I was still producing on a regular basis. And I'm like, this is knocked down.
This is a great account.

Speaker 1 I'm like, this is going to, it was probably going to be like probably all in with.

Speaker 1 the package and the comp.

Speaker 1 We were going to hold on their commercial auto as a different effective date.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 it's probably like $30,000, a little $30,000, $30,000 account, which was a nice account for me.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 I submit this account and I'm like, this is a freaking no-brainer. Like I knew, like

Speaker 1 they did like carpentry stuff, but it was in a state where that wasn't as big a deal. It wasn't New York.
And the comp made sense and went through the whole thing and it looked good in the rater.

Speaker 1 I got pricing and

Speaker 1 submit. And because of the carpentry class, it did have to be, you know, just kind of looked at by an underwriter.
And

Speaker 1 two days later, I get a decline. So, two days later, after that submission, I get a decline.

Speaker 1 Just a decline. And you're like, so now I'm like, what the is going on? Like, why did I get a decline on this account? This looked like, this looked like a perfect account.

Speaker 1 And now I just get a flat decline 48 hours later. Like, that's infuriating to me.

Speaker 1 So, come to find out, the underwriter looked on the website and saw saw that they put roofing on one page on their website in one spot. Now,

Speaker 1 what they meant was,

Speaker 1 what the person actually meant was, because they don't do roofing, I mean, I knew this business, was that if they were doing a remodel or carpentry remodel, they could like fix up the end of a roof or something, right?

Speaker 1 Like, just if they like damage or something was damaged, they could just fix it up. They're not roofing, you know, and they're certainly not going on roofs.

Speaker 1 They just, that, you know, the fascia and all that kind of stuff, like they could do all that. And

Speaker 1 so the underwriter just flat declines it. And I'm like, why? And I, so I email them and I'm like, why was this declined? And then they send me a screenshot of that.

Speaker 1 And I'm like, they don't do roofing. They're like, it's on their website.
Doesn't matter. They do it.
Decline. And you're, and now you get murderous, right?

Speaker 1 You're like, I want to reach through my computer screen and strangle this underwriter because that's three grand in revenue for us, say, just at a flat, conservative 10% commission rate.

Speaker 1 I was like, that's, they don't do roofing, don't care, right? So instead of, hey, do they actually do roofing? Because you didn't submit roofing.

Speaker 1 Nowhere else on the website other than this one place do I see the word roofing. Do they actually do roofing? No, they don't do roofing.

Speaker 1 Here's, I can have the owner sign a statement that they don't do roofing

Speaker 1 and then have them remove it from the website, right? Like that was the solution that I provided. And they're like, no, no, we saw it, you know, decline.
And that kind of not helpful flat decline.

Speaker 1 One, it makes you feel like you don't matter to them, right?

Speaker 1 So if if I'm a producer and an underwriter just flat declines something with no real explanation, and then when I bring them solutions, they just throw their hands up like, no, can't help you, you feel like you don't matter.

Speaker 1 And the return is, I now don't submit business to you because now I know you're not trying to help me solve problems. You just want to tell me no, because that makes your job easier.

Speaker 1 So I think that the first bridge, if you really wanted to be proactive, was start talking in terms of yes. Like, how do we write this? Or even, you know what?

Speaker 1 This one's a hard no, but geez, when you get one that looks like this, if they don't do this little thing over here, we could absolutely write that and we'd love those.

Speaker 1 And maybe here's two that I declined from another agent that maybe you want to take a run at and or that, you know, whatever. I don't just the idea is work to yes.

Speaker 1 If you want to be an agent's best friend, help them get to yes. Right.
That's the whole key. You're supposed to be a team writing new business, but most underwriters are no first.

Speaker 1 You're like, why, why are you even here? Like, all you do is tell me no. That's the general perception agents have.
And if you can change that

Speaker 1 by working more towards yes and helping them find yes and talking in terms of yes, you're gonna make a tremendous number of friends. You're gonna move up that agent's ranking in terms of submission.

Speaker 1 They're gonna think about you first. And I think, as an underwriter, that's what I would want: for people to think of me first.
So, cool. All right, great question.
All right.

Speaker 1 Last and final question for this very first AMA Ask Me Anything

Speaker 1 episode of the podcast.

Speaker 1 Here we go. Let's see.
If you could go back to your younger self and tell yourself one thing, what would it be and why?

Speaker 1 So when I saw this question, it actually made me a little nervous because

Speaker 1 I didn't have an immediate answer, but I did do some thinking about it. Now, this one is going to be specific to me.

Speaker 1 And actually,

Speaker 1 it came from something I said to my kids after I had read this. And then I said it to my kids over the weekend.
And then I was like, that's what I would tell myself, right?

Speaker 1 So that's where this came from. So you know.

Speaker 1 So I'm going to answer this in terms of what I actually said to my children. And I wish that someone when I was younger had said this to me.

Speaker 1 The context of it is

Speaker 1 we were, my kids play baseball. Baseball season is officially over, but they still love to play.

Speaker 1 And on Saturday, what they wanted to do was was go over to the fields and take batting practice on the field. So

Speaker 1 I have a nine and seven year old sons. They both play travel baseball.
And we're over there and I'm throwing them pitches. And,

Speaker 1 you know, my

Speaker 1 kids, I think, unfortunately, like a lot of kids today,

Speaker 1 lack a killer instinct.

Speaker 1 Because our world has softened so much and everything is about feelings and we're our feelings, which is like the worst advice ever. We are not our feelings or or our emotions.

Speaker 1 You know,

Speaker 1 they're that some of that killer instinct has been taken out of me. My kids don't necessarily, or they're let's just say they have undeveloped killer instinct.
Yet, both are incredibly talented.

Speaker 1 It's it's wild. Like, I look at them and compare them to me at similar ages.
Now, I know they're young, but they take baseball very seriously, so there is a level of that.

Speaker 1 They,

Speaker 1 I was all killer instinct and no skill. I was like a hammerhead.
I just

Speaker 1 ran and dove and swung the bat as hard as I could. Like

Speaker 1 skill, technique, not so much, right? Like, I mean, my dad was my coach. My dad's a great guy, but he was a football player trying to teach his kid how to play baseball.

Speaker 1 And it was really just like swing harder and keep your eye on the ball. So like, I didn't get a lot of technique training.
I don't know that I would have taken to it even if I did.

Speaker 1 I was like a bull in a china shop. That was my, that was the way I played.
I was all hustle, all heart, less skill. I developed skill as I went, but, but certainly at their age,

Speaker 1 it was just a hammerhead. Uh, but I wanted to win, and I wanted to be successful, and I wanted to get on base, and I wanted to take an extra base, and I wanted to dive, and I, all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 1 That's, I like, it would like, it would like offend me even at a young age if like a ball got by me if I was playing on the infield.

Speaker 1 I played a lot of infield and eventually became a catcher, but like it,

Speaker 1 it would like offend me if that happened, even in practice. Like these guys, they miss a ball.
They're like, meh, meh, you know, whatever.

Speaker 1 It just boggles my mind that that's the way the thought process is. But so we're talking about the game, and it was actually my younger son was like, you know, we're here.
We're sweating.

Speaker 1 It's hot out. We're at this field doing this work.
I mean, I love. doing these things with them, but at the same time, there's like a million other things I'd rather be doing

Speaker 1 than just, you know, sweating out here if they're not going to engage. So I had, so basically what I said to my younger son, which is the answer to the question,

Speaker 1 there's no redos.

Speaker 1 Fucking go as hard as you can.

Speaker 1 You don't have to win. You don't have to be perfect.
Your technique doesn't have to be the best,

Speaker 1 but go as hard as you can all the time. Like you get one life.
That's it. And I know that's heady for young kids, but like I talk to my kids like they're adults, just so you guys are aware.

Speaker 1 I don't do the, I don't hide things from them.

Speaker 1 You know, we try to, you know, some of the sex stuff I keep kind of bottled up. But like for the most part, I talk to them about heady concepts because the world is real and it's hard.

Speaker 1 And I can get hit by a freaking bus tomorrow.

Speaker 1 And do I want there to be unsaid things, lessons, ideas that I live by today that are core values and virtues for me today as a a 42-year-old, that if I were to get hit by a bus tomorrow, would I regret not having said or shared certain concepts or ideas with them?

Speaker 1 I don't want that to be the case, which is why I talk to them like adults.

Speaker 1 So, but if I were to go back and in that moment, it triggered me, it would be that all this nonsense, work-life balance is bullshit. It's consulting nonsense.
It's TED Talk BS that

Speaker 1 sounds super good, but isn't how you actually win, right? Winning matters, I guess. Winning matters.
So go hard. Go hard.

Speaker 1 Like, like, it's, you know, I, I, I, I've been doing a lot of stuff on Instagram and sharing a lot of concepts and ideas as I continue to develop and grow as a person

Speaker 1 and try to kind of find peak performance in my own life. And, you know, I keep coming back to this idea of like, so many people want to rest.
They want it easy. I don't want it easy.

Speaker 1 I want everything to be hard. I want it to be hard.
I want it to be work. I want to be pushed.
I want to to be stressed.

Speaker 1 And I want to know that when I get to the end, whenever that is, that I went as hard as I could and that I did everything I could. And wins and losses, you know,

Speaker 1 for sure. But, but, well, I don't, I don't even think of it as losses.
I think it wins and lessons. But like, you're going to have losses.
There's going to be failures.

Speaker 1 Those things are going to happen. But they don't matter if you're going as hard as you can.
Because if you're going as hard as you can and you have a loss, do you know what you do? You keep

Speaker 1 going.

Speaker 1 And this is the thing. We give up, right? We give up.
Everyone gives up.

Speaker 1 You're not feeling it that day. You know, that's what my son said.
Ah, dad, I'm not into it today.

Speaker 1 I said, you're not into it. I said, we drove all the way over here.
It's sweating. I'm sweating.
It's hot. I'm throwing pitches to you.
You have a bat in your hand and you're not feeling it today.

Speaker 1 Come on, man. Like, we're here.
Engage. Like, fucking engage in the world and go hard.
I don't care if you hit the ball.

Speaker 1 Honestly, if you swing a miss or you hit a pop-up or if you were in a game, you hit a hard ground ball and got out, doesn't matter. Don't care if you strike out.
Don't care what the result is.

Speaker 1 I am completely detached from the outcome. But go hard.
Like if at the end of the game, you didn't try as hard as you possibly could, even if you win, you didn't win.

Speaker 1 Because what you taught yourself is you could win without going as hard as you can, which becomes a habit, which becomes a a negotiation tactic for the resistance the next time you want to do something hard right there the resistance starts going you don't have to you might be successful if you don't go as hard as you can right that's what the resistance starts whispering in your ear you don't have to try as hard as you want you you could you you still might win even if you even if you don't go as hard as you want right you don't have to do that you know you're you've you've already won a couple times you don't you don't need to keep going hard take a break you should take a break right that's what the resistance tells you and

Speaker 1 if the resistance is negotiating with you, if the resistance is telling you that you don't have to go hard, I don't care how much willpower you have. Eventually, you're going to break down.
So

Speaker 1 don't even give it a shot. Don't even give it air.
Don't give it any fuel. Just work as hard as you can in the moments where you're there to work.
Doesn't mean you don't need rest. Sure, you do.

Speaker 1 I like resting at the end of the day. I think it's a great thing.

Speaker 1 But in the moments, when you're at work, when you're doing the thing, go fucking hard. Go as hard as you possibly can in those moments.
And then everything will shake out. That is my best advice.

Speaker 1 Because

Speaker 1 if I look back at my own life, and I think part of the reasons that I, one of the reasons that I am the way I am today, is I have regret about my sports career, about my

Speaker 1 educational career in college,

Speaker 1 you know, different things like that, where I was naturally good at things. I naturally had certain skills.
I I was naturally athletic. And I leaned on natural ability a lot.

Speaker 1 And I wish that I had pushed myself even more. I wish that I was the nerd about things that I am today, the way I like to research things and dive deep into topics and really know them and own them.

Speaker 1 I didn't do that, right? I was okay being slightly above average, right? I was good enough to keep playing. I was good enough to kind of get into that next level.

Speaker 1 And I allowed that good enough to be the bar when I probably could have been, I probably could have been a hell of a lot better at baseball.

Speaker 1 And I certainly could have done more with my own academic and early professional career

Speaker 1 if I had committed myself and really worked hard. But I often allowed the resistance to tell me that

Speaker 1 I was doing good for a, you know, for a for a poor kid that came from a town of 900 in the middle of freaking nowhere with the parental situation and life situation that i had growing up yo you're doing good enough that that's bullshit

Speaker 1 it go you can you be the best version of yourself not the best version of someone who came from some place that's that's nothing that's an excuse Go as hard as you can in the things that matter and in the moments that they matter.

Speaker 1 That's the best advice that I have. It's how I live my life today.

Speaker 1 It probably annoys the shit out of some people, but I don't ever want to, I would rather someone was annoyed by my energy and my pace and my desire and some of my craziness that comes out of those things.

Speaker 1 And like, obviously, I've talked to you guys before about having ADHD. And now that I'm aware of it, I kind of see it and understand why some people get annoyed by me.

Speaker 1 But I would rather that people were annoyed by me because

Speaker 1 I work hard or I'm energetic or I operate at a fast pace, or I'm willing to make decisions and

Speaker 1 live with the consequences. I would rather people are annoyed with me about those things versus being annoyed with me because I don't show up.
I don't work hard. I don't engage.

Speaker 1 Those are things I don't. You know what I mean? Like, so that's kind of the trade-off.
That's the advice I would give myself.

Speaker 1 That was a much longer answer than I meant it to be, but I believe in it so much. I think that

Speaker 1 however hard you are working today, you can work harder. It doesn't mean longer necessarily.

Speaker 1 It doesn't mean that you have to throw every other aspect of your life out and forget about your kids or your spouse or your partner or whatever. It doesn't mean you have to do those things.

Speaker 1 It doesn't mean you have to give up all your hobbies. But it might mean instead of boating, fishing, golfing, and bowling, you can only pick two of those or you can only pick one of them.

Speaker 1 It might mean instead of being having seven niches that you work on in your business, you work on two niches.

Speaker 1 It might mean that you actually have to come out of your pocket and pay for some trainings that help you get better at a specific skill, like cold calling or cold emailing, or leadership, or service, or whatever.

Speaker 1 It might mean that you have to go out and pay for some things. The number of people that say, I would do that training, but my work won't pay for it.

Speaker 1 I mean, do you know the number of freaking marketing courses and sales courses and stuff that I've paid for myself, obviously, to get better at what I do. I mean,

Speaker 1 it's not your,

Speaker 1 I think it's amazing, and companies should pay for training. And we have a, we definitely have a training culture at Rogue Risk.

Speaker 1 But to think that your company has to pay for your training or you're not going to do it and somehow feel justified or vindicated in that is bananas.

Speaker 1 It's absolutely bananas and it's the resistance talking. If the skill matters to you, if it can make you better, if it can make you the best version of yourself, then it's worth paying paying for.

Speaker 1 Pay the money, get over it, and go do the work. That's the idea.
Work hard. Work harder than you are today.

Speaker 1 If you're not giving your, if you can't expect results that you didn't put in the work to get, that's not my original quote.

Speaker 1 I think it's Kobe's or someone else's, but I love that quote, or whatever version of it is accurate. So, all right, I hope that

Speaker 1 resonates. I would love to know what's your thing? Like, hit me up on Instagram, Ryan underscore Hanley on Instagram.
Hit me up and let me know.

Speaker 1 Like, what what would be the thing that you would tell your younger self? I would love to know that, guys.

Speaker 1 Maybe even I'll share a couple of those on a future episode, depending on when they come in. And again, if you have questions, if you like this format, I'd love to hear from you.

Speaker 1 Let me know if you enjoy this format.

Speaker 1 Would love to do more of these Q ⁇ As. These were obviously fairly high-level questions, but if we want to get specific, I'm happy to answer those questions as well.

Speaker 1 I did throw out when I did some of the marketing for the AMA that, you know, you can ask me if I believed in aliens or whatever, too.

Speaker 1 Obviously, I love the conspiracy conspiracy theory stuff. I'm happy to answer those questions, but um, they're not, they're always, they're a little more entertainment and less tactical for sure.

Speaker 1 Uh, either way, guys, I love you for listening to the show. I hope you enjoy it.

Speaker 1 Please remember that come September, if you're not subscribed to the Ryan Hanley show feed, you're going to lose the ability to listen to this show.

Speaker 1 It's not going to go out through the agency intelligence main feed anymore. So, I hope you'll come over and listen to that.
And you can always find it at ryanhanley.com.

Speaker 1 Uh, guys, I love you for listening to this show. I love you for being part of this.
If you're watching this on YouTube at some time in the future, hit that subscribe button if you like these.

Speaker 1 All right, guys, I'm out of here. Peace.

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