IA Forward
IA Forward is your playbook for success as an insurance agent.
Every week, Shane Tatum, Tonya Lied, and Mike Boesl tackle the real challenges insurance agents face, from growing a profitable book of business and building a stronger team to marketing, leadership, carrier relationships, industry changes, and the decisions that come with owning and running an agency.
No corporate talking points. No textbook advice. Just honest conversations, practical strategies, a few strong opinions, and lessons you can actually use in your agency.
Whether you’re building your first book, growing an established agency, or trying to figure out what’s next, IA Forward is about helping you think bigger, lead better, and build a business you actually want to own.
Learn more at www.integrapartnernetwork.com
IA Forward
Let the Rainmaker Make Rain
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
The quarterback is not effective if he is playing every position. So why are you spending so much time doing exactly that in your agency?
We discuss hiring for weakness, where AI and your tech stack fit into the equation, why delegation isn’t giving up control, and separating out $500-an-hour work from $25-an-hour work,
Figure out where you create the most value and then go make it rain!
Learn more at IntegraPartnerNetwork.com.
And at some point, when the people that are trying to implement all those Rainmaker ideas, and you're like they haven't got the one implemented from yesterday, and you're bringing them a different one today, like at some point you do need somebody to tell you and be honest with you, say, whoa, hey, are we doing this or are we doing this new thing today? Like, which way are we going? And and that is something that rainmakers do have to learn.
SPEAKER_02This is IA Forward, your playbook for success as an insurance agent. Now, to help you knock it out of the ballpark, here's your host, Shane Tatum, Mike Basil, and Tanya Leed. Welcome to IA Forward.
SPEAKER_00And I forgot what we're talking about.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I know Shane. I definitely know. I definitely don't know what we're talking about.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god. Okay. Okay. I know what we're talking about. I know what we're talking about. Um, it's usually Shane that has no idea what we're talking about.
SPEAKER_01I still don't know what we're talking about, but I'm glad somebody else doesn't know what we're talking about.
SPEAKER_00Oh my goodness. Okay, happy Teesday, everybody. Um, we're going to talk about our third episode that we ever did. And going back and looking at some of the topics that we've done. Um, and you know, we would love to think that when you find the semi-entertaining, quasi-brilliance that is IA4, that you're going back and listening to all 330-plus episodes. But in the real world, uh, we know that you're not. So I really do want us to go back to some of the concepts that we talked about in our third episode. But since that was 2022, uh, there are a lot of things that we can add to the topic. So the original topic was are you a rainmaker or a technician? We want to do the 2026 updated version of that, which is do what you do well, hire everything else, and that includes using AI and the tools that you have. But before we get started in all that, Shane was not a part of our fantasy football draft this week, but Mike and I were. So how did your draft turn out, Mike?
SPEAKER_03I think it went well. One thing I realized after all of my drafts were done, I hadn't really I hadn't put a lot of thought into it, but I was looking through all my drafts and I was like, oh, apparently Bucky Irving is my favorite player in the NFL this year because he is on every single one of my fantasy teams, which is four. I don't think I know who that is.
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah. Who is Bucky Irving? Is he in the NFL? Or do you draft a high school kid and on your fantasy team?
SPEAKER_03No, no, or a junior high kid that's on NIL or something, or this is not some shady Lane Kifin type activity here. Good grief. He's a running back for Tampa. All right, all right. He's a buccaneer, got it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, why would I know that?
SPEAKER_03But you know what's interesting just about fantasy football in general? This is the only draft that I do with people outside of my area.
SPEAKER_00Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_03So it's real interesting. Like you get into a local draft and it's like, boom, Josh Allen. Boom, cook. I mean, everybody's going fast, right? More fast. Kincaid fast. And then I get on to ESPN, which is the platform we use for this one. I'm like, oh, I can wait on some of this stuff and actually have a better shot at getting Allen's a different story, but um, you know, like I was waiting, I was able to wait real late for Kincaid, so I was happy about that. I don't know. I felt it went well. The way I usually gauge my drafts is by the grade I get from whatever platform it is. So if I get back a grade like, oh, you did really well, A minus. I know X is over. But if I get like a C somewhere C area, I'm like, okay, I got a shot here.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So you really don't trust the grades the platforms give you. No, I do not.
SPEAKER_00This is the first season I haven't been like last or second to last coming out of the draft, which kind of scares me.
SPEAKER_03I will say this about fantasy football. I did something I've never done before this past weekend, an 18 team draft. And to your point about not knowing, like I was getting to the last few rounds, I was like, okay, I'm just looking for names I've heard of before. And you know those those boys are not starting.
SPEAKER_00That's kind of the way I was with this one for some reason. I you know, uh, and you don't have I I think it's because I don't have the college attachments that I used to have. Like I knew who players play more. And since they're only playing for teams one season, like I'm not following any players long term because they may play for Alabama one year and then the next year they're at Wake Forest, and then the next year they're at Oregon, and like I don't know.
SPEAKER_01So that's fair.
SPEAKER_00The draft was a lot harder for me this year.
SPEAKER_01That's fair. Even though I'm not uh in fantasy football and haven't been for a couple of years, it that has changed, right? Like the the NIL and all of the one one year loyalty, lack of loyalty, whatever you want to call it, is it's really changed the following of a player, right? Right. How do you how do you follow a player? Like where are they? I don't know, just really weird dynamic we got going on right now. And then, you know, we're kicking kids out of the NCAA and banishing them for life, but then we're advertising DraftKings and you know, fanDuel on on every commercial. Like we have such a hypocrisy world right now going on. So I don't know.
SPEAKER_00I mean, those are being advertised in the stadiums.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Um I mean, they're on the big screens and they're talking about them, and yeah, it's it's absolutely shame on you for betting on your game.
SPEAKER_01You know, you should know better.
SPEAKER_00Somebody else's game.
SPEAKER_03It's okay that we take their money, but hey, well, someone from Diraft Kings or MGM or somewhere called down in that mission gigging at the end because that was ridiculous. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, you think absolutely, absolutely.
SPEAKER_03I mean oh, there's a different clock, guys. Guys, there's a different clock that no one knows about that said there was still a second left.
SPEAKER_00A second left, yeah. So I have a really fast mean there's a there's a special that says um, you know, like Ohio State um marked safe from needing one second added to win our game.
SPEAKER_01I'm telling you. Yeah, that one was yeah, a lot of questions right now, a lot of questions when it comes to the credibility of stuff. So yeah.
SPEAKER_00But all I know is I am a Buffalo Bills fan for the season, and I have no idea why Mike had the second pick and didn't take it, but as the third pick, I went for it. So I have Josh Allen this season. There you go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So we hope that I know we got to get on with it, but does that not bother you to have a buddy that will not draft his team's players? Like he will not draft the Texans players because he doesn't he doesn't want to he doesn't want it to destroy or hurt his ability to watch the game and and root for the Texans. Like, I don't know. It's he doesn't even really like to draft within his the Texans division.
SPEAKER_03That's uh yeah, I I would need a better explanation on that because that's to me that's counterintuitive. Like, I mean, if it's a guy on the team you root for, you just want him to do well anyway. But the thing that I don't do anymore because it was just driving me nuts, is I make it a point to never look at who is on the team that I'm playing. So I never know what the players are on the team that I'm against.
SPEAKER_01That's that's a good idea.
SPEAKER_03Two reasons for it. Number one is if there's any bills on it, then it then you feel weird. Oh, we need to win by we need to win, but I can't have this particular person do well. Like I can't do that. And then the other thing is if you're in enough leagues, you get guys on the team you're playing against that are on your team somewhere else, and now you're trying to figure you're trying to make this this like mathematical equation in your head of how well this person can do that isn't too well that helps you over here, but doesn't hurt you over there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and that I can't, I couldn't do that anymore. It drove me crazy. I can't, uh it just in general, that's why I had to stop. Like, I got over the top. Like Julie's like, what are you, what is wrong with you today? And it's like, well, you know, whoever.
SPEAKER_00My only rule is I will not draft an Atlanta Falcon. Nothing in me as a Saints fan growing up in the great state of Louisiana, I can not root for a single Atlanta Falcon. So that's just that's the one team I I don't recruit from.
SPEAKER_01Are they still in the NFL? Yeah, this is relegated. That's been relegated to that.
SPEAKER_00I'm assuming we're talking about the Saints.
SPEAKER_01No, I'm talking about the Falcons. Oh I'm actually talking about the Falcons. But I mean, I guess we could be talking about the Saints over the two years. Yeah. I I don't have that issue. I mean, I I won leagues with Drake May. Should we relegate? Should we have that in the NFL or or MLB or something like that? Do you think? I think it'd be tough in the NFL.
SPEAKER_03MLB, you could do it. You could do it, definitely do it with MLB. Basketball, you could do it with those.
SPEAKER_00And they're talking about moving the Saints to Biloxi again, which you know had been signed when Katrina hit.
SPEAKER_01Oh wow.
SPEAKER_00So they left it that yeah, that was a big NFL thing. But um, so they're talking to Biloxi again. So maybe, maybe if they go to Biloxi, they'll get relegated.
SPEAKER_01Interesting. Interesting. Thought you were about to say the arena league. We're getting an arena league team here in East Texas.
SPEAKER_00Are y'all?
SPEAKER_01We are. We are. It's kind of interesting. That way, yeah. Well, it's not not the Huntington, it's the Desperados, it's the Lufkin Desperados, not the not the Huntington Desperados. They had to go to the big city here in East Texas. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Okay, Shane. So would you like to explain to us, uh, going back to starting out with rainmaker versus technician? And then we got farmers in there too. But yeah, you know.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I I, you know, um, kind of drawing on our past thoughts, I think, and you know, because that's the really crazy thing is do you feel the same way, right? Five years later, four years later, and um as you're progressing forward. But I I think this one is easy for me to feel the same way about, and that is um, you know, are if you're most most insurance agency owners are are salespeople first. And, you know, kind of where this idea came from was they're rainmakers, right? They're the big salesperson, they're the primary salesperson, um, they're the ones driving the opportunity, the growth. And yet where where the struggle starts to happen is when you don't understand that you should stay the rainmaker. Like if you're the rainmaker, you're making it happen, then you know, the first thing you should do is hire your weakness. And that's been kind of something I've believed through the years. Um, what we tend to do is we tend to think, okay, we need another rainmaker, and then we need a third rainmaker and a fourth rainmaker. And while that would be, you know, nice, fun to have, uh, maybe the natural school of thought, the actual way to build an agency is not to replicate yourself, but to actually hire people that are much better at doing the things that you either are terrible at doing, or that you just absolutely hate doing, therefore you procrastinate on them. And now AI brings in a whole different discussion on this.
SPEAKER_03So, do you think one is better than the other in terms of you know your personality to start the agency off? Is the rainmaker gonna have an easier path?
SPEAKER_01I think so, um, naturally, because I think when you're a technician, when I think of a technician, I think of like more of the risk manager mindset, um, maybe even like borderline underwriter. Uh, you are um you're you love reading insurance policies, right? Like you are the insurance policy police policy, yeah. You're you're the insurance policy, like nerd coverage, risk is your thing. And I think that technician side, the structure, you know, you can do that all day long, and you can you can advise on the right coverage, you could be great at that, but if you've got nobody to advise, if you've got no clients, you know, uh that's problematic. And so I think the rainmaker always has an easier path. And I think that's why we tend to see that rainmakers um uh tend to grow faster, be more successful long term, is just understanding that it is a sales business. Insurance agencies for the most part are sales organizations.
SPEAKER_00Since I've been with Integra, I can remember having those last conversations before uh before an agent signs with us. And and I love that that's part of our process is you know, a prospect that wants to come on board with us, we always do this last conversation with several members of the leadership team because we really want you to know who you're doing business with, who you're truly partnering with, right? So it's not like an interview, it's more of a it's more of an opportunity for um for agents that are really thinking of coming on board to talk with the leadership team, to ask all of their questions. It's that type of feel, more of a conversation. And we have had those with rainmakers and we have had those with technicians. And I would say nine times out of ten out of those conversations with rainmakers, they are signing a contract within a week or two, right? I mean, like they are those contracts are ready to be signed. And then when we had those same conversations with technicians, I would say eight out of ten times they don't sign and they decide to stay doing what they're doing because they don't want to take the risk. Like they think they want to take the risk, but then when the time comes to it, they stay where they are.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it it's very natural to me for that to happen that way, right? Exactly like Tanya's describing. We've we've talked with and um you know, showed our program with many account managers, slash CSR, slash underwriters. And it's really difficult. Um the knowledge is there, but what's really difficult is like that first that first set of questions, like, where are your leads coming from? Like, where are you going to get business? And uh even talking to some of our partner agents that are super successful, maybe um uh maybe having someone call them and say, hey, I'm thinking about you know uh starting an agency, thinking about doing it um as an integra partner, uh, you know, asking them questions. And a lot of our our really successful partners will kind of discover like, where is your natural source of leads? Where are you going to get opportunities from? And I've had those phone calls from some of our successful partners going, well, you know, the only thing that worries me about, you know, so and so is they have no natural lead source. Like they just don't have the opportunity or they haven't created the opportunity of where they're gonna get the opportunities from. And I think that's always sort of one of those, uh, I know we've had the yellow flag, red flag conversation over the last uh few weeks. Like that, that's one of those yellow flags. Like, okay, they know what they know what they're talking about, but are they gonna be able to, you know, actually grow a book of business? Are they actually gonna be able to sell enough policies, have enough opportunities uh in order to build a book of business from scratch?
SPEAKER_00Working with agents, I hear so many of them say it's time to hire somebody, and I want to hire someone exactly like me. And I'm like, no, you don't. Well, because first of all, if you find someone exactly like you, y'all are gonna kill each other.
SPEAKER_03That's exactly what I was gonna say.
SPEAKER_01That is, yeah, you're never gonna get past that. Yeah, and and I think, you know, that that is is the truth of the matter, is it's why opposites attract. Uh, my wife and I recently were doing this kind of planning session and um really just kind of thinking about uh, you know, one day we have to think about like, okay, not necessarily planning to retire, but like we need to at least have a retirement plan. And so we've kind of been going through. Julie already has a retirement as well. She she does. I don't. I don't know what I'm gonna do during retirement, but she's got a retirement plan. So I figured I need to hurry up and get with the program, right? And um, so anyway, we were doing these personality, and I I I think we were doing the uh Colby, maybe, I don't know. Um whichever one we were doing. We are opposites, like a hundred percent opposites at the end of the day. Like we just are not related to each other in any personality form, and I think that's why um I think that's why we uh why we work, right? The opposites of that is why we work so well. You want that as a rainmaker, you want that, like you want your opposite first, you don't want your your twin. You I hope you didn't pay for that. I could have told you that. Well, I mean, we didn't pay for it, but it was part of the process, right? So I guess we paid for it in some way, but it's just part of a process.
SPEAKER_03I mean, I could have told you guys are opposites, and you don't need to go do a 50 question test for that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but you couldn't have given us like a number code that told us what our personality code was.
SPEAKER_03Because I mean there'd be no numbers, but I can yeah, I can do that without the numbers.
SPEAKER_00The problem when a rainmaker hires another rainmaker is everybody wants to sell and nobody wants to document anything.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Right? And that goes back to a technician hiring a technician, then you have like an incredibly organized agency that's sitting around waiting for the phone to ring. Yes. So I loved uh our our comp troller, Deanna Cassidy. Um at one point she and I were working together, and it was the best team. Because like all of the stuff that I love to do and all of the stuff she loved to do meshed perfectly. Right? And so that was a ringmaker and a technician that worked really well together.
SPEAKER_03Hey Tiny, what's happening at your house?
SPEAKER_01Hey, are you is your kid uh acting up today? Like what's going on over there?
SPEAKER_00There is somebody at the door, and apparently Marybale is having a hiss event because she's not smart enough in this moment to go through the other door out of my office to go to the first door. So yes, my title is Marybelle P, no ma'am. No ma'am. Anyway.
SPEAKER_01And now the real Tanya comes comes out. Uh you know, and we get uh we get to hear uh Mary Bell on the podcast. That's fun. That's fun.
SPEAKER_03So how about this to to try to get back on the tracks? So we had we had brought up a little earlier AI and how that would impact this topic. So when we start talking about AI, or we start talking about outsourcing things to a service center or something like that, and now you can kind of take the things that you're not good at off the plate of the agency itself. How does that impact what the second person you bring on looks like? Can it be a second Rainmaker now? If you've got these other things or these other or this other service that can do some of those other things, can that work now?
SPEAKER_01I my opinion is not yet. Um my opinion is that somebody's got to run that, and the AI even has to be monitored, ran in some way. Somebody's got to document the stuff. Somebody really needs to take what you're doing as a rainmaker because you're and really get it documented, get it trained, get the AI tool figured out. Um, and and those are things that I think rainmakers think and believe that they're going to do. Oh, well, I'm gonna do, I'm gonna, I gotta get this implemented, I'm gonna do this, and then well, okay. Number one, I s what I see is all that all that money quote saved, right? The the air quotes of saving money is actually costing you money, right? It's costing you momentum, it's costing you sales, especially if you come out of uh a producing uh situation in an exclusive channel, an agency owner in an exclusive channel, wherever you're coming from, um you have built typically a referral network, an opportunity network, and you don't want to lose that momentum. And you start down this path, what naturally happens is you're you're ready to go. And so it's just it's just doing stuff, and you don't really know what you're doing yet, you don't really have it documented well, you don't really have your processes in place. So even the AI is just dealing with a bunch of stuff, right? You're dealing with, well, maybe I click, maybe I do this, maybe I do that. Whereas someone who can help be your alter ego a little bit, right? You're the the anti-you can actually move things faster, allow you to go faster. And it's a short-term, it's a short-term problem. Because if you're betting on yourself, like most Rainmakers are willing to do, then you're gonna outrun that really quickly. Um, it and and you can afford to put that person in place before you think you can.
SPEAKER_00So I Shane, you know, you're obviously a visionary, um, you're our CEO, you're our chief visionary officer, you're our chief translation officer, all of the things, right? But looking at the original leadership team that you put together of Holly, Tara, your mom, Kylie, like your original leadership team were all people that were fantastic at implementation. That were wonderful at systems.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, um, I didn't replicate myself initially. No. Uh, as a matter of fact, the original, when you go way, way back, um, it was really Julie Holly Terra, right? And it was three people that uh that were I knew I left one off. Yeah, no, it was Julie. My wife, right? Yeah, sorry, Julie. I just had to get that in there because I can't don't bother saying it. She doesn't listen. Uh she doesn't listen. Um, she's not listening right now. She's not listening. So, you know, but those three were, yes, to Tanya's point. Uh, I actually put three people in place that were more execution, implementation, documentation, all those things. Now they were in different roles in different areas. Um, and instead of, I think I'll go, you know, add another Shane, you know, or add another quote, rainmaker, if that's the role that I I think I fell into, uh, which is typically, you know, it's very typical of an agency organization. And so that is what we did. I mean, that's exactly the pattern, and that that's why I feel that way. I think if I would have gone out and put a, you know, a second chain, a third chain, uh, more rainmakers in place, I think we would have just, you know, tripped, fell all over ourselves and created a lot of chaos. I created a lot of chaos by myself. If you're a rainmaker and if you're an agency owner and you're a top producer, you are a rainmaker. Let me just say that to you right now. Whether you think you are or not, you are. If you you can create plenty of chaos by yourself, okay? You're you're really good at creating chaos as a as a supercharged salesperson. You need some people who can organize that chaos, right? And they're they're very valuable to you, and you know they're valuable to you once you once you work with them for just a little bit of time. It won't take you very long. Um, what most people struggle with is they they don't actually hire that right person. They hire another rainmaker, and then they get a lot of frustrated. I'm sorry. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Say that again, Shane.
SPEAKER_01No, and then they get frustrated.
SPEAKER_00I think a lot of people, a lot of agency owners have this mindset of, okay, I'm gonna hire somebody when I get busy, when I'm too busy, when I'm busy enough. They always say they I they always have some version of that. And if you flip that around to what could I accomplish if I wasn't doing all of this stuff that I really dislike doing or that I'm not good at? And I mean, you're not gonna get a quote unquote return on investment of a fire necessarily. That's not what your technician does. It's what will that new employee free you up to produce, right? So if you hire a service person, they're not gonna directly generate a hundred thousand dollars in new revenue for you. But if they give you 20 hours a week back, and you have those 20 hours to sell, and that's the way you're thinking of it, then that hire looks really different.
SPEAKER_03It's more of an opportunity cost. You're looking at it as time spent on X that could be spent on Y. Yeah. Which is appropriate. That's the that's the way to look at it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's right. It it is it is an investment, right? You have to look at it as an investment and when and the return on that investment. Um, you know, I I know this this is kind of a a perfect analogy or or or maybe a perfect picture, and it always doesn't work out this way, but you know, when I'm thinking about helping an agent uh, you know, just start their agency, get off the ground. I've always been an advocate of you need to understand how it all works, right? And so I don't want to be, I don't want to be a little too confusing here and say that you should hire someone as soon as you start your agency with no revenue, right? Like I'm not I'm not advocating that. I'm advocating that you do need to understand what you don't understand, or you do need to understand what you're not good at. And some of the best ways to do that is to go through that process a little bit. And you so in the beginning, you you know, starting out, you might you might feel that pain a little bit. Like I think it's good pain. I think you should feel that a little bit. Um, maybe you go down the the uh the route of um a virtual assistant, executive assistant route, uh maybe that helps a little bit take take the edge off, so to speak. Uh at some point, what I think is the the best scenario is you make a really good hire on the service side uh as an account manager or CSR for yourself. And if you're fortunate enough, like ultimately I was, uh if you're fortunate enough, that person can become kind of your your office manager or your um your director. They're gonna become the person that's actually gonna manage the other people as you grow your agency. If you are fortunate enough, right? I'm not saying it works out that way every time because I'm sure somebody can DM me and go, well, Shane, you know, I hired the CSR, they're a terrible manager. You told me they were gonna be my man. No, that's I'm not saying it's gonna be perfect. I'm saying that is the best case scenario that you're looking for. You just have to jump back and things think at hiring. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're just terrible and hiring and quit, you know.
SPEAKER_00Well, and then the first six months is difficult because you're having to put in extra work to train this person. So, yeah, if you've only had somebody on board with you two weeks or two months and they're not where you want them to be, it's probably not their fault or a combination of both. Now, if if they get in there and they're not showing up, you know, three out of the five days a week, that's one thing. But make sure that uh you're asking them the right questions and making sure that they're getting the right training for you. But I think it goes back to the concept of the only I can do this list. And there are things that are tied to ownership that only you need to be doing, especially at the beginning, right? There are things that require unique relationships that require like specific talents or authority or vision, like there are those things, but then there are also there's really important things that don't require the owner, right? Um, and I kind of put those under things that somebody else can do better than me. Like if I was starting an agency, the first thing that I would hire would be a bookkeeper. Period. Like, you know, I can muddle through an accounting class, but it takes like the same amount of time for me to get through one accounting class as it takes to get through like marketing communication and history. Like those things, those, those things are equal because accounting is not my thing, right? I mean, if you're inconsistent with marketing, how would marketing help? If you're terrible at follow-up, you know, come come play with us at Integra. We have an optional service center that can help you with all of those things, right? So you figure out what you can only do, and then you figure out what can somebody else do better than me, and it it kind of puts it into a different perspective of what can I stop doing or what am I doing simply because I've always done it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I mean, to kind of blend the two things you've each said, I I love the idea of when you first start out, you do all of the things, and then you have to be able to have a real, frank, internal conversation about what those things are that you are not good at. And the the really great thing about having tried it is now you can assign some sort of a value to it, and you understand what that other person is dealing with when they come in and take that over for you. Because you can very easily slip into these mental places where you think the people that work for you are not doing enough because you have this perception of how long things should take. But if you never walked that walk to begin with, you don't know. And now you're now you're aside now, you have this issue with someone that could be totally unfounded because you have this thought in your head that came from nowhere. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I, you know, uh if you have a spouse, then ask your spouse what you're terrible at. And you know, they'll tell you, maybe, hopefully, they'll tell you. Um, and then don't be upset about that, right? I don't want to know that you listen to IFOWER podcast and then you had to go to marriage counseling. That's not what I'm saying. Um I'm just saying, like that that person in your life is gonna tell you they know you best, right? Whoever that person is. Um, you know, if you're if you're not if you're not married, if you don't have a spouse, um, and maybe you have a really close friend, maybe you have a sibling, maybe you have a parent, whatever, um, somebody that can be brutally honest with you, that you trust to be brutally honest with you, to help you understand what you're good at and what you're not good at. If I would have done more listening like that, asking that question and then listening, I would have made it a lot further along, a lot faster. Uh, I would have been to a place uh that I continue to work on now still, but I'd I'd have made it to that place faster. Um if money was no object, and the second thing here, if money was no object, that's a best place. Yeah, this is always where that goes, right? But I I mean I like to work from this place, right? Um, because maybe it is for you, or maybe there's a way for you to get there. I would love for insurance agency owners, rainmakers, I would love for you to work from more of the uh doctor type position, um, you know, like a a physician's place, uh, maybe an attorney's place. And what I mean by that is doctor's doctor. Like, you know, you spend all this time, you go to medical school. Yeah, doctor's doctor, right? Um, you spend all this money, you're you're, you know, they they they're in debt up to their eyeballs when they come out of medical school, and they got to see patients like constantly, all the time. Like they don't have time to do uh, you know, bookkeeping or scheduling or all the other things. Like most of the most of the medical profession, anesthesiologist are the worst financial managers on the planet. Like they're terrible at managing their money. The reason they're terrible at it is because they're really good at doctoring. Like they're very good at it. You have to be, right? You can't be a, you can't, you really well, I guess you might can be, but you really don't want to be a C student as a doctor. Like, I don't want my doctor to be like, I barely made it. I'm just saying, I don't, that's not what I want, right? Like I want my doctor, hey, you know, so what you get on this test. Well, you know, that one, you know, right before he's cutting on me, you're like, well, that one I didn't do too well. Like, I don't want that for my doctor, right? And so, you know, my point is you're a rainmaker. Like, make it rain, like do that stuff. And we get so wound up and and and and really mixed up on stuff that probably doesn't matter at the end of the day, like, you know, the the perfectness of my website. Sorry, I said it, I went there. Um, and you know, all these other things that really don't make sales at all. Uh, and so I think I think we just have to be, we have to we have to allow rainmakers to make rain. That's what it comes down to.
SPEAKER_00I had a mentor years ago tell me that there's $500 an hour work and there's $25 an hour work, and they're both important. But $500 an hour work are things like building referral relationships, closing big accounts, coaching your team, making strategic decisions, being that that visionary. Um, and even as you grow that agency, starting to look at maybe even acquisition opportunities, right? I mean, those are big $500 an hour things. And then looking at like $25 an hour things, like that's chasing electronic signatures, data entry, bookkeeping, um, certificate processing, like on a uh on, you know, like looking at commercial or calendar management, all of those things they're important. But if you're spending two hours a week on calendar management, which is very easy to do, could you have spent that same two hours and produced five hundred dollars worth of value? So two hours would be a thousand dollars worth of value, right? Why would you choose to not do that?
SPEAKER_02Are you ready to make the decisions? What do you sell? How you grow, who you hire, what kind of agency you build? The integra partner network helps insurance professionals start and grow their own insurance agencies. Your agency, your decisions, your future. Be the boss. Learn more at IntegraPartner Network.com.
SPEAKER_03So do you guys think that I'm not sure if I agree with this or not, but I'm gonna say it. Rainmakers, good or bad, ads, leading, disseminating information, having everyone be on the same page. I feel like that is something, generally speaking, they struggle with.
SPEAKER_01I think that it's an initial struggle that can be learned. I think that depending on whether or not you stay in the Rainmaker position or you um promote yourself or give yourself uh a promotion, so to speak, into the sales management world slash CEO world of your business. I mean, you can certainly stay, we we can get off into practitioner versus enterprise builder. Um, you know, I think if you're staying in the pract in the in the insurance practice environment, you can certainly stay a rainmaker um and lead a small group of people. I think once you decide you're gonna go on and build what I call an enterprise agency, uh Which would generally, and doesn't mean you're you're like hundreds of employees. I mean you're eight to ten plus, right? Now you've got to have maybe uh maybe a manager, uh, maybe two managers in different departments. Maybe you start to reach this place where um you you need to go beyond the practice management style, right? Now you're getting into Mike, some of those areas I think you're talking about leading, disseminating information, uh, you know, strategy, all of those areas. I think that is learned for the most part, and you can become that. But I think it's one of those things back to some of those initial questions. Are you good at it? Are you going? Do you love it? Like, do you like doing that? Like for me, I actually love doing that more than I love selling as much as I love selling. Like, I love to sell, I love to market, I loved being the referral generator, the networker. Like that was my first job was doing that part of our business for the first probably 15, 15 to 18 years. Um, the last 15, 16 years has been more leading um uh strategy. Uh, as Tanya said, you know, I still do a lot of the marketing type stuff, but that's really more idea creation than anything. It's not implementation. Like that's not what I'm doing well, is implementation. And so, you know, that shifted because we went from practice to enterprise. And it it had to be different for me. Like I had to grow, or I had to give that job to somebody else. I had to hire for that job. And and sometimes that's what happens. Like, it's okay to hire someone to uh operationally lead your agency while you're still the CEO. Maybe you need a a COO or a president or executive vice president, something that's operationally driving things if you're not going to be able to make that leap into the enterprise.
SPEAKER_00To go back to Mike's original question, uh I believe that rainmakers tend to be pie dipers. That's what makes them rain makers. People believe them, people follow them, people want to be around them. Um so I think though they tend to be leaders in a different way. Like Shane said, they tend to be a little more visionary, but they tend to give information at more of that 40,000-foot view. And then they have technicians in place that are able to take that vision and put it in the language that their teams understand, but it takes the rainmaker to get people excited about it. People that are technicians don't have a tendency to get excited. And and you know, Shane, of course, is the um is the exception that proves the rule because he doesn't let any of us know when he's excited. But I I believe somewhere inside of there, there is something that he gets excited about. And that's that's when he shares it with us, is when there's some internal excitement. But he presents it very stoically. But people know he's not just going to randomly throw stuff at us, right? Like he he's thought through it for weeks before he says it out loud, right? So I do believe that the the rainmakers do tend to be the people that get other people excited and and ready to go forward, but it takes that technician sometimes to be able to say, okay, let's step back, make sure that this can be done, and then shares it in a different way.
SPEAKER_03Hold on. Somewhere is there a VHS tape of Shane Tatum hitting a walk-off home run, bat flip, helmet comes flying off. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00There are no pictures. There are no pictures, there are no video. I have been asking for this for eight years, and I keep being told that nothing exists.
SPEAKER_03Comes around third and just stomps on home.
SPEAKER_01No, because that is not how you play the game, right? That is not how you play the game. Maybe not. That's how you do it now.
SPEAKER_00But you know, but you quote the gig the great Gary Ward. I should be able to look in the dugout, and whether you're up by 10 or down by 10, I should not be able to know the difference.
SPEAKER_01That's right.
SPEAKER_00Am I flows, Shane?
SPEAKER_01That's a hundred percent right. And uh when the mainly when the TV, when the camera pans the dugout, the the camera should never know, right? And uh, you know, there probably well there could have been. I don't know. I don't know what is out there on recording. I I need to go see if there is anything, but yeah, it's the really sadness about the 80s and 90s is you didn't you just didn't have the video um of uh at the amateur level, right? And uh I think that there probably was some some dumb idiot things that I did back then uh that one would call excitement today. Uh maybe I would call it a little bit different. I know, I know in high school football, uh I did uh I did think that I needed as a receiver, uh as a wide receiver, that I needed uh gloves, right? I needed the latest sticky gloves. Uh and um I think it I think it was one of the only balls I ever dropped. Uh and these are early days. We're talking this would be like 89, 90. You know, this is way back. Early days. What football? In football, yeah. In football. Yeah, in football. Early days, the early days.
SPEAKER_00Leatherhead days, right? The 80s.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Uh just put the mouthpiece in, right? Don't worry about the helmet. Did you have a letter helmet?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Don't worry about the concussions.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But I had these gloves. I remember it vividly, and I I I was uh I dropped a pass, and I didn't drop a pass. I I I that's just not what what I did. And I dropped this pass with these gloves on, and my coach um probably get probably get arrested for. I mean, he didn't he didn't like tackle me or anything, but uh my coach about ripped my head off, right? Because and it was it was he said a few choice words about those blankety blank gloves, right? It's those gloves. You would have caught that ball if it wasn't for those gloves. Never put another pair of gloves on uh in my football days ever after that. But I thought I had to be a little stylish with the gloves, right? And uh I think that's that's part of the the even killness. Then you had the the coaches in those days were just like different, man. You just I don't know. They they were just different.
SPEAKER_00They were smoking on the sidelines, yeah.
SPEAKER_01They they were smoking on the sidelines. That's right. So a little bit of little bit of cigarette smoke in your face when they're yelling at you. Yeah, so but I mean, you know, I I do get excited. Uh the other the other thing, the other thing, right? That excitement, that excitement, or anti-excitement, was because the first 15 plus years of my career, I would come in almost every day, maybe weekly for sure, but maybe every day, with some new idea that Tara and Holly and Julie had to hear about and try to implement. And at some point, when the people that are trying to implement all those Rainmaker ideas, and you're like, they haven't got the one implemented from yesterday, and you're bringing them a different one today, like at some point you do need somebody to tell you and be honest with you, say, Whoa, hey, are we doing this or are we doing this new thing today? Like, which way are we going? And and that is something that rainmakers do have to learn. And so part of my part of my like explanation of even killed and not excitement and maybe being a little bit like thinking about something for weeks or months before I talk about it, is because there was a day where that wasn't the case, right? And so I think that's really important uh to understand as rainmakers is that we we gotta we gotta understand where our people are, right? And we need them to be able to breathe a little bit.
SPEAKER_00I do not mean to step on toes when I say this, um because I do consider myself in the rainmaker category. I've spent most of my career selling, so I want to put myself there before I say this.
SPEAKER_01That's her apology before her statement, by the way.
SPEAKER_00It is, it is. So sometimes rainmakers tend to have an ego. Would the two of you agree with me on this?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I don't know what you're talking about. Okay. Yes, rainmakers do have egos.
SPEAKER_00Do have egos. Let's just put it out there. And delegation. Okay, whatever, whatever.
SPEAKER_01Maybe a little bit of arrogance. Maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe a little bit of arrangements.
SPEAKER_00Um but this is your kingdom, right? This is what you have built, and this is sweat equity, and this is this is money, and this is all of the things that you have put into this, right? It's like your own tiny kingdom, and it's yours, and you have built it exactly the way you want it, right? So delegation is not abdication. You are not giving things up, you are not abdicating by saying if somebody can do it 80% as well as I can do it, let them do it, right? I mean, you don't have to admit that they can do it 100% or 120 or 150% as well as you can do it, right? You have plenty of you have plenty to do because while you are delegating the work, you are not delegating the responsibility for the outcome, right? Ultimately, the outcome, everything's on you.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you can you can get into a weird headspace when you start feeling like no one can do anything as well as you, and your ideas are the best, but the worst part of getting into that that headspace is now you have slowed the entire operation down because now you're micromanaging everything. So instead of getting back to what we've been talking about, getting out there and selling, you're worried about are these people doing things exactly the way I would do them, and that is not helpful. That is that is counterproductive. And it, you know, for a for an agency to function well, there has to be things happening that you don't even know about, but you trust the people that you hired to handle them in the light that you would handle them in, right? I mean, there's plenty of things that happen in the agency that you don't you don't know what's going on, right, Shane? I mean, I'm working on a project for you that has to do with a portal that that folks will log into. Yeah, you're not involved in every step of the process, it's let's see where it's at.
SPEAKER_01Other than the recording and the end result, I have no idea what happens in our podcast, right? I have no idea how this thing happens. I don't, right? I would not know how to get it from point A to point B. Um and there's several things like that. I I do want to speak though to those Rainmakers and founders about that. I think that's one of the things that um to Mike's point, one of the things that probably was said to me a while back by a mentor around translation. Um, and Tanya mentioned it earlier, you know, you need to be the chief translation officer, like communication and being a better and better communicator every day. Um being able to have the right tone, say what you're feeling without, you know, berating people, um, and translating what it is that you're trying to accomplish to the people that are trying to implement the thing um is super, super important. And I think that's one of those areas that everybody can work on, like everybody can be better at at communication. And people cannot get in your head, like they don't know what's in your brain, right? And and that's something that I had to learn is, you know, just because I was thinking it didn't mean everybody else understood it. Didn't mean even even me explaining it didn't mean that everybody else understood it. And that doesn't mean everybody else was dumb. It just means the vision wasn't coming out well, right? I wasn't I wasn't capturing it well, uh, which is still on me, not on them. And I think that's one of those things that has to be clear. And and back to the AI point that we've kind of hit on here, I think that's my whole deal. Like somebody's got to run the AI, right? Somebody's got to monitor it, somebody's got to make sure it's doing its right thing. Is that you as the Rainmaker, or is that a trusted person that you have? And that kind of back to where does AI fit into this thing five years, four years later from our original conversation on this, right?
SPEAKER_00So think of yourself as the championship quarterback, right? Starting with our our whole football discussion at the beginning of this. If you're the championship quarterback, you're not gonna play defensive tackle. You're not gonna be the punter. You're not going. I mean, like you have to have teammates and let your teammates do what they do best, right? I have never I'm trying to imagine Josh Allen as an as a you know as a defensive.
SPEAKER_01I don't know why I went to the old, it's him. I know. I don't know why I went I went to two things there, and I I think you're right. I know you're right. I just I went to two things there. I went way back to the player coach days, um, you know, where the I think Pete Rose was a player coach at one time, player manager, right?
SPEAKER_03It was more prevalent in baseball.
SPEAKER_01It was very prevalent in baseball way back in the day. And um, you know, I think I'll just insert myself in the lineup today. I don't how do you explain that in the clubhouse? I don't know. You know, hey man, you're you're kind of stinking it up. I'm gonna play first base today. I just I don't know how that works, but um, you know, I think there's there's a lot of that. You you know, this isn't this isn't high school. Um, you you know, you're you're right. You're not gonna play defensive tackle, you're not gonna play all the different positions. Um there's that's why it's so rare to have a Deion Sanders or a uh a Bo Jackson. Uh I guess now we've got uh I forget the kids' name. Yeah, Travis Hunter. I mean, uh you can count them on your on one hand, right? All these multi-sport or multi-position athletes. Like I still love, I'm gonna stick with it. Doctor's doctor, right? Like, I still love that analogy. Like, there's a reason that the doctor that you're seeing isn't, you know, doing all the the stuff before then. They're not taking your blood pressure, they're not they're not doing all the vitals, right? They're showing up when it's crunch time, and everybody else is doing their their stuff. And I think that makes our agency so much stronger when rainmakers allow themselves to be the rainmaker.
SPEAKER_00I mean, Deion Sanders never tried to be an offensive lineman, right? He knew what made Brian Bryant, yeah, like speed and personality and confidence and playmaking, and he took all of his strengths and he leaned into them, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, the only thing he did. The only thing faster than his feet was his mouth.
SPEAKER_01Mouth, absolutely, yeah. But he's the quinnocent, like he's a great example of a rainmaker, right? Like he made it rain at Jackson State and Colorado now, and I mean, like, he he I I know is you may not you may not like him, it doesn't matter, but that's a great example of a rainmaker, right? Who has figured out that his job is to run his mouth, his his job is to talk, right? And uh there's a lot of rainmakers, me included, whose job is to talk a lot. And so, you know, go talk, go do that.
SPEAKER_00I'm gonna hey, why don't we just have a why don't we have a coach Sanders quote for the day? Um, don't allow my confidence to offend your insecurity.
SPEAKER_01Attitudes of choice. Make a great one.
SPEAKER_00Bye, y'all.
SPEAKER_02At the Integra Partner Network, we understand that carrier access is the key to your agency's success. That's why Integra offers direct access to top-rated personal and commercial carriers, ensuring your agency thrives in today's challenging market. And with our comprehensive resources, profit sharing, and bonus opportunities, technology and peer support, all of you retain 100% of your book with no families to exit. Integra is ready to empower you and your agency to find sustained growth. Find your way to Integra. Visit IntegraPartner Network.com today. That's integrapartnernetwork.com.
