Musicians, Athletes and - Producers?

Here I sit, listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Second Helping. What an amazing band! Although Lynyrd Skynyrd is now a classic rock radio station staple, their first album was avant garde. They combined country music stories, southern culture, rock, and a polished arrangement — including a great horn section — and a New York City producer. Their songs were very well written. The musicianship was phenomenal and the arrangements were unique for the time. All this from a bunch of high school dropouts and miscreants!

They, of course, had worked hard for many years leading up to that historic first album. Yet, what are the chances of any nine poorly educated guys, all in their teens and twenties, getting together and creating a classic album? Without a doubt, Lady Luck was smiling on these people, but there’s much more to it. Hard work and extreme talent are definitely key ingredients.

Many agencies depend entirely on good fortune. Even though these agencies’ futures require finding good, solid producers, they never perform extensive searches (if they search at all) and provide no technical, sales, or marketing training. They have no program for finding good producers and no method for growing their agencies without hiring competent producers. As a result, these agencies fail to grow and continually waste money on poor producers. Because hiring and training practices are so poor, I’d estimate that eight out of ten new producers fail to generate $200,000 in annual commission within five years.

Every week I get calls asking where to find good producers. The callers might as well be asking where they could find the next Tiger Woods or Kobe Bryant — because good producers are almost as hard to find. Trained, experienced, and affordable producers are rare and in many localities, nonexistent. Instead, agencies need to focus on improving the results of the employees they already have. Winning agencies will be those that find a way for average producers to excel and can develop good producers from scratch. Here are some suggestions:

Hire smart. Find good salespeople in college or other industries and train them. Teaching insurance to someone who can sell is far easier than trying to make a good salesperson out of someone who knows insurance.

Find the best people. Use personality tests to match candidates with your agency’s culture. The Web offers a variety of tests and information on testing. The most common tests used by agencies are probably OMNIA, Caliper, and NPI. Also try using a sales reluctance test such as that offered by Sandler Sales Training.

Train! Train the producers you have. Even great musicians need to practice — that’s how they became great in the first place. Every producer won’t become a superstar without training. But if even average producers can increase their annual production from $175,000 to $225,000, the training will easily pay for itself and the agency will grow more easily. Training is an investment with the potential of a substantial payback.

Keep your good employees. Pay them well. If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. Offer incentive based recognition and rewards, together with vesting opportunities. Base producer bonuses on net new business, high retention (more than 93%), and high hit ratios (more 50% with at least 20 attempts).

Great talent, whether it be musical, athletic, or sales, is so rare that to base one’s success on divine intervention is pure folly. In this situation, it pays to heed the advice Alan King’s father gave his son. When the comedian told the elder King that he didn’t believe he could be a great comic, his father responded, "Being great isn’t the key to success. In this world of mediocrity, being good will get you to the top."

Help your agency achieve its success by developing the talent that’s most readily available.