Agency Takes Training In-House Graham features three-year program for producers

The Graham Company, an agency in Philadelphia, has resolved its training issues for producers and other employees by coming up with its own intensive program.

Margaret C. Jones, vice president of the agencys technical development department and corporate secretary, said Graham dedicates a large percentage of its staff to the effort. Of 160 employees, she said, 13 are devoted to training, continuing education and quality assurance.

“We have the commitment from Bill Graham, who owns the agency, that he wants the best-trained people in the industry,” she explained. “We have found that this type of [in-house] training is very unusual for an agency.”

She noted that while the agency hires some employees from the insurance industry, many are recruited from outside the business. They include successful sales people, certified public accountants and some with engineering backgrounds, she noted. “We look for the best people we can find. We bring them in to our agency and we train them.”

The training period for a producer and an account manager is three yearsthe first six months of which are spent learning insurance coverages and provisions of contracts, she said. “We want them to be able to tear apart any companys policy form. Were really teaching them how to think,” she noted, adding that the remainder of the training is spent serving as an understudy by working with more experienced employees.

She noted that very few people “wash out of the program,” largely because of the agencys comprehensive recruiting process. “We go into a lot of detail about the amount of work and the commitment for training,” she said.

Ms. Jones said the agencys clients typically pay between $500,000 and $10 million in premium. The agency has only 200 accounts, where “most agents our size would have 2,000. We are almost like the risk management department for our accounts,” she said, providing heavy service.

The agency provides claim consultants and loss control services for clients, which are “sophisticated” and have “a lot of service requirements.” The agency reviews the insurance provisions of clients contracts and helps them in the acquisition process. “Were on the phone with our clients daily; were almost like their risk management departments.”

Reproduced from National Underwriter Edition, June 25, 2004. Copyright 2004 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.

Special Reports /

Agency Takes Training In-House

Related Stories

Recommended For You