One of the complaints I hear from industry partners is that there aren't enough insurance-related programs around the country to meet their talent needs. And that is absolutely the truth. If you look at the top 10 risk management and insurance (RMI) programs across the country, we only have 1,665 students nationally, hardly enough to fill the demand.

So what can you do if there are no RMI programs in your area? You might think about starting one. The traditional way is that your company, foundation, or group of friends get together and contribute $2-3 million to endow a chair, which is probably the only way to guarantee that a program in RMI will remain at a college or university permanently.

However, that kind of donation doesn't come easy. It is a lot easier to convince donors to contribute to a program when it is already producing successful talent, and it is a lot easier to persuade a university to offer a curriculum when there is already an established track record of students finding jobs in a particular field like insurance.