IIABAs First Woman President Faces Communication, Other Challenges

"Bringing young people in, getting them excited and keeping them" is a major challenge, she said, noting that the current agency force needs younger blood in its ranks. "Insurance is not a career that one naturally gravitates towards, unless you grow up with it. How do you channel that interest to the younger generation coming in?"

She said another challenge involves communicating with the membership. With so much information coming into agents each day, it is difficult for the association to get its message to its members heard. IIABA needs to find new ways to get through to its agents so they have a greater appreciation for the value their membership brings to them.

In her inauguration address, Ms. Canter said: "We are a large and growing organization, with several separate for-profit and not-for-profit corporations. My goal in the coming year is to monitor and provide oversight for this growth."

She said the association must continue its efforts to persuade Congress that the answer to fixing the regulatory issues in the United States is by improving state regulations, not federal oversight.

Ms. Canter told agents they need to do more to encourage bringing young blood into the association and support the InVEST program (which teaches high school and college students about the insurance industry through their school) by volunteering their time to the education of young people.

"I challenge each of you to use the InVEST program as a way to give something back to our industry," she said in her address. "Volunteer your time and help perpetuate our industry by opening up the world of insurance to as many young people as possible."

During the interview, she said it is encouraging to see how agents have embraced technology in the last couple of years. Ms. Canter said she sees a tie-in between advancing technology and bringing a younger generation into the business. The advancement of technology could serve to peak the interest of the younger generation in careers in insurance, she said.

Ms. Canter said that, in her travels, she has heard that association members dont know what is going on and she blamed that on the information overload agents are experiencing today. There is a need here, she observed, to find new ways to get the word out about IIABA above the technology din to the members.

"What we need to do is get our information to stand out," Ms. Canter said.

To reach this objective, she has assembled a member communication task force, which she announced in her address, to be chaired by Rick Gregson, Arizonas state national director. The purpose is to ask agents what would get them to open that document, not just delete the e-mail and never learn the benefits of being a part of IIABA.

"If we could accomplish that, I think it would be incredibly important," she said.

Ms. Canter wants to build upon the work of previous agents, especially InVEST, which she called "the best kept secret in the association," and bring in that new talent. She said IIABAs Virtual University is another resource vital to agents that many simply dont know about.

"We have to let people know what is there," she observed.

Ms. Canter also spoke about the growing diversity of the agent population. More women are becoming agency owners and shareholders within major-sized agencies as women move up the corporate ranks, she said.

She said she is also encouraging more women to enter their associations and work to take on leadership roles within their local associations.

Ms. Canter said she wants to continue to see the expansion of the network of communication and encourage other groups, such as the National African-American Insurance Association and the Latin American Agents Association, to join in with IIABA and promote diversity.

"There are just huge possibilities out there," she pointed out.

In the past, younger agents were mentored through the family business. Today, as agencies become less of a family affair, producers need to recognize the need to be mentors to the younger generation of agents, she observed.

Sales skills that, today, are second nature to them need to be taught to this younger generation, with the reminder that this is a business based upon relationships and not just technology, she said.

She agreed that insurance has always had a public relations problem and came back to the topic of communication, not only within the industry but also outside for consumers, referring to the Trusted Choice program. It will take years for the brand to be built and become a sign of trust and professionalism in the minds of consumers, she noted.

Reproduced from National Underwriter Property & Casualty/Risk & Benefits Management Edition, October 3, 2003. Copyright 2003 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.