Think the future of insurance lies exclusively in hiring young people? Think again. With baby boomers headed toward the exits in record numbers, the insurance industry desperately needs to retain institutional knowledge. That's what Sharon Emek figured out when she founded WAHVE–Work at Home Vintage Employees LLC–a service that connects retired insurance professionals with companies needing contract workers.
As the managing director of CBS Coverage Group in New York City and former chair of IIABA New York, Emek kept hearing from members about the problems they had in finding talented people for all agency positions. Concurrently, she was speaking to older women business owners on how to develop an exit strategy when it was time to think about retirement. And her involvement on the ACT board also made her knowledgeable about the tech side of the industry and how VOIP, Skype and other methods enable successful remote work. When the recession hit and everyone's retirement plan took a hit, "one morning I woke up and everything converged," she said. The idea was to get seasoned, retired insurance workers back into the picture by recruiting them to work remotely for employers.
Emek launched WAHVE in April 2010. To jump-start the business with a pipeline of qualified workers, she worked with the National Alliance, which put together a survey and sent it to its database of 59,000 baby boomer-and-older members. The survey got a response of more than 3,000, 1,600 of which wanted more information on WAHVE.
Today, WAHVE has a database of 400 insurance professionals, many with CPCUs and MBAs, and all with years of insurance industry experience. The plan is beautiful in its simplicity. WAHVEs are independent contractors who work out of their homes. Because they are already intimately familiar with the insurance industry, the only training they need is to learn a business's individual workflow. WAHVE screens them for job qualifications and ensures that they have a home office set-up that will enable them to work remotely, including dual monitors. Employees get a salary and a flexible at-home work schedule; employers pay a flat fee ($24 an hour for part-time workers, $43,000 annual fee paid monthly for full time) and get a seasoned worker who knows insurance inside and out. Positions range from CSRs, account managers and executives. The average WAHVE is about 60, ranging from 55 to 68.
One WAHVE's story
Sue Prince, 62, has worked her entire career in the industry, first as a vice president at Aon, then as an account executive at the USI office in Dallas. Although she loves insurance, she was tired in working 70-hour work weeks and commuting in heavy traffic ("I had no life"), so she decided to retire. But after 2 years, she decided she didn't fit with the rest of the housewives on the block. "I kept up with my CIC and industry groups, but decided I didn't want to work 'til I'm 80 and drop dead at my desk," she said.
A fellow insurance professional told her about WAHVE, so Prince gave them a call to check it out. "Sharon placed me within a day," she said.
Today, Prince works from her Fort Worth, Tex. home for Foa & Son Corp., an insurance brokerage based in New York, where she handles large accounts–a perfect fit for her big-broker background. She works a 35-hour week and loves the job that "keeps me in the insurance industry where I've been all my life."
From the broker's perspective, using WAHVE is a preferable alternative to outsourcing work to the Far East, said Justin Foa, owner of Foa & Son. "There was real resistance to it; people didn't like us outsourcing to China, even though we weren't replacing anyone," he said. The China arrangement wasn't ideal for the brokerage, either: "For simple tasks and smaller accounts, using the Far East was fine, but we tend to focus on larger, more complicated accounts," he said. "We needed someone with experience." Sue Prince and WAHVE have turned out to be a much better fit for the brokerage.
"For us, especially for certain job descriptions, the cost of recruiting a new person is very high; you have to hire them, pay a recruiter, add benefits, figure in the cost of real estate space–and if they don't work out, go through the whole process again," Foa said. "By outsourcing, we eliminate all that. We did have one (WAHVE) person who didn't work out, but we figured it out quickly in about 2 weeks and got another person immediately. "
Today, Foa & Son has two WAHVE outsource employees, and is pleased with both. "It's a great opportunity for people to help with a segment of the population that still has a lot to offer – and our employees feel pretty good about it," he said.
Sharon Emek hopes to have at least 100 WAVES working in 2011. For more information on the program, visit www.WAHVE.com.
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