Thinking Differently: The “Four Pillars” Test

By Leslie Lacroix, CRM, CAIB

Not too long ago, a coworker of mine was getting married. During the lead-up to his wedding, he researched and selected vendors quite differently than the way I did several years ago. He publicly tweeted questions and requests for information, and then chose service providers based on whether, how quickly and how well they responded. I'm not all that old, but certainly I feel so when I tell a story like that, as I did in my opening remarks at TENCon 2013 last fall.

We're living in a different world today. People have access to more information than ever before. And they have access to it more quickly and in different ways. That raises the bar for us as insurance professionals. We're called on to know more, so we can better fulfill our roles as expert advisors. And we're called on to do more, because we can. 

In an era of changed expectations, a shifting workforce and evolving workflows, we need to be ready to respond and deliver. It would certainly be easier to keep doing things as we've always done them, which is something insurance organizations have struggled with for as long as many of us remember. But we can't maintain the status quo—as organizations or as individuals. 

We need to find ways to keep growing our businesses and our personal value. We need to change our perspectives. We need to be open to new approaches. 

As principals and managers, we need to encourage employees to think differently, to find creative approaches, and to be different. As employees, we need to be willing to let go of how we always did things, and make sure we're willing to adapt. All of us need to ask ourselves, our staff and our co-workers: “Why do we do this?” and “Does it make sense anymore?” Opening our minds to something new, to something different, can bring great rewards. 

When it comes time to drill down and ultimately implement change, it helps to have a guide, a foundation, if you will. It's been said that if you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. We need to make sure our new ideas will take us down the right road. We need a foundation on which to build. 

At our firm, we have such a foundation, which we refer to as The Four Pillars. It's a very simple test against which we measure ourselves. The elements of this foundation are “assessment, advice, execution and retention,” and they provide guidelines for everyone in our office. 

Actually, these are terms that insurance people are familiar with. They're part of the fabric of what we do: assess risk, offer great advice, execute on what we say we'll do, and set ourselves up to retain clients. But we use these pillars for internal processes as well. As we deal with colleagues, we make sure we're doing a good job of assessing the situation, providing the right coaching and advice, doing what we said we'd do, and retaining staff.  

Employees at every level in our organization can articulate and understand the pillars. As a result, despite any role differences, experience differences or generational differences, we all talk the same language and operate in a common culture. 

Having a foundation in place allows us to stay centered as we find new ways to respond to customers, interact with employees and business partners, and build bright futures for our organizations and ourselves.