If you own an insurance agency or advisory firm and want to grow beyond what you can produce on your own, at some point you need to bring in other insurance agents or financial advisors. That sounds straightforward. In practice, it is one of the things many owners struggle with most.
They cannot find the right people. They worry that managing someone will take more time than it saves. Or they are already so busy serving clients and running the business that recruiting keeps getting pushed to the bottom of the list.
Those are real challenges. But waiting does not solve them. The firms that get past this point build a recruiting and onboarding system that helps them consistently find, hire, and develop the right people, instead of starting from scratch every time they need someone.
In this article, you will learn how owners answer each of those reasons and make recruiting insurance agents part of everyone’s job.
Key Takeaways
- With team growth on your scorecard next to production, you see how recruiting is going whenever you review the business.
- An interview can only tell you so much about a candidate. Clear expectations, a roadmap, and leadership after the hire can matter as much as the interview itself.
- Leading and developing people is a skill owners can learn. It is what lets a business grow beyond what the owner can produce alone.
- When you are too busy to recruit insurance agents, newer team members can run first interviews from your script. Then the recruiting hours are shared across the team.
- Promoting eager people early gives capable people a chance to grow into leadership before they feel ready. Each person gets a written development plan that lists what earns the role.
Why Recruiting Insurance Agents Is the Owner's Job From the First Hire
Tracking Whether Your Team Grew on a Recruiting Scorecard
If you track production and revenue but not whether your team grew, you can add team growth to your scorecard. Once it is there, you see how recruiting is going every time you review the business, including in the months when you are busy and fully staffed.
An insurance agency or advisory firm’s scorecard can hold dozens of numbers, from client acquisition and retention to production per person. One of them, often called net gain, shows whether the team grew once you count both the people who joined and the people who left.
Leaders who watch net gain can use it to answer three questions:
- Who is winning the year. The office or team with the largest net gain.
- Who needs help. The leaders whose teams did not grow.
- Who is ready to move up. The people who keep building their teams, because once you win at recruiting, much of the rest of the business follows.
When net gain sits on the scorecard next to production, you review recruiting with the same discipline as the rest of the business. That makes it much harder for recruiting to slip off your calendar in a busy month.
Optimizing Your Sales and Building a Team That Can Scale
Business owners tend to fall into two groups:
- Most business owners wake up each day trying to optimize the game they already play.
- A much smaller group step back and design a business that can scale.
For an insurance owner, optimizing often means figuring out how to sell more insurance: another sales course, another conference, another improvement to the sales process. Those steps can make you a better producer, but they still leave growth tied largely to what you can personally produce.
If you want to build a winning team from nothing, recruiting becomes a second responsibility on top of selling. The team you build is what lets the business grow beyond the hours you can sell yourself.
What You Tell Yourself About Recruiting: "I Can't," "I Won't," or "I Will"
When owners think about building a team, the beliefs they repeat to themselves about scaling often come down to three responses: “I can’t,” “I won’t,” or “I will.” Each one leads to a different decision about growth.
- “I can’t.” This usually starts with an assumption: I cannot lead that many people, I do not have enough time, or I would not know where to start. Most teams start with one person, then two, then three, and the owner learns to handle each new level of complexity as it comes.
- “I won’t.” This one can sound more final: I could do it, but I do not want to manage people, or I would have done it if I were younger. Often it works as a defense mechanism that rules out work the owner has never tried. A useful question is whether that decision matches what you want the business to become.
- “I will.” Owners who say this may not yet know how to build the team. They are willing to be coached, change what needs to change, and get help when they reach something they do not yet know how to do.
Finding Good Insurance Agents by Leading Them Well After the Hire
When an owner says, “I cannot find good people,” it helps to look beyond the interview. You have limited information about a candidate before the hire. What you do after the hire, including the expectations you set, the roadmap you give, and the leadership around the new person, can matter as much as how well you read them in the interview. So when you recruit insurance agents, it makes sense to put your effort into three things you control:
- Clear expectations.
- A roadmap.
- Leaders who take responsibility for helping each new person become productive.
Setting Expectations and a Roadmap for Every New Insurance Agent and Financial Advisor
An interview can only tell you so much. A candidate with an impressive background and a confident story may not make the calls once hired. Someone who makes a weaker first impression may turn out to be the person who works the hardest.
Because of that, many leaders put their effort into what happens after the hire:
- Clear expectations. They set clear expectations and a roadmap for success.
- An open door. Anyone who wants the career gets the opportunity.
- Leadership after the hire. Once people join, leaders treat developing them as their own responsibility.
- No judging on appearances. Leaders set aside how candidates look, how they talk, and how they carry themselves.
Over time, other people may seek you out because of how well you develop the people who join.
The No Bad Hires Norm: Leaders Take Responsibility for Each New Hire
That thinking sits behind No Bad Hires, one of several named norms that hold a team to a standard. Once the leadership team hires someone who wants the career, leaders agree not to describe that person as lazy or unproductive. They ask what leadership can do to help the person become productive.
No Bad Hires is meant for people who want the career, and some hires still do not work out. Before deciding the person is the problem, leaders look at the expectations, training, coaching, and roadmap they provided. When someone still does not do the job, leaders replace them.
In a small business, you are often the whole leadership team, so you are the one asking that question. A useful first thing to check is whether you gave the new hire clear expectations and a roadmap.
Managing People as Your Insurance Agency or Advisory Firm Grows
You already manage people, because every client you serve is a person.
Growing past your own production asks for more. Leading and developing people becomes part of the job, and it is a different skill from producing, one that owners can learn. If you want to scale, part of your week goes to developing other people along with your own production.
How much this belief matters depends on your goals:
- If you have decided to stay a solo producer with a small support staff, you can leave it alone.
- If you want a business that grows past your own calendar and can one day be sold, management becomes part of your job, and it is a skill you can build.
Moving from top producer to firm leader usually starts with small steps, such as blocking time for leadership work and building a bench of future leaders.
Sharing the Time It Takes to Recruit Insurance Agents
Giving Recruiting 20 Percent of Everyone's Time
The Pareto principle is the idea that about 80 percent of results come from 20 percent of activities. At Florida Financial Advisors, the advisory firm led by Greatness Lab founder Jason Mickool, applying it to recruiting means two practices:
- Everyone recruits. Recruiting is part of everyone’s activity, from the receptionist to the first, second, and third hire.
- Everyone gives it about 20 percent of their time. Each person spends about a fifth of the week on recruiting and tracks the right numbers. New recruits keep coming in whatever else is happening.
How the Owner's Share of Recruiting Time Changes as the Team Grows
Greatness Lab uses a related benchmark with owners who join its platform for independent agencies and advisory firms. Those owners commit 25 percent of their own time to building or working the recruiting system. That figure is the owner’s own commitment. The 20 percent at Florida Financial Advisors describes how the whole team shares the recruiting work.
The mix changes as the team grows. With two or three people, the owner may still carry most of the recruiting work. As each new person learns to run a first interview, those hours spread across the team, and the owner no longer has to be in every conversation.
Why Team Members Who Run First Interviews Tend to Stay Longer
At Florida Financial Advisors, each new person’s job has two parts from the first hire:
- Generate a lead, turn it into a prospect, and win a new client.
- Run first interviews with candidates who would later join that person’s team.
The firm found that running first interviews helps the interviewers, too. When you walk a candidate through the career, you make the case for it to yourself as well. The firm’s team members who run first interviews tend to stay longer.
“They talk themselves into the career. Their retention goes way up.” Jason Mickool, Founder and CEO, Greatness Lab
Team members who run first interviews work from a script, so every candidate hears the same picture of the career. At Florida Financial Advisors, the candidates they interview may later join their own team. That gives each interviewer a stake in who joins and what the team becomes. The practice also works alongside a firm culture that keeps good people from leaving.
Promoting Team Members Into Management Before They Feel Ready
“You’re never ready for the job that you’re going to get. You’re only eager enough to go give it a try.” Jason Mickool, Founder and CEO, Greatness Lab
When you promote on eagerness, capable people get a chance to grow into a role, and you judge the fit by their results. At Florida Financial Advisors, it works like this:
- A clear path. Leaders lay out a clear path of leadership titles.
- A shot for the eager person. When a team member sees that path and wants it, that person gets a chance to try.
- A written plan. Leaders write out, in an individual development plan, what the person needs to do.
- Results that earn the role. When people do what is in the plan, they earn the role, whatever their seniority.
Promoting on eagerness still comes with standards. Some people will try the role and struggle, and you replace them. Others turn out to be capable of far more than anyone expected. You set that standard in the written development plan, where you spell out what each person needs to do to earn the role.
At Florida Financial Advisors, Gino Lavorgna grew from new advisor to senior vice president. The firm’s Tampa office grew from 30 to 72 people during his time there. In your own insurance agency or advisory firm, you decide what “early” means through the criteria you write into each development plan.
When Will Your Business Be Ready to Grow?
How to Make Recruiting Insurance Agents Part of Everyone's Job
At Florida Financial Advisors, a recruiting coordinator posts jobs, takes the inbound candidates, and moves each candidate through a set procedure:
- Career preview
- First interview
- Final interview
- Paperwork
The firm does not leave that process to the coordinator alone. While the coordinator keeps it moving, people across the team take on parts of the recruiting work as they build teams of their own:
- A team member who runs first interviews has five people placed underneath them.
- A leader one level up has five of those team members, each with five people of their own.
- Each person earns a small override on the people underneath them.
How you describe the opportunity matters too. If candidates hear only that they are joining to sell insurance, they see a production job. If they also hear that they can help build a team and a larger business, they can see a path beyond their own book of business. Many people want to be part of something bigger, so the larger picture can help you recruit.
Overrides are one way to reward people who help with recruiting. What works in your own insurance agency or advisory firm depends on your compensation plan, your contracts, and the licensing rules that apply to the people involved.
Recognition matters as well. At Florida Financial Advisors, people work toward named leadership titles, such as associate manager and district manager. The firm recognizes people as they reach each title, which gives them something to work toward besides money.
What an Insurance Agency Recruiting and Onboarding System Includes
With a recruiting system in place, your team can run the same process for every candidate. The process runs from the first contact through the new person’s first months on the job. Owners who build one usually put these pieces in writing:
- A recruiting playbook.
- Interview guides.
- A candidate tracking dashboard.
- Discovery call scripts.
- Onboarding checklists with 30, 60, and 90 day milestones.
It is the same kind of structure owners use to recruit and train financial advisors at scale.
A Recruiting Beliefs Check for Your Insurance Agency or Advisory Firm
The six questions below follow the reasons owners give for not recruiting and the habits that answer them. If you write your answers down, you will see more easily which habits you already have and where recruiting tends to stall.
- When you review your numbers each month, can you see whether your team grew?
- Which of these have you said lately: “I cannot find good people,” “I do not want to manage people,” “I do not have time to recruit,” or “they are not ready yet”?
- When a new hire struggles, is your first question about the person, or about what you can do to help them become productive?
- Who on your team, besides you, runs a first interview?
- Does anyone on your team have a written development plan with the next role and what it takes to earn it?
- When you describe the job to a candidate, does it include the part they can play in building something bigger, along with selling?
Building an Insurance Agency or Advisory Firm Where Everyone Helps Recruit
The reasons owners give for not recruiting are real. Each one has a practical answer that you can build into how your insurance agency or advisory firm runs:
- “I cannot find good people.” Clear expectations, a roadmap, and leaders who take responsibility for each new hire’s development.
- “I do not want to manage people.” Treating leadership as a skill you can learn, one step at a time.
- “I do not have time to recruit.” Sharing first interviews and the rest of the recruiting work across the team.
- “They are not ready yet.” Promoting on eagerness, with a written development plan for each role.
When net gain is on your scorecard, you can see whether all of this is working. Candidates also have more reason to join when you describe the bigger opportunity. With those habits in place, you can recruit insurance agents without fitting every interview into your own week. A team that recruits without you in every conversation also helps make a business worth more when you sell it.
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Questions Owners Ask About How to Recruit Insurance Agents
How do you recruit insurance agents when you are too busy?
Should the owner of an insurance agency or advisory firm hire a recruiter first?
How much time should an insurance agency owner spend recruiting insurance agents?
How can you tell in an interview whether an insurance agent or financial advisor will succeed?
What is the No Bad Hires norm in an insurance agency or advisory firm?
Why do newer insurance agents and financial advisors who run first interviews stay longer?
When should an insurance agency or advisory firm promote a team member into management?
About the Authors
Jason Mickool, Founder and CEO of Greatness Lab
Jason Mickool built Florida Financial Advisors from a kitchen table conversation into a national advisor enterprise. It grew to dozens of locations across more than a dozen states, and he completed a nine-figure transaction. Today he brings that operating experience to Greatness Lab. There he coaches insurance and financial business owners who want to build, scale, and exit on their own terms. He is the author of Built to Lead, Built to Scale. Connect with Jason Mickool on LinkedIn or at jasonmickool.com.
Coach Micheal Burt, Performance Coach
Coach Micheal Burt is a performance coach, best-selling author, and founder of The Greatness Factory in Nashville, Tennessee. A former championship basketball coach, he teaches the Prey Drive and Monster mindset frameworks to business owners and financial advisors. He partners with Greatness Lab as its Greatness Executive Coach. Connect with Coach Micheal Burt on LinkedIn or at coachburt.com.
