Leading Your Agency Through the Unknown: Overcoming Fear in Leadership
Most, if not every, agency owner would take a crystal ball if they had the opportunity. The ability to see into the future, play through different decisions, and control how everything turns out would make life so much easier. To have the foresight that allows us to make strategic decisions that lead to the very best outcome for the agency would ease some of the stress of the decision-making process.
Unfortunately, this is not an option. Agency owners and leaders know a particular set of things and make the best decisions possible based on that information. You don’t get to control the outside forces that can affect business. Given this uncertainty, how do you lead teams through and drive success for your agency and its employees?
Develop & Commit to a Purpose – Understanding the “why” or purpose of your agency is critical to everything that you do as an organization. The goals and decisions of your agency should be rooted in your purpose. Taking the time to develop your purpose will then allow you to define your core principles, which will dictate how you do business. Having these established allows your employees to connect with the agency, you as the leader, and to one another. All of these things combined help drive your agency culture.
Plan & Action –Whether it’s revenue growth, client retention, employee satisfaction, these are all essential components of your agency. Taking time to examine these and define what “success” looks like in all of these areas is critical to making sure everyone understands where the agency is going. When goals and objectives are clearly defined, you can build a roadmap from where you are to where you want to be. Just as important as planning is taking action. Your agency roadmap should serve as a guide to specific actions and steps required to accomplish the agency goals. Once this is mapped out, everyone in the organization should be prepared to take action and execute the plan.
Be Prepared to Pivot – It would be so much easier if life went exactly as planned. Unfortunately, this is not reality. There unexpected events every day that impact the business. Sometimes the impact can be absorbed, but other times it requires leadership to go back to the drawing board. Pushing forward with the original plan when everything around it has changed will only breed frustration at all levels of the agency. Possessing the willingness to examine the current strategy objectively, evaluate what will continue to work and what changes are needed, and then pivoting is critical to the success of the agency.
There will always be plenty of unknowns when running an insurance agency. Having the right building blocks in place will provide the foundation you need in order to lead your teams through uncertainty successfully.
