Every day we ask a question of our readers on our Daily Dispatch. Here are some of our favorite answers we’ve received recently:
What advice do you have for a young carrier side professional in the call center who is about to burn out?
If you have any passion for the end result of doing your job well, I recommend start working “on the business” not just in it. AN example would be to study the work flow of your job and see if there is a better way of doing it. Keep in mind the end product and its impact on your down line co-workers and clients.
He/she needs to speak up and let management know asap.
Few questions: Is it just the job? Or is this employee going to school, have a second job?
Burnout is recognized by most employers today and management should be supportive of the employee taking time off, moving to another task, or using volunteering time off (VTO) in order to take a break. Speaking up is the first step though. If the employer is not empathetic, it’s time to find another job.
Everyone has to grind through the boring stuff early on- the better you do, the sooner you’ll get moved up. And if you aren’t loving what you’re doing, then make sure all of your free time/money/energy is going towards things you DO love.
Call centers burn out a lot of people. One of the ways to keep your attitude up is to realize you have options, and that this role is a stepping stone to your next one. Take a self-assessment – what skills have you developed? (Product knowledge is probably number 1, but also consider how you have learned to deal with stressful situations, the ability to help customers who do not understand the policy features or processes the carrier uses, etc.) What have you enjoyed the most? What do you want more of in your current role? (and less?) What would you like to do in your next role? What do you need to learn more about? What do you want to learn more about?
Now that you have assessed your own skills, have a conversation with your boss about what she thinks your skills are, and how she thinks you might move into a more significant role. What options does she think you have? What can you do within your current role to position yourself for the next one?
Who are your mentors? Ask them to help you assess your skills and move forward in your career? If you don’t have a mentor, find one! (That VP who sits in the corner is probably a good choice.) Discuss options for career advancement, and work with your mentor to build a plan for the future.
Once you recognize your options, the stress of your current situation will feel much more manageable.
Great question. Call center burnout is a rampant issue on the carrier side and something I see as one of the contributors to the insurance talent crisis. With aggressive KPIs, tight controls, and little flexibility, the insurance call center can kill a young insurance career before it even gets off the ground. It can also be a fantastic learning environment though on which to build a career. At the carrier I worked at some of the all-star leaders grew up in the call center and attribute that experience as the foundation to their success. Those that successfully leveraged their call center experience and avoided burnout tended to do three things that I would share with others currently in the role.
- Keep your eye on the prize. Know where you want to go and continually think about how what you’re doing now will help you get there. When you get a tough call, use that as an opportunity to research and learn, expanding your industry knowledge. When you get a tough caller, use that as an opportunity to build a great STAR answer for your next interview. Thinking about the value that you’re adding to your future career with your present role helps you stay engaged and focused.
- Check in with your manager and/or mentor(s) on a regular basis. Leverage the experience and guidance of tenured industry professionals to help you through the challenges of the call center environment. Bounce questions and ideas off them regularly so that you can both benefit from their experience and improve your team / environment with your ideas.
- Practice self-care. This is a given for any role but is often overlooked, especially when it is needed the most. What can you do in your 15-minute break that is going to energize you for the rest of the morning? Get out for a quick power walk or chat with a colleague or read a chapter of a great book. Let your mind off the hook for a couple minutes! And if you’re talking all day – don’t forget to stay hydrated. It sounds like a trivial thing but really makes a huge difference.
And above all – know that you are truly in a key role in the industry. The work that you are doing is important and can take you down a lot of different paths. Good luck!
Call center work can be a real struggle. It becomes hard to know that you’re helping people, or making a difference.
- It’s time to come up with a plan for what’s next. Do you have a college degree? Do you need one? Would a designation help you to move forward in your career.
- Discuss your plans with your supervisor. You should be able to work together to come up with specific actions, learning, etc. that will move your career on.
- Many call centers require reps to be available on their phone on a fairly regimented basis. That doesn’t mean that you can’t be working on what’s next while you’re on the phone. In my call center days (working in a credit card collections center), there would be some time during my shift when the call volume dropped to where I could read, study, and learn between calls.
- Maybe you can’t study while on your shift, you still have breaks and there are usually another 16 hours available and days off when you could be reading and studying.
- While you’re coming up with your plan, here are a couple of band aids.
- Change your mind. I know that call centers have high turnover and there are reasons for it. If you can decide to stick it out while you work on what’s next, you can make it. (BTW, you may have to change your mind several times/shift)
- Explain to a mentor or your supervisor that you’re struggling and still want to be a great team member, but you need some help and encouragement.
- Get approval for a class that will get you out of the office for a day.
- Get approval for online classes during your shift that will give you a break from the normal schedule.
Question from a reader: Who out there is the best a delivering fast, binding, insurance quotes with limited inputs (SSN and VIN and maybe an address)?
Word on the street is coverwallet and next insurance – if I had to name two!
For homeowners – definitely swyfft
Commercial – nothing of note.
Swyft
If you could get AI (Artificial Intelligence) to do the boring parts of your job so you can concentrate on the fun parts which parts would you outsource and which parts would you keep?
All parts of my job with people, relationships, discussions, face to face and over the phone would be kept…
Did you grow up wanting to work in insurance? How did you find your way into the insurance industry?
Like Michael Corleone, I don’t think I was ever going to get away from the family business.
Growing up, my dad worked at the insurance agency my Grandpa owned (My parents now own it). I never had a desire to work in insurance, but when I was 16, I began my first job at the agency as a receptionist, so I could earn money for college. 7 years, a promotion, a diploma, a husband, a house and a dog later, I’m still here. I found out that there was more to insurance than selling and servicing. I am able to use my creativity and other interests within the field as well. It’s not the work I expected to be doing, but it’s work that I love doing.
My father was an insurance agent. He thought I should be an actuary. All Dad knew about being an actuary is that you had to be good at math. (He also thought actuaries made a million dollars a year. We don’t!) Of course, that meant the actuarial field was the last place I wanted to be. However, I wasn’t finding a job elsewhere, and when the actuarial position came along, I took it. And learned that it is a fascinating career, with plenty of room to grow and contribute in an industry that matters.
I, like probably 95% of folks in the industry, fell into it by chance. I took a job at an agency and fell in love with the business.
I definitely didn’t grow up wanting to work in insurance. I was going to be a scientist, a geologist! I fell into insurance when a friend referred me for a claims job to get me out of the crappy low-wage bank job I was working at the time. A lot of working in claims is customer service since you’re dealing with people at a very difficult time in their lives, and I had those skills. It’s also business knowledge – being able to understand contracts, handle multiple tasks, prioritize work, and coordinate multiple people to complete a task. After a terrifying first claim where the insured didn’t speak English and I found myself explaining complex things that I didn’t yet fully understand myself to an interpreter, I settled in and found I actually liked insurance. After several years in claims, I finished my MBA and moved over to the “business side” of the business – in product and pricing. Now I work in Research & Development, where I study market trends and competitor pricing. After years of not doing “science”, I found a job that lets me use some of the skills of my BS in Geology, like taking scattered bits of research and drawing a big picture of the market and my company’s position in it. I still miss the rocks, but I don’t miss the mosquito bites and twisted ankles I’d getting hiking to find them. I still love the mountains; I just spend my weekends there instead (covered in bug spray).
No I did not grow up wanting to work in Insurance, in fact after college I would not accept any interview for positions such as an insurance adjustor. I did ultimately accept an interview for an Insurance Examiner, sounded cool ( I was 21) I didn’t know that it was the same as an adjustor. I was offered a trainee positon with that company and that’s how I started in insurance. I worked my way through the industry from working with carriers, to brokers to insureds. A lot of the people I started my carrier with some 30 years or so ago are no longer adjusters, they moved on. Some went back to school and became attorneys, one of my fellow trainees went back and became a forensic Psychologist and another got out and became a budget analyst. A few of us (including myself) went into Risk Management.
I did not dream of working in insurance. My path to insurance starts after I spent 10 years in the US Army and another 4 years in college.
When I graduated from college in 2005, I had a dream. My family and I moved from Jacksonville, FL to a small town in central New York, just off the Finger Lakes region. We had moved there specifically to start an independent church in the community.
We had sold a house and so had some money to live on, but a job was certainly in order. We moved to town in June 2005 and I made it my mission to find work. By August, I was really starting to get anxious to have work. I answered an ad for a temp to hire gig. That turned out to be basically a data entry job in underwriting at an MGA, working with fire departments. Once I started looking at those forms, I was hooked.
Throughout high school and college, I was mostly unaware of insurance. I knew that my parents needed it, but I really didn’t have to worry about it. Back then, health insurance was an option, and many people paid for their doctor visit with a personal check!I ended up in the industry by applying for a role with the research and development department of a regional insurance company. I didn’t know anything about how insurance companies worked, but figured that research could be pretty interesting. They also wanted someone who could write well, which also appealed to me. While writing well has become a standard request of many employers, it was fairly unique at the time. What I didn’t realize was that this role was a gateway to many other departments of the company where I could learn even more about this fascinating industry!An so began my insurance career 28 years ago. There is always something new to explore – especially with changing technology and social norms. Each of us manages risk every day of our lives, but many don’t realize it. Insurance is one facet of the bigger risk management picture. Certainly, it comes at a price…but that price may be far outweighed by a single unfortunate loss!
About Antonio Canas
Tony started in insurance in 2009 and immediately became a designation addict and shortly thereafter a proud insurance nerd. He has worked in claims, underwriting, finance and sales management, at 4 carriers, 6 cities and 5 states. Tony is passionate about insurance, technology and especially helping the insurance industry figure out how to retain and engage the younger generation of insurance professionals. Tony is a co-founder of InsNerds.com and a passionate speaker.
Tony started in insurance in 2009 and immediately became a designation addict and shortly thereafter a proud insurance nerd. He has worked in claims, underwriting, finance and sales management, at 4 carriers, 6 cities and 5 states. Tony is passionate about insurance, technology and especially helping the insurance industry figure out how to retain and engage the younger generation of insurance professionals. Tony is a co-founder of InsNerds.com and a passionate speaker.
