Risk & Resolve
The Risk & Resolve Podcast is your go-to resource for insightful conversations at the intersection of leadership, business ownership, and the insurance industry. Hosted by Ben Conner and Todd Hufford, this podcast dives deep into the challenges and opportunities that leaders face in an ever-changing world.
Each episode features candid discussions with business owners, industry experts, and thought leaders, exploring topics like innovation, risk management, and the strategies that drive success. Whether you’re an entrepreneur, executive, or insurance professional, you’ll gain actionable insights and inspiration to navigate today’s complex business landscape.
Tune in to Risk & Resolve—where leadership meets resilience.
Risk & Resolve
Comfort Won’t Build Your Future with Jason Starner, Commercial Team Lead/Sr. Advisor at Conner Insurance
Jason Starner, Commercial Team Lead at Conner Insurance, shares his journey from a banking background to insurance professional and the pivotal risks that shaped his career. Reflecting on 25+ years in the industry, he discusses his unexpected path into insurance and the valuable lessons learned along the way.
• Growing up in rural Ohio with a father in banking initially led Jason to assume he would follow that career path
• His first real exposure to insurance came through a finance class at Bowling Green State University
• Early career anxiety about meeting experienced insurance professionals was overcome by purposefully seeking relationships with top agencies
• The transition from carrier representative to agency side required taking a significant risk - "burning the ships" on his previous career
• Transparency with clients and team members has been fundamental to building successful relationships
• Current insurance market continues to be challenging with general liability claims and "nuclear verdicts" driving increases
• Mentoring early career talent provides as much fulfillment now as closing new business
• Taking calculated risks earlier in your career can lead to unexpected growth opportunities
Insurance is about relationships first—listening, empathy, showing up consistently, and following through on promises. If you do these things and focus on transparency, the technical expertise naturally falls into place.
You're listening to Risk and Resolve, and now for your hosts, ben Conner and Todd Hufford, welcome to another episode of the Risk and Resolve pod. Today we have a very special guest, jason Starner, who is the commercial team lead here at Conner Insurance. Jason, thanks for joining us today.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thank you, gentlemen. I've been looking forward to this for the last few months, ever since I heard this was starting, so I'm looking forward to seeing what hopefully softball questions you have for me today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, lots of softball questions. I've got two of those and I've got a bunch of fast pitches for you. I've been looking forward to it too, jason, because, first of all, we know each other so well, and so I'm hoping that some of those stories that you know we already know about you get shared a little more broadly. But what I'm really hoping for is that I'm able to uncover something I don't yet know about you. So that's my own little challenge.
Speaker 3:Let's see if we can figure that out.
Speaker 2:You know I thought about this conversation and you know Jason Starner just equals insurance. I mean, jason's been in insurance his whole career, been very successful at it. Recruit that we do hire to kind of give them a picture as to what at least one person's trajectory and history was in getting into insurance. So take me back to Northwestern Ohio and give me a little glimpse of what 16, 17, 18-year-old Jason Starner thought he was going to do with his life 16 and 17.
Speaker 3:I would say early on, quite frankly, I figured I would end up in the banking business because that was the business my dad had been in. So I really felt just naturally kind of looking up to him, just like I would imagine a lot of children, or particularly sons and their fathers, do. You just look up to that and think you're going to emulate that and the success in that career path Out of school at Bowling Green, that's really where I got my first taste of insurance. I majored in finance and international business and one of the finance classes to take was actually from the CPCU, one of the CPCU books, and that was really my first jump into understanding what insurance was.
Speaker 3:Outside of giving my dad $600 every year to pay for my car insurance, I had no plans to go in insurance. It wasn't the path or the trajectory that I thought I would take. But oddly enough, out of school, I would say, 90% of the jobs that I ended up interviewing for were either finance companies or insurance carriers and when it really got down to it, the insurance piece just appealed to me a lot more and the training programs I was going to go to and the overall the roles that I was interviewing for were always in the territory manager or sales roles with the insurance carrier, so that greatly appealed to me. I think naturally the pull was there, because I'm just a people person.
Speaker 2:So what you're saying is we can debunk the myth that Jason Starner, as a high school student, knew he was going to be a successful insurance magnate knew he was going to be a successful insurance magnate?
Speaker 3:No, absolutely not.
Speaker 2:So you grew up in a pretty rural area, defiance, I mean, that's not a big metropolis. Explain what home life was like back in high school days.
Speaker 3:Home life. Defiance County had between 18,000 and 20,000. I still think it probably fluctuates in that area as far as population goes. So it's right between Fort Wayne and Toledo. Fort Wayne, indiana and Toledo, ohio those were the bigger towns 30 and 40-minute drive we'd go to if we wanted to go shopping for anything. My father was in the banking business, my mom. She was in the banking business until my brother was born and at that point she made the determination to have her be a stay-at-home mom taking care of my brother, who was five years younger than I. You know, again, insurance wasn't anything that I knew anything more of outside of when I turned 16. Outside of when I turned 16, that was where my dad started to instill the responsibilities of the financial responsibilities, and one of those was if you want that car, a, you're going to pay me for it, and B, you're going to pay for gas, and C, it's going to be here's how much additional you're costing me every year for insurance. So that was my first look into the space from the very beginning.
Speaker 2:Rural area. What kind of farming exposure did you or your family have?
Speaker 3:I didn't, we didn't, we didn't have any farming. The only farming exposure I really had was as a child I would grow up with I'd spend a lot of time with my grandfather once quite a bit, and on.
Speaker 3:Sundays and the weekends and I'd spend those weekends with him. There was a rather large farm down in southeast Ohio, down in Appalachia in the Hocking Hills area, and every Sunday we'd go out do a few things and we always ended up at this massive farm for breakfast. It was a big dairy farm. Always ended up at this massive farm for breakfast. It was a big dairy farm. I actually got some experience there with dairy farming but always had extremely fresh and homemade breakfasts. So that's about the only farming exposure I've got.
Speaker 2:So you ended up at a big farm on the weekend in southeastern Ohio. You didn't say Rio Grande, but gosh, it sounds like a Bob Evans farm southeastern Ohio.
Speaker 3:You didn't say Rio Grande, but gosh, it sounds like a Bob Evans farm. You know Bob Evans had nothing on this place. I mean, it was homemade ketchup. You know their own homemade sausage eggs right out of the coop. It was legit Awesome. So you go to Bowling Green. How did you pick Bowling Green out of all the places? I just found it to be middle of the road Through high school. I had initially had my eye on Ohio Northern, much more small and private school, similar probably to like a Taylor here in Indiana, size wise. I like that because I just naturally, even though I'm a people person, I naturally have gravitated to smaller things, meaning I'm not a bigger is better type of person.
Speaker 1:And when I went to tour that campus.
Speaker 3:Quite frankly, it was a very quick, no, and all they had was a splashing faraway stoplight. I think they had a Kfc, I don't know how. And then it looked like somebody put a bunch of brick buildings in the middle of a cornfield and said let's call this a couch and it, you know, it's 17, 18 years old. I was like I, I can't spend 40 years. Um, conversely, you know, obviously those that know me, I I'm a big Ohio State fan, right, but conversely, ohio State was just so big and I just was like that, just I knew that really wasn't my fit. So, you know, the middle of the road was kind of a Mac school. It's very similar to Ball State here in Indiana. It was Bowling Green. It was an hour and 20 minutes or so from home, so far enough to where, if they wanted to get you, they'd have to call you to let you know they're coming, but close enough to get home pretty quick if you needed to go home and have mom do laundry or something like that.
Speaker 2:So four years of finance at international business at Bowling Green.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:You're a senior at Bowling Green. Had you had any insurance internships at all, or were you kind of going?
Speaker 3:I did not. I had no. The only internship I did I did, um, I did work for some family friends that owned a rather decent size manufacturing company at home and, uh, I actually did a bunch of ground maintenance and things in the summers. They provided a job. They knew my dad and uh, when one of the owners, marty, said, hey, you know you're coming back again next summer, I said no, I need to really find an internship. And his response was he says well, you just send me the paper and tell me what qualifications it needs to be to qualify and I'll make sure it qualifies Right. So I end up just doing an internship there, working with their lead controller and accounting person there for a summer. Working with their lead controller and accounting person there for a summer. Nothing insurance related.
Speaker 2:Well, obviously Ohio for those that don't know is the domicile and home state for many insurance companies. So I can imagine going to any Ohio based college. There's going to be a fair number of Ohio insurance companies recruiting students, who are some of the names I guess. Guess you remember recruiting on campus and otherwise.
Speaker 3:Well, todd, quite frankly, when I was in college I never went to one job fair. Actually, I take that back. I did go to one and nothing much came of it. I don't remember talking to insurance carriers. I, quite frankly, don't even remember who the heck I remember talking to it, just naturally. I do remember sending out resumes galore out of my apartment using my old word processor. You know address, just delete and add, delete and add.
Speaker 3:And Lincoln Financial, you know, had at that point in time three big offices up in Fort Wayne. You know, had at that point in time three big offices up in Fort Wayne. Um, salina Insurance Group, which is down in Salina, ohio, which was south of the finance, about, you know, an hour and a half drive or so, was another smaller regional insurance carrier, and there were. There were a few others as well. I saw. I remember talking to State Farm that was a phone interview initially, um, but uh, most of the others then again were more in the financial. You know, hey, you go to a furniture store and we can finance that business for you working in an office somewhere doing something like that.
Speaker 2:So you approached the latter half of your senior year Growing up in the household you did. You knew that responsibility was coming your way quickly so that freshman in the real world first job where'd you land? The first person that paid you, who we like to say, didn't love you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the first job I took was with Salina Insurance Group, a small regional in Ohio. Like I referenced earlier, they were primarily personal lines in the farm and agribusiness. That's really their forte. They did commercial as well, but it was more Main Street mom-and-pop commercial business. So, you know, it was a great start though, because they were hiring at that point in time four individuals, fresh right out of college, to come in and go through a whole year long training session.
Speaker 3:So we are in a basement, no windows, you know one door, no computers, right and literally insurance manuals and policy forms in front of us. And that's how we learn reading the form. And we there were days we'd spent you know four hours on how this one word changed the coverage and that's. And then our test work. Here's the form, here's the question tell me where and how and why. And that that was my training. But that training was training us all to be in the marketing territory, rep position. So that that was has always been the 15 years I was on the carrier side. That was always um, those were always the positions I was in.
Speaker 1:So, jason, after Celina, uh, what? What was your next stop? Um, cause, we're leading up to this build, to where you were at Philly, and then we can. We can leave from there, but tell us about after.
Speaker 3:Celina Insurance. What happened? So, celina, I moved to Acuity Insurance. I was at Celina for five years. Primary duties were really agency relations in the state of Indiana and at a big eye convention after about five years I had met an individual at Acuity up out of Wisconsin and, lo and behold, it was about a year later or so. He kept my card and calls me up and says, hey, you know, we have a position opening up, and actually initially the position was for a territory rep job in Wisconsin, but that just wasn't going to work at that point with my wife and I.
Speaker 3:So that ceased conversation Six months later he calls back and says, hey, what if you didn't have to move?
Speaker 3:We have a position in Indiana. Away that conversation went and I ended up taking up the same, very similar position with Acuity. From Salina to Acuity, really the biggest difference there much bigger carrier At that point, more of a regional Midwest carrier. Today they're more of a super regional. The big difference was they were primarily commercial driven with very much small, almost a flip commercial to personal. So for me it was a great professional growth opportunity to learn a lot more on the commercial side of the business and really expand my knowledge base there.
Speaker 1:Yes. What were some of the key takeaways? Because those were a few early career job opportunities. What do you feel like was the main takeaway from those early career opportunities, especially in the insurance space?
Speaker 3:opportunities, especially in the insurance space Takeaways. Well, you know, at that point I was 25, 26, I think, when I was leaving Salina to go to, you know, to go to Acuity, and still, I mean, that's pretty young, you still really. I think you're stuck trying to figure out is this what I want to do with my life professionally? Would I move potentially even to a wisconsin or something else? Would that be in the cards for my wife and my family? Um, you know, as you're out there in the field, you just don't. Well, particularly at that point, you know, technology isn't what it is today. So, connecting via team zoom and and all the fashions that we do today, and we're there uh.
Speaker 3:So the carriers did their best to make you feel part of the group internally, you know, and you'd get to the home office three, four, five times a year. But you were still out there on your own on this island and, while I always felt you could make an impact, I always wondered was the impact enough and was I being heard and seen enough internally to potentially position myself to make that next move, which would potentially mean I moved to a home office somewhere right Wisconsin, columbus, wherever that would be? So I just constantly tried to position myself, to be in front of the right people and and be seen and heard where appropriate. So if those opportunities were to arise, I was seen as a good candidate for that. I mean, I went as far and during one of my jobs, my manager asked me you know, what's the one thing you need from me? And my very direct answer as you guys know me, I'm pretty direct my direct answer was I need you to train me to take your job.
Speaker 3:That was, and I quote that was, and he sat back and says really I said, yes, I'm not out to get you, but I also, you know, in the progress of my career I want upward mobility right and if it's with this carrier or another carrier, it likely would mean a position that he sat in right and I needed him to mentor me to help prepare me for that.
Speaker 1:He understood it completely and actually was one of the better managers I had thought process of being early in career and being placed in front of very technical insurance people. Um, how did you like prepare? What was your mindset Like? Can you like recall like that period of your life and what that part of the situation was like?
Speaker 3:It was um, you know, when you're young like that, you don't know what you don't know. Um, most people that knew me back in high school, um, would not probably fully back then. They would have not recognized the confident and seemingly outgoing person that you see today. It was, it was, it was. So there you go. I mean, Todd, you want to cover something that that may be one. It was almost the complete opposite. You know, I wasn't the social butterfly, I wasn't the real talk that it won. I just it was the opposite of what you see today.
Speaker 3:So, being young like that and stepping into a role that was very outwardly facing, walking into agents that you never knew, that had been in the business for 20, 30, 40, 50 years, that knew far more than you did technically, it was very nerve-wracking. So I approached that initially with Celina. I said, okay, who are my top four or five largest insurance agents in my territory? And I made it priority one to be in their office nonstop to get to know them, because I figured well A very selfishly they would likely give me the most amount of time because they had the most business with us, right?
Speaker 3:So at that point, stepping into there and I asked them a ton of questions and a couple of them were just incredibly open doors and they would I mean one of them actually had me work in their agency for the day, answering the phone, working alongside their account managers, just to get a feel for what that operation looked like. Which again technical details continue to come out. That operation looked like, which again technical details continue to come out, and it just continued to build that confidence in myself and my knowledge base. And as time goes on, obviously you learn more and more and more and at some point you start realizing wait a minute, I probably am the smartest person in the room on these details. I'm worried about it, but the odds are I probably know more than the average bear that I'm talking to.
Speaker 1:So over time you start to build this to just fake it and pretend I knew a lot you're like hey, like I, what I can be really good at right now is like relationship and building that while I'm learning. So I'm going to lean into something that I can, I can control, that I can, like you know, be successful at with with preparation, and that's where I think that on that is great advice, cause I think there's a lot out there and certainly there's an element that you have to step into the unknown to some degree. Right, and like just figure it out, but there's always a part of a situation where you can lean into a strength. So that's really good. So not to go through like a whole resume by any means, but you ended up at philly, philadelphia insurance and you, uh, um, you were the expert, like you knew what you were doing.
Speaker 1:I don't really share with us like that experience and like that you know where you were at in your career, like how long, how many years, you've been a professional and then, and then from there you came over to connor and because that's how we met is when you're at philadelphia insurance as a as a carrier rep, but just kind of recount that circumstance and like what that transition was like to come to the agency side and maybe even some like hey, I thought this about the agency side, but getting over here it was actually maybe different or a lot of what I expected. I don't know. You tell us.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, a couple of things before I answer that question directly to your point of the intimidation and being young and how actually I can tie this directly into Connor.
Speaker 3:Even back in my Salina days, I remember coming into this office and at that point of course you guys weren't here, but I sat because a part of my job at that point was also appointing new agencies to grow the territory, and I walked in to the door and I walked in and I asked I forget who was the receptionist at that point to speak to a principal or a partner. And Jack actually was the one that got the lucky opportunity and I remember sitting in our conference room around the round table I can almost tell you exactly where I was sitting and where he was sitting. And I sat in there in those big burgundy chairs and I'm out of my league here. And Jack walks in and we all know Jack right, I'm out of my league here. Jack walks in and we all know Jack right, and and he, you know, if you didn't know him, of course in my twenties it can be, intimidating Right and I remember sitting there trying to go through it and I thought this isn't going to work.
Speaker 3:I'm just I'm, I'm overshooting it here. So to tie in it's. It's interesting that I'm now here at Connor insurance and I've gotten to know Jack pretty well over the years and how that goes, you know, from 15 years to today. Anyway, left Acuity, went to Philadelphia Insurance, worked there for five years, same thing in the carrier rep position, which is where I met you guys. A large part of Philadelphia's book, they're the King of the Hill, you know, when it comes to nonprofit social service business, private charter schools, a lot of things like that, a lot of things that Connor Insurance did then and still does today very well. We write a lot of business and have a lot of relationships in that space.
Speaker 3:So, working with you guys. That's how I got to know Connor. Really I spent a lot of time, ben I know, with you on Heritage Christian. I believe back then you were still doing more PNC at that time, but of course I remember sitting at the roundtable with the AMs multiple times as well, with Karen and Debbie and Todd.
Speaker 3:At some point I think I got to know you working on the Humane Society I forget what account it was, but that's my intro working for Philly into really getting to know and understand counterinsurance, you know, and at that point in time I quickly realized you know, you do what you say and say what you do.
Speaker 3:That's the type of people I was dealing with here, and Ben, in particular, your dad. I worked with him on multiple accounts and I quickly realized if I did and I hit this number, here's what you need to do to win and if I did it nine times out of 10, I was going to get the win and I was going to write business. So I was in here at least once or twice a month. Sometimes it would just be in the library and I'd talk to a few people, other times I'd get the whole crew. But that enabled me A, to build incredible relationships with everybody on the team, but also get to understand what it took to grow a business. And at that point I mean I vividly remember because you were one of my higher growth agencies during my tenure there we went from somewhere in the hundred and some thousand dollar range to well over a million dollar book of business.
Speaker 3:Uh, just through building those relationships and that trust factor that we established. So and then, of course, I happened to be in here one day, um sitting then with you and your dad working on a school account, and the opportunities came up. Uh, you know, um, and here I know, and here I am today. Here I am today.
Speaker 2:So about that were you looking? Were you at a point in your career where you were open to looking, or was it kind of a surprise ask that changed the trajectory of what you were doing?
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, I wasn't. Well, was I actively looking? No, I think anybody that has a growth mindset is constantly looking to grow themselves professionally and potentially look at what that next opportunity may be. So from that aspect I wasn't actively looking, but I'm always listening for that next opportunity.
Speaker 3:And I believe it was a few weeks before I was actually sitting in Jim Ben, your dad's office, I think you two were actually at Philadelphia Roadshow over in Columbus, ohio, and we chatted for a bit. Anyway, then, fast forward to that meeting in your dad's office, somebody on the board your dad had asked would you be happy to come out and present and help us present? I said absolutely. And the person on the board that was coming out from that school worked at Travelers and I made a very just meant nothing, just to say well, I have to ask them if they're hired. And I remember very vividly, ben, you and your dad kind of looked at each other and you got up and left the room and went to your office. You came back with a piece of paper from that roadshow and across he said well, actually, and he pointed at the bottom and it said recruit Jason Starner. And evidently you told me you two had had a conversation coming back from Columbus about me. So one, it was very flattering. Two, even more so from the people that were asking me In the carrier rep position, as not just me because I'm special, but most reps, I believe.
Speaker 3:If you're worth a darn, you're in and out of literally hundreds.
Speaker 3:I was in and out of, but darn, you're in and out of literally hundreds. I was in and out of, over the course of 15 years on the carrier side, hundreds and hundreds of different insurance agencies, from two and three man shops and in the middle of the farm country to the largest brokerages in the country. You're approached often with hey, you know, have you ever thought about this or thought about that? We'd love to talk to you and, quite frankly, it's just for one reason or another a lack of trust, understanding how they treated their employees, knowing how they treated and interacted with their clients For whatever reason it was very, very, very few were ones that I would have ever considered to take a job with. Um, and you know, when that opportunity popped up that day with you and your dad again, I know you guys have heard this, but I I remember right where I was parked outside, I walked out to my car and I to myself said that could work and that that that was kind of the start of what led me here today.
Speaker 3:That was what 10 years ago it would have been probably about 12, closer to 12 years ago.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of the reasons I think that you and I get along so well. I mean, there's a lot of reasons actually, but one of them is we both have a passion for that early career talent. And you look at our team we have some early career talent, but we also have some seasoned talent, which you need. A balance of both and, of course, you and I talking about welcoming early career talent to the team is at our own jeopardy as we get closer and closer to being not even anywhere near the definition of early career talent. From your standpoint, what does that phrase mean and why is it important for any agency to focus on that, to build systems and means to attract those individuals into the industry?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, I think a lesser confident person at 49 years old would sit there and be worried about it. But as part of the team now, I used to use Ben, your dad, on occasion to pull gray haired into the meetings with me to have gray hair. Well, I've had now two people on our team pull me into meetings for that and I'm like OK, so we've entered that phase of life. It's actually quite humbling that they look to you for that and it's a great responsibility that we have to, whether it's our own children or the people here at work, right, to do that. You know, if you're not growing, where are you going? Right, you're dying on the vine. So for that growth, where are you going? Right, you're dying on the vine.
Speaker 3:So for that growth, you know we need to continue to recruit young career talent and I think all too often, in my opinion, young career talent, with a lot of people, gets associated with somebody right out of high school or college. Right, yes, they're young, but that may not be young in their career. Right, look, maybe they, maybe, maybe they're 30 years old and they've done something else for 10 years, but they've made that transition and said that's not it. Insurance is for me now. That's where I want to go. I've learned enough. That's that. That's my trajectory.
Speaker 3:I would still consider that young career talent. Right Now we start getting to our fifties, that may be a little different story, but I think it's incredibly important that we do that. Um, I myself over the years and I still enjoy it to this day greatly going out, whittling through an opportunity and leading it to the close and the yes. But I think, as with most people, as you get older, your bucket gets filled also by helping others to become successful and imparting your wisdom. It's you know, of what you've learned, your experiences and shared experiences with them for them to compete or compete in the marketplace and to win personally and professionally. And my bucket, I would say, is probably about half full between going out and still getting wins, and that they're probably about 50-50 right now with where I'm at in my career, still getting wins in that they're probably about 50-50 right now with where I'm at in my career.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and some of that entered too, todd, because you know being a father as well. It greatly changes your perspective on life personally and professionally.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're managing current accounts, prospecting new business, managing a team which involves not just the people part of it, but the processes, and even, just this week, getting into different accounting details, and so you're getting the full spectrum of it. You know, over my shoulder here is that ship, and we oftentimes use that phrase burn the ships. Have you burned the ships yet? You know, when you started here, third generation had not yet purchased the agency, but you're smart and you knew what you were looking at. And so, while Jim was very much in the room and Jack was involved and Tom was involved, you knew that you were coming on to a team that was, you know, not going to be led by them long term, but by us. Was there a point in those last 10 years, 12 years where you proverbially had to burn the ships on any other plan B in your life, where you said, no, this is it, this is where I'm going to do it, I'm going to make all my dreams and hopes and dreams come true here. Was there a moment like that? I mean?
Speaker 3:I don't know if there was a. I mean, quite frankly, that moment probably was best, when I finally got the nerve up to accept the position, to come here. Quite frankly, you know, as you're aware, you made the offer to me sometime in like May, and I didn't start until October, and you and I and you were extremely patient, which again told me you were looking for the right person, not just to throw bodies at the wall and see who's stuck.
Speaker 3:Right, that was actually a question I asked you, ben I said well, how many people are you talking to, what's the list look like and where am I at? You're like it's a list of one. But again, no matter who I talked to, I got the same message Right and it was about the person and it was about the fit. So you take that along with. It was very clear that you know the third generation was going to come in, of which I more relate to age-wise, and in conversations and meetings that we had, I knew the trajectory that you guys wanted to take this thing Right and I specifically remember I would love to be a part of that ride. So in 15, 20 years we look back and say, wow, that was incredible. And you know, and I could somehow at that point, whatever my role would be in that. I mean, I take extreme pride in where we've gone, even in the last 11 years since I've been here.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, it took a lot of nerve for me to make that choice and I took a pay cut to do it. It was very nerve wracking but I looked at it as an investment in myself, greater control over my time, and at that point, of course, we were pregnant with our first, you know, with Solaire. So it gave me greater control over my time and at that point, of course, we were pregnant with our first, you know, with Solaire. So it gave me greater control over my income. It gave me greater control over my time and aligned better with me personally and missionally with where I needed to go. So, todd, really, quite frankly, that probably was the time I burned the ships, because, as I've said this was, this wasn't, this was my retirement plan.
Speaker 3:Right, invest in it, see it through, make it work, because if it works, you know, hot diggity dog things could be good, right? So, uh, and you know, knock on wood, things have been, things have been great.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Um, you know, jason, I think you have just an incredible talent for not only clients and consulting and helping them navigate decisions around. You know risk and risk transfer as it relates to insurance. You need to just know what you're doing. Just a phenomenal consultant in that. What is your mindset around how you approach doing your job? How did you get to this spot of honing those skills relationally?
Speaker 3:but also technically so well, I say this all the time what we do isn't rocket science, it's not.
Speaker 3:Most of it comes down to just pure relationships Listening, being empathetic, let people know they're heard, showing up and say what you're going to do and do what you're going to say and the rest I feel naturally.
Speaker 3:If you do those things and focus on those things, I think a lot of the other stuff just naturally falls into place. Right, you clearly in our, in our roles, need to then add in the technical expertise of insurance to make it all function. But I think I would like to think that a large part of the reason why I've been able to either gain new relationships, maintain the current ones and just in general, even with the team here, internally keep things moving, is because I feel that those are my strengths, that I excel at, and I think the people that are around me see that it's a very sincere and empathetic approach that I take to it. You know, and if you do that and you educate your clients, you communicate regularly with them along the way, don't bring surprises to them, and you just do it through building, you know, on the foundation of your relationships, things just, things just, will naturally take care of themselves.
Speaker 1:What do you? What do you? What do you wish C-suite leaders knew about? You know, like, what's missing that C-suite leaders need to know, I guess about the approach to insurance that you see that they might be missing in your interaction of like man. This relationship could be better, but their mindset isn't right. Like what would you tell employers about around mindset and engaging with their agent or their insurance advisor?
Speaker 3:One word comes to mind initially would be transparency. Going back over the different places I've been along with the different managers I've had and I would honestly say transparency, and I believe a large part of that. I think I've gotten the most of it by far and away here, particularly with you, todd right, you've always been extremely. It's like.
Speaker 1:I've said you know, you're the Wizard of.
Speaker 3:Oz, but you pull back that curtain right and that allows that allows me to understand the inner workings of what's going on and that led us to the decision to get us there, and then how my piece, or my team's members, my team member pieces, work in that and then I understand that picture of how to make it work for the greater whole some places they don't right, it's just hey, here's our number, if you need to write four million dollars in new business this year.
Speaker 3:They give you no consultation, they don't ask you your opinion on, hey, what are the agencies doing? What are you seeing in the market? It's just more throwing it at you with no real explanation, and then you're sat there trying to kind of backfill it with very little explanation as to why or input into why. So I think that's something that here with our team that we're very good at, and in turn I try to do that, you know, all the way down, even with the rest of my team members. So there is no, there is no question Like this, is it so? And I try to be that way with my clients, very transparent with them. If I leave that meeting or that office space and they walk away scratching their head on whatever it is, then I've clearly missed. I've missed the mark and I've not done my job.
Speaker 2:Well, I know one of the things you do really well and I know this because we ask our clients, you know, after renewals, what they think and one of the things they oftentimes talk about is the way that you and the account managers you work with share with our clients and our prospects the state of the market, and you know these are people in businesses doing other things. They don't know if it's restrictive or open season. You know, for those that are listening to the podcast, you know here we are sitting in Q1 2025. What's a brief update on the commercial property and casualty market.
Speaker 3:Yep, I do one for every one of my clients at Renewal and even provide them updates throughout the year if I happen to be on a phone call with them or whatever. You know a lot of it is again Todd. It's just the education and being transparent with what's going on. I tell them. I think it's important you understand what's going on nationally, or even in our world, globally, in the insurance marketplace, because it all trickles down to the end user right the person buying a home or car, the business owner, et cetera.
Speaker 3:So the current market today is we're still in a hard market. Right Pricing continues to still push up. That started late in 2019. So carriers are still chasing their tail and trying to increase their profitability. The biggest changes, I tell my clients right now that is occurring is the percentage of increases that carriers were looking for compared to four and five years ago, back in 2020 to today is coming down. So that's good news. The other major thing is the lines of coverage that is driving the bigger portions of increases has shifted Back in 2020, it was a lot on initially with COVID, it was directors and officers and your management liabilities and cyber liabilities and some of those things that were driving it.
Speaker 3:You know it shifted over time, once COVID and the freaking out that everybody did. Once that started to calm down and the industry started to realize, ok, you know, we're going to be fine from that At that point. Then property ramped up really fast.
Speaker 3:Property is still there, there's still pushes on ITVs and deductibles and things, but the overall rate increases are starting to trickle down and get smaller Carriers and publications. You're starting to hear the buzzwords rate adequacy a lot in that space, additional capital flooding into that space, which means at some point reinsurance treaties they sign with will ease up and that should ease up for all of us. Really, the biggest thing right now that's ramping up big time are general liability, just liability claims in general. So you know you hear terms like nuclear verdicts, millennial juries. You know, depending on the coverage line, some statutes or limitations have been waived in many states allowing things to go back. So these verdicts and even the investments made to bring these lawsuits, it's absolutely insane for what it takes to settle some of these claims these days.
Speaker 2:Let's fast forward a number of years. You're at the end of your professional career and you're deciding to hang up the gloves. We've talked about where you've come thus far. What are some things that you want to make sure you accomplish between now and you say goodbye to the insurance industry?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I still don't really know what that looks like. You know, you think about it. Lips is here and there. You think about it from a timeline standpoint. You know, at 49 years old, I'm a lot closer to retirement than I'd like to be. You know, is that another? You know, can I do it another 10 years and call it quits 15 years, 20 years? I don't know, timeline wise, what that looks like.
Speaker 3:I enjoy what I do and I don't know I can't just sit at home. No, you cannot, yeah. So initially, my thought on the timeline is I'm going to, I'm going to play this out until I physically or mentally probably can't do it. Or you guys will say you know, get out of here, because I, quite frankly, you know, again, it's not rocket science. If you like what you do and I do, if you like what you're doing it with, and that involves our team here at connor as well as the clients you're doing it with it's not really a job, right? You hear it all the time. Um, so I could see myself doing this another 20, 25 years?
Speaker 3:um, we're at. You know, over time, I would you know. I could see myself, though, spending more time at the lake, or doing it from a different location, remotely here a little more often, or at a different remote location in Florida. Maybe Todd's sitting on the porch with you somewhere on a farm making maple syrup, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Could be anywhere. Yeah, I could see myself doing it from different locales.
Speaker 3:I could see myself doing it from different locales.
Speaker 2:You bring up a good point. This industry allows smart, experienced, intelligent people to stay in it a long time. That's one of the concerns I have about just the amount of people retiring.
Speaker 3:I get it, they're at retirement age but there's a lot of brain drain that's happening. That why I'm so passionate about bringing on those early careers to capture'm hoping I don't have to really think about that. Like I said, as long as I feel I'm adding value to the clients and the team in some way shape or form, and it may be in a different capacity at that point, in 15 or 20 years, then I likely want to be involved in helping to do my part.
Speaker 1:I have a question before Todd ends us with the, with our two standard questions what, what, what advice would you give your 22 year old self, just kind of looking back at what you've experienced over the last many years of professional experience? What would you tell yourself?
Speaker 3:What would I tell myself? You know it's easy to look back, 26, 27 years later and understand it now versus then. You know, the first thing I would probably tell myself is don't be so darned afraid of taking more risk. You know, again, going back to burning the ships and that decision to make the jump from the carrier to the private side here, it was a big decision. Again, it took me five months to get up the nerve to do it and I wish, you know, I've told people before I wish I would have done it earlier in my career.
Speaker 3:Knowing what I know now, I wish I would have done it when I was 25 or 30. I mean, for a multitude of reasons. But again, you don't know what you don't know. And you know we're, we're, quite frankly, again, we're not in control, right, there's a path that's already set for us and we just got to do our best to navigate that path and um, we're, we're along for the ride, you know. But if, looking back, I would tell myself take more risk, don't be afraid to take some risks and you may lose, you may fall, you may set yourself back a step or two, but take that risk a little bit more often because you just don't know where that potentially could lead to and it could just take off. Or I mean, you know it may not, but you're going to learn something from it that likely will set you up for more success down the road risk.
Speaker 2:That's perfect, jason. I think those that know you on the team and clients know that they probably already know every single bit of this podcast information because you are so transparent. But on the point of taking a risk, you have always been very good to remind people that you're there with a pretty big safety net for them, which encourages people to kind of move into that risk. Which brings us perfectly to our two questions that we like to ask everybody. First question I think I might know what this is, but we'll see. You might throw a curveball. What is a risk that you have taken that has changed your life?
Speaker 3:We've covered that. Really it was. You know it was go back to the burn of the ships and really making I can't exaggerate how big of a deal that was for me and the sleepless nights I had trying to make that decision to go from the comfort of knowing the carrier's life for 15 years, yeah, and what that entailed financially, etc. And making that jump into it. I'm going to work for commission. What Right. And that that was by far and away Right. But if I wish I would have taken that risk earlier and knowing what I know now. But it's worked out and I I looking back on it and you guys have heard me say this it was the best thing that I did not knowing it at the time, personally, professionally, spiritually I mean spiritually for for multitude of reasons, looking back, it was like that was the right time and I understand now why it was the right time. Right.
Speaker 2:Second, final question what is an what's unfinished that you have the resolve to complete in the near future?
Speaker 3:This podcast? No, no, what's unresolved is honestly not. You know we have the, we have the vision and we have the plan here right, and we've set these goals for our firm and each department and each team.
Speaker 3:So what's left unfinished is seeing that through bringing in the new talent, educating them, mentoring them, passing along what we can to them to achieve those goals, while also nurturing and being empathetic and helping those that have been here for a long time play their career out here as long as they want to be here, because that's the foundation that we've got to build on right. I would say that's what's left unfinished and how my role looks in it. I mean, I know what it is today, but that's going to change right. We have to learn and change and adapt each one of us as we add another 10, 15, 25 employees to our staff. That's what's left unfinished Great answer.
Speaker 2:Thanks for your time, jason. Thanks for your dedication to the team and the team members, the clients. If anybody doesn't know, I receive all the feedback from your clients. If anybody doesn't know, I receive all the feedback from your clients and there has never, ever, ever been a disparaging comment from any one of the customers. It's always been super positive. So it's always fun to get them and to send them to you and be like here's another winner, you know. So we appreciate and enjoy and love that you take care of the customer so well and, of course, in your role as the commercial lines department lead, that you take care of the team so well. That's almost more important, and so thanks for that and thanks for your time today. Thank you, guys for having me.
Speaker 3:It's been a pleasure.
