Insurance agencies rely on reports to review and track performance across this organization. Reports provide insight agency leaders need to compare the agency’s current status against its goals and make appropriate strategic decisions to keep the organization progressing forward. The problem that arises, however, is that reports are often difficult to understand and interpret. System-generated reports are also at high risk for errors due to the data that is in the system.
What can agencies do to make sure they are using reports in the AMS effectively?
Identify Critical Information –
Before going through the setup process, leadership needs to identify what they need to see from a reporting standpoint. Without defining this, agencies can quickly get caught up in reporting for the sake of reporting. Understanding the strategic initiatives, the timeline, and the progress benchmarks required to confirm if the agency is on track is the first step. This clarification will provide the direction needed to set up reports properly.
For example, an agency has a growth goal of 10%. Monthly reporting should provide feedback on New Business, Lost Business & Retention.
Every report should tie back to a specific goal. Anything outside this is potentially information that has no impact on growth and performance and only creates a distraction. Narrowing down reporting that correlates precisely with the agency’s vision allows leadership to focus on data that matters the most. If it’s not valuable to the agency, delete it!
Confirm reports are set up correctly –
Agency Management Systems typically come stocked with a variety of pre-built reports. However, these are “one size fits most” and using them as-is will likely provide inaccurate results. Given that every agency makes some level of customization to the AMS to fit the specific needs of the business, the reports will need to be customized as well. Report criteria need to be correctly set up to ensure that reports are producing valid information. To handle this most effectively, agencies will want to assign someone within the organization to oversee the setup and production of reports. It is also a good idea for this individual to work directly with the AMS Company or an outside consultant who has a deep understanding of the AMS.
A method for verifying data and checking for errors is critical as well! Data will be flawed, systems will fail. Develop a process for identifying errors before they become agency performance gospel.
Convert data into an easy-to-understand/actionable format –
Reports from an Agency Management System can get out of control very quickly. Spreadsheets of data with columns and rows for miles. This information becomes overwhelming for leaders and trying to dissect massive amounts of totals and percentages can take hours.
The person(s) in charge of managing the agency reports will also need to simplify all of the details in a format that is easy to look at and understand. Color-coded charts and graphs with a legend and even a brief narrative will summarize mounds of data into something usable. When the information is pulled together in an easy to use format, leadership can quickly see results, compare against goals, and start making decisions about any strategic action that may need to occur.
Create/Implement a plan for data clean up and ongoing auditing –
Reports generated from the Agency Management System are only as good as the information entered into the system. The saying “garbage in, garbage out” applies here. Bad data leads to Bad Reports. Erroneous reports lead to incorrect information being handed to leadership. Using inaccurate information leads to misinformed decisions.
Bad data can cause several issues in an agency’s operations, ranging from inaccurate client information, policy limits, or other details, premium and revenue, and any number of other things. Not only does this create an issue with reporting, but it can also become an E&O issue for the agency.
Data cleanup projects can be a very time-consuming process but are a worthwhile investment in the long run. Whether it is a matter of misuse of a data field or missing information, all of it will impact reporting and anything else generated from the system. Consider outsourcing or hiring temps or interns to take on the project.
Agencies will also need to implement auditing practices. Auditing information in the system on an ongoing basis is critical to keeping the AMS functioning in a way that allows the agency to use it as a tool that helps the agency operate more efficiently.
Without the right processes and procedures to support reporting functions, the AMS becomes an expensive data warehouse. Putting the above pointers into practice will allow agencies to utilize their system better and start leveraging reports to make well-informed decisions for the organization and drive continued success.
For more on this topic and others, check out the complete episode of The Independent Agent here!
About the Author
Justin Goodman has spent the past 20 years in insurance. He is the co-founder and CEO of Total CSR and co-founder and Managing Director of Project 55. By the age of 29, he was recognized as one of the top five construction insurance experts nationwide by Risk and Insurance Magazine. He also was named to Insurance Business Magazine’s Hot 100 and most recently the 2024 Insurance Journal Agent of the Year. Justin has trained over 50,000 CSR’s, account managers and producers through his work at Total CSR. He has a passion for developing the next generation of insurance professionals. When not with his family, he devotes his free time to speaking engagements and advising agency owners across the country.
