With the coronavirus pandemic, many insurance agencies are still working remotely. Although not what you planned for this year, take this opportunity to capitalize on the competitive advantages you can get with a remote insurance agency.
If your employees feel discouraged, help them see it in terms of what it can do for them. For example, it can be as simple as the lack of commute time or the ability to take an evening walk before dark.
Remote work can unlock business-related advantages as well. First of all, remote work helps with organizational flexibility and resilience. For one, work can always happen, because there is no commute. There are no worries about things like traffic or weather issues. Severe weather, especially, gives no warnings. These usually unavoidable problems can pose less of a threat to business and create less stress when no travel time is involved. The removal of this factor can enhance business continuity while your employees are working remotely.
You have the chance to learn and use new technologies, which enhances the scope of tools and abilities of your agency in the future. Video calls, apps, internet optimization, and the like are becoming the future. This situation’s silver lining may be that your agency is optimized for employees to go or work remotely under various circumstances in the future. You can be ahead of the game compared to your competitors.
This also gives you more time to spend honing in on making your agency’s website clean and easy to navigate, as well as enhancing your agency’s digital marketing efforts. Spend time cleaning up your social media and digital assets like your website, or create them if you don’t have them. For help with that, Agent Pipeline’s Marketing & Innovation team has plenty of resources on hand to help you.
If your team is working from home, it will change the way your resources are managed. One of these changes is that the agency is more resilient to disasters and other local problems. Depending on your coworkers’ home locations, not all of them may even be affected by some local issues.
Remote work also allows people with difficult life situations to still be gainfully employed by your company. Whether a person is facing a severe disability that limits their ability to drive, has a sick child, or is otherwise in a life situation that keeps them from working in most jobs, remote work can be a blessing. After all of this, you could consider extending partial or complete remote work to some employees, depending on their situation and productivity. You may see them be an even more stellar agents when they can work without travel.
At a societal level, remote work offers the opportunity to lift many people out of misery, and assure them that, even in difficult times like these, your agency will not abandon their employees.
Remote work changes the way employees and potential employees evaluate agencies.
If you don’t want to be always competing on price for your agency, remote work is a way to attract more employees. As the practice becomes more accepted and familiar, which is not unlikely with today’s technology, you will be ahead of the game compared to those who are not prepared for remote work.
For more help on giving yourself a competitive advantage while working from home, call Agent Pipeline at 800.962.4693
