May 29, 2023 • 43 mins
In this episode, ADJUSTED welcomes Ema Roloff Director of North American Property and Casualty Sales. Ema discusses effective implementation of digital transformations and some ways to help facilitate an easy transformation.
Season 5 is brought to you by Berkley Industrial Comp. This episode is hosted by Greg Hamlin and guest co-host Sam Neer, Group Product Manager with Berkley Alternative Market Technology (BAMTECH).
Visit the Berkley Industrial Comp blog for more!
Got questions? Send them to marketing@berkindcomp.com
For music inquiries, contact Cameron Runyan at camrunyan9@gmail.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Greg Hamlin (00:13):
Hello, everybody and welcome to adjusted. I'm
your host Greg Hamlin coming atyou from beautiful Birmingham,
Alabama and Berkeley industrialcomp. And with me is my co host
today, Sam near Sam, do you wantto introduce yourself today?
Sam Neer (00:26):
Everybody, Sam, they're coming from Raleigh,
North Carolina where it's gottenway too hot, way too fast group
Product Manager with Berkeleyalternative market sec, and
really excited about today'sconversation.
Greg Hamlin (00:37):
Yeah, it's gonna be fun. We had Sam on as a guest
recently. And since today, we'regoing to be talking about
digital transformation. Ithought I'd bring him on to be
our expert co host. So he's heretoday. And with us, we have our
special guest today, Mo Rohloff.
She's the director of NorthAmerican property and casualty
sales and host of her ownYouTube series called leading
(00:59):
change. So Mo, we're glad tohave you here.
Ema Roloff (01:03):
Thank you for having me, guys. I'm excited for the
conversation.
Greg Hamlin (01:06):
Well, I am too, I had the opportunity to do a
short interview with you on yourpodcast. So I thought it was
time to turn the tables. So gladto have you. I always like to
start by asking this question.
How did you end up in theindustry? Because I'm guessing
like when you were in yourcareer day in like second grade,
you weren't like this? Is it? Iknow, I'm going to do I'm going
to be in the insurance space. AmI right?
Ema Roloff (01:28):
You are right, I wish that I was one of the like,
I've met a couple of people thatactually do have those stories.
And now I'm almost a littlejealous of them. Much more
unique than everybody else whokind of stumbled their way in.
But you're right. So I actuallyback to those second grade days
was planning on being a teacherand went to school for
(01:49):
education. So I actually have acertification to teach sixth
through 12th grade socialstudies. Okay. And I started
that down that path and wasplanning to do that. And really
truthfully, it was because Ireally enjoyed public speaking
and liked kids. And, you know,that was kind of the the initial
(02:10):
like, this is a great career foryou go for it. And so that was
just kind of like my operatingassumption for a long time. And
then it again, kind of liketwisty windy to get me here. But
I ended up taking a position outof college as a corporate
trainer. So I had done a coupleof internships while I was
finishing out my studentteaching and realized, like,
(02:30):
Hey, I actually kind of likebusiness. And there's a lot of
stuff that's applicable to whatI do in the classroom. It's just
bigger people that you'reteaching now. I was like, Okay,
I kind of like this. And it'snot necessarily that I just love
kids, I like people. And so thatwas kind of my first step into
the business world. And I didthat for a couple of years, and
then was ready for a change andwanted to get into technology.
(02:52):
And I always joke that myhusband, my father in law, and
my husband's uncle sat me downfor an intervention one year at
Thanksgiving, and they told meto go into sales. And at the
time, that was something thatsounded like really not
appealing to me. But they werelike, if you find something that
you're passionate about, andyou're actually helping people
solve problems, while you're insales, you're gonna really enjoy
(03:14):
it. And you can do all of thethings that you're good at from
like your other positions inyour other jobs that you've had
in the past. And so I applied toone sales job to get them to be
quiet, and ended up finding avery wonderful company that was
focused on Process automation,and enterprise software
implementations. And I was withthem for about eight years and
(03:37):
really caught the bug fortransformation and technology.
And finally, this really windypath to lead us into insurance.
When I was like 24 years old,just took this job brand new to
tech brand new to sales. Theysaid, You know what, there's a
big need for Process Automationwithin the insurance industry,
but we don't have anybody that'sa specialist in that area. Would
(04:00):
you like to learn about it? Andthe answer to that is like,
well, you, you're giving me anopportunity. So yeah, I'm gonna
take it and I'll figure it outfrom here. And over the course
of the last handful of years, Iwould say that the insurance
industry has done what it doesto a lot of people. It's pulled
me in again, my affinity forpeople, there's so many
wonderful people, and thebusiness is so relationship
(04:20):
driven, that I feel like now I'mstuck and I'm just not gonna
make my way.
Sam Neer (04:26):
You can't get out.
Greg Hamlin (04:27):
That's a lot like your story. See, I'm too because
I think you kind of got pulledin sideways, too.
Sam Neer (04:31):
Yeah, very much. So again, it wasn't like, again, my
podcast a few episodes ago, itwasn't like I grew up thinking
about insurance. But again, youstart getting in here and you
start getting the people you getseeing the change that's being
affected. And like you said,Emma, it's you know, once you're
in you can't see yourself goinganywhere else, which is the
exciting part about it. So lovethe journey to get there. Right.
And the one application just theone application and then the
(04:52):
rest is history, correct? Yeah,exactly.
Greg Hamlin (04:56):
So the big topic for today is digital
transformation and And I knowthat like the concept of digital
digital transformation is beingtalked about all the time. And I
don't know if a lot of ourlisteners even know what that is
or what that means in relationto the insurance industry. So I
thought maybe we just startthere, what what do you define
(05:16):
digital transformation as andwhere does it fit in the
insurance industry?
Ema Roloff (05:20):
Yeah. So I would say my definition, you know, when
you like Google it, part of thereason that it's this, like big
ambiguous buzz term is like, ifyou look at Wikipedia, just like
kind of says, like processoptimization through the use of
technology, which is a greatplace to get started, but where
I really kind of look at it, andI'll give you the soundbite
(05:41):
definition, and then dive in alittle bit further into kind of
why I'm so passionate about theway that I phrase this. So to
me, it is making your peoplemore efficient, and improving
your processes throughtechnology. And I lead with
people in process because thoseshould ultimately be the area of
focus, and we're enabling themwith technology. And when you
(06:05):
start to kind of, again, unpackthis idea of people and process
tied to it, the reason that Ithink it gets so fuzzy is
because we start to bring inthese really big intangible
ideas, like improving ourculture, or customer experience,
again, through this lens of howdo we improve it with
technology. And those things arekind of buzz terms in their own
(06:28):
right, as well. And so it getsreally muddy, when you start to
think about it through that lensof like, we're enabling these
big intangible things throughtechnology. And that's why I
always like to bring it back tolike people first and foremost,
in all of it. And because we gettricked by the use of digital on
the front of the term, so we optdirectly towards technology. But
(06:52):
if you go with a solution ledapproach, you're going to lose
sight of the fact that yourpeople or your technology is
being used by people, yourcustomers, or people, your
employees or people, yourpartners, and I can go on and on
not the people that aredeploying it are people. So it
all comes back to that idea. Andit's enabling that all through
(07:14):
technology. And the tools arethere, I promise that there's
wonderful and I mean, maybe Ishouldn't say this as a software
salesperson, but there's a lotof platforms that will meet your
need, if you focus on the peoplein the process side of it first,
and you know what you'reactually trying to enable. But
if you lead with the technology,you forget about that other
(07:34):
stuff, and then you getfrustrated that it didn't do
what you wanted it to do,because you started it with the
wrong part.
Greg Hamlin (07:40):
Yeah,
Sam Neer (07:40):
I love that. And I think it's really the idea of
extension beyond the software,right? It's the idea of, it's
not just gonna get saying thisprogram, the the code, the lines
of code, the product as aproduct manager, myself, it's
like, look at the cool buttonand look what it can do. But
what how you go beyond that nextstep, and the people centered
approach or the human centeredapproach, I think, is really
awesome. I think the buildingthat I made a follow up question
(08:02):
may be is there anything elsethat extends besides the
software? I know, you mentionedpeople in process, but have you
found anything else that helpscomplement the technology that
most people wouldn't think ofoff the bat?
Ema Roloff (08:14):
Good question. You know, I obviously just went on
my monologue about people. Butcoming from my starting point
within a process consultingcompany, I cannot like stress
the importance of also tyingyour technology implementation
to process improvement at thesame time. To your point, again,
we can like afterwards, likelook at what this really cool
(08:36):
button can do. But like, are webuilding a button to do a step
that's unnecessary in the firstplace? And I think that that
question sometimes gets fed pastto and within the insurance
industry, you know, I guess Ididn't address this part of the
question at the beginning of howdoes it relate to our industry.
But when you look at theinsurance industry, we have this
(08:57):
concept that what we do is socomplex, that there's no way we
can simplify it. And we havethis propensity to use that I
think, as an excuse to keep usfrom asking the hard questions
of why are we doing it that way,anyhow? And is there a simpler
way for us to manage this? Now,don't get me wrong, there are so
(09:18):
many layers, and there iscomplexity, we can escape that.
And part of that complexitycomes from things like
regulation and all of the restof that, but I can't tell you
how many times I've been in ameeting, where I've asked the
question of like, okay, so whyaren't we doing it that way? And
someone will start to tell you astory about like, well, 25 years
(09:40):
ago, and you're like, Okay,well, I get that, but have you
thought about maybe doing itdifferently now. And so, I mean,
again, I went on my big peopleconversation, but I also can't
stress how important it is foryou to really truly stop and
think about what's the mosteffective way that we should be
managing this and then bringingin the technology to enable that
(10:02):
efficient process.
Greg Hamlin (10:03):
I couldn't agree more Emma and I, you know, what
you said really stood out to me,in that I, one of the employers
that I worked for in a differentlife, I remember that people
were so married to a certain waywe used to do things. The
example I always gave is like,if you had done everything in in
Word, and then I gave you excel,and then you try to take
(10:25):
everything that was in that Worddocument and put it in one cell.
And you're frustrated that itwasn't working the way that you
wanted it to. It's like, well,that's that's actually not how
this tool works. And we're somarried to doing it this one
way, we're not even looking atthe possibility. So I think
that's hard for people to dojust in general, as we get
comfortable with how we dothings. And then thinking about
(10:47):
it a different way can be hard.
From your experience, where doyou think digital transformation
can make the largest impact?
Ema Roloff (10:53):
So I think within again, going back to like kind
of where we're at within theinsurance industry, I think a
lot of carriers. And this is notsaying that this is the wrong
approach. But a lot of carriersfelt intense pressure to improve
their customer experience. Andwe're still seeing that today. A
lot of the conversations thatI'm having, whether it's
(11:15):
speaking at conferences, ortalking to customers during, you
know, discovery, and that kindof thing, it's this idea that we
have to have a digital firstapproach to customer experience.
And I think that many carriershave at least some component of
a digital experience on thefront end of how they're
interacting with theircustomers. Because they were
(11:35):
told that that was like theultimate spot to start, the
Amazon effect is real, we're allused to dealing with technology.
And if you didn't do that, you'dprobably be in a lot of trouble.
But where I think many, manycompanies have an opportunity
right now is on the back end.
And fixing what those processeslook like and improving their
employee experience toultimately impact the customer
(11:57):
experience down the line.
Because again, if you've doneall of this work, and it's
massive lifts in many scenarios,to build a digital experience
and integrate it back to theback end. But if you're not also
in tandem looking at are weupdating those core systems that
are in the background ofeverything? Do we have the
(12:18):
appropriate integrations andconnections to make this as
seamless as possible for ouremployees to be effective,
there's still a lot of room foryou to improve that customer
experience by shortening yourclaims lifecycle with how you
manage things in the back end.
So I think that that is going tobe something that we start to
see also tied to many of thethings that are just kind of
happening at a macro level, youknow, I think we're out of the
(12:39):
great resignation. But thatmentality of workers really
seeking a different experiencefrom their jobs, whether that's
remote work, but also inefficiencies, I see a lot of
stuff popping up. And we couldmaybe go into a different but I
do a lot on tick tock, I createa lot of content there. I see
comments there. And then alsointeracting with people when
(13:00):
it's not tied to their employer.
And being in that likemanagement leadership side of
tic toc is very interesting,because there's a lot of
conversations about people in mygeneration, having zero ability
to deal with inefficiency, andlike just getting angry and
deciding to leave jobs becausethey can't handle inefficient
processes. And so I think, as westart to see those younger
(13:23):
generations that are used tothose seamless experiences as
customers coming into leadershippositions, we're going to see a
shift toward that seamlessemployee experience being more
important as
Sam Neer (13:33):
well. Yeah, to really double click on something you
said there am I really like yousaid around the not just the
shiny veneer, not the you know,again, digital front ends and
the customer first experience isimportant. We all agree on that.
But sometimes the book says thenon scintillating ways the
backend writes the dataprocesses, the API's, the data
transfers, right. But that'sreally what can impacts the
(13:56):
things that you do think aboutwith speed. Right now, again,
we're blessed to be able to havewebsites that load like that. So
if you're waiting for like twoseconds, or going back to your
tick tock example, if you'rewaiting, and it's waiting, like
three seconds, the short formcontent, this is a lifetime,
right? So it's sometimes theimportance of not necessarily
having, hey, we've got the coolfront end, which everyone likes
to see. But then if you hearit's taking too long, or it's
(14:17):
not integrating, and now youhave five of these systems, it
all really does tie together. SoI really liked what you double
clicked on that area.
Greg Hamlin (14:24):
What are some of the challenges of a digital
transformation? I think you'vehit on a few of those. But I
know that if you're creating aroadmap as an organization
realizing we need to do somethings different from your
perspective, what are some ofthe pitfalls or challenges that
you've seen that carriers gothrough?
Ema Roloff (14:40):
So I would say the first piece is maybe lacking a
strong vision at the leadershiplevel. Now that's not like into
all of the details of exactlyhow we execute on our digital
transformation strategy. Buteven just that clear Your vision
from your leadership team ofthese are the most important
(15:03):
things, and how we're going toenable them through the use of
technology in a way that giveseach and every department leader
and each and every person in thecompany, a Trendle, to pull
from, of, we're all steering inthis direction. And some
companies do that really, reallywell. And other companies will,
(15:24):
you know, have the imperative todigitally transform, or we're
going to become a digitalcarrier, or we're going to, but
that's too vague in the way thatit doesn't help your team
prioritize what's going to bemost important for you. And it
doesn't help your team, pull outtheir own individual
initiatives, and then down tothat individual level, to make
(15:45):
sure everyone's going in thesame direction. And if you just
have like a very vague vision,what's going to happen is
everyone's going to interpretthat their own way. And each
department's going to startinnovating in a silo. And then
what you're gonna get back to alittle bit of that conversation
of lack of integration and lackof continuity, you're gonna have
everybody kind of going in thesame directions, and then just
(16:08):
even coming down to like the itlevel of it, they might not even
know all the systems that arebeing used, they might not even
know what's happening in thatlike, nasty little shadow IT
thing starts to pop up. And so Ithink that all bubbles back up
to that vision at the top. Andit needs to be specific enough
where everybody can use it tostart heading in the same
(16:30):
direction. And then I would saythat's closely tied to and I've
already ranted about people. Sohere I go again. But I think
change management is anotherpiece that I'm very, very, very
passionate about being a part ofa transformation strategy. And
that ties really closely to thatvision. So part of the reason
(16:51):
that I feel so passionate aboutthat vision being something that
people can latch on to is yourteam, every single person on
your team needs to understandwhat's in it for them, if
they're going to support aninitiative. And they can't do
that if they don't have the endvision in mind. And if they
don't know how that relates backto their job, and how it's going
(17:11):
to improve their job, makestheir job easier, help them make
more whatever that what it is,what's in it for me statement is
apt for that individual. And Ifeel like everybody knows Change
management is important. Andeverybody knows that they should
be focusing on how to help theirpeople adapt. But even just like
(17:33):
Greg, the conversation that youwere having with like word
versus Excel that's attached towe have a thought process, we're
creatures of habit, and we'rewe're scared of change, because
we don't know what it means. Andif that change feels
threatening, we're going toresist it. If that change feels
like a mandate, we're going toresist it. And so there's all of
(17:56):
these different directions thatif you don't manage that change
appropriately across your team,suddenly, you're going to start
to see all of these behaviors.
And it's really easy to chalkthose behaviors up to like, Oh,
our team is so on, likeunwilling to change when it's
like well really like if youjust did the piece of making
sure that they understood whereyou're going, why you're going
there as a company, and thenhelp them figure out how it was
(18:17):
going to impact them, youprobably wouldn't have this
issue. And we overcomplicatechange management sometimes,
too. So I think it can be thatvision, that why having a strong
communication strategy, and thencelebrating small wins along the
way so that they know yourecognize the work that they're
doing. And just that can helpyou get so much more adoption
(18:38):
towards your transformation asyou're going through the
process.
Sam Neer (18:43):
I love that, especially with the recognition,
right? It's the first step torecovery, as everyone says. So
again, silos change management,clear leadership really connects
with a lot of that, Emma, butsort of taking this to the next
step is we as you know, carriersand insurance organizations
can't do this all of ourselves,right? As much as we want to
solve world hunger. We can't bespecialists, it's everything. So
I think that leads to maybebuilding off the idea of
(19:05):
challenges. How do carrierssuccessfully choose who to
partner with who to assist withthis process? Because it always
seems easy, you know, it's like,Hey, everyone, just plug and
play. It'll just be quick spinup. But I think there's more
than meets the eye in regards tothat partnership. So building
off the challenges, how do youknow who to work with at a broad
(19:25):
level?
Ema Roloff (19:26):
Well, I would say one thing, very frankly, and I
will tell my customers this totransformation is not easy. It's
not for the faint of heart. Andif somebody is telling you that
something is going to be like,so easy, don't worry about it.
There's likely something lurkingunder the covers. So I mean,
when I'm talking to mycustomers, I will regularly say
(19:49):
like, well, you know, we need todive into that a lot more detail
to understand like in theory, weshould be able to use an API to
integrate their or we'veintegrated in this capacity. In
the past, but I don't knowenough about your environment.
And I don't know enough about,like, what endpoints you're
going to have, becauseeverybody's environment is
different. And there's uniquechallenges that come with every
(20:10):
organization. If you're notsharing acknowledgement of what
those potential challenges couldbe, and hearing the things that
you need to hear, to know thatthey're going to work through
challenges, and not just bethere, when it's like the happy
path, then I think that thatmight be a signal to you that
you need to dig deeper into thatrelationship to understand what
(20:32):
it's going to be like, ifsomething doesn't go according
to plan. No salesperson is evergoing to say, you know, of
course, this is going to be likethe worst experience of your
life. And so like, that's not areal. And I would never say that
to a customer, because you neverwant that to be the scenario.
But they should be willing totalk through with you like,
(20:52):
okay, so if we run into achallenge, what does your
mediation process look like? Or,you know, what, what would be
potential pitfalls that you see,based off of our timeline and
our scope that we're talkingabout, they should be
comfortable talking through thatwith you. So that again, you
know, it's kind of like amarriage, like you shouldn't get
married without talking to them,like your spouse about how
(21:15):
you're going to work throughconflict, and what that's going
to look like, and figuring outhow to communicate effectively
with one another. When you'regoing in, especially for
something like a coretransformation or really big
project, you almost have to gothrough that due diligence of
like, okay, what do ourcommunication strategies look
like? What are our cadence forcheck ins going to be? How do we
escalate on both, and so ifyou're not getting what you need
(21:38):
from us, like you know who to goto, and vice versa. And just
working through some of thosecomponents, I think can be
really important. But I alsothink part of it is like culture
of the carrier and culture ofthe company that they're
partnering with, there's goingto be software companies that
work really well with a specificculture of a carrier, that might
(22:02):
not mesh well with another. Soyou also kind of have to be
honest with yourself of like,who are you as a company? And
what does your culture looklike? And what are the who are
the vendors that you've seen beeffective from a cultural fit in
that perspective? And how do youreplicate that with other
relationships?
Greg Hamlin (22:19):
I think that's great. And I, you know, I think
one of the things you hit on ismaking sure that you are picking
the right partner and planningfor things that might not go
right, and making sure you havethe open communication channels,
things are gonna go sideways,change is hard, you know, some
of the places or carriers thatI've talked to think of trying
(22:41):
to do it all themselves. Sothere's always that approach,
right? Like, well, we'll buildit ourselves, which is great. If
you have the resources to dothat. I often think that we're
in the insurance space. Andthat's what we're experts at. So
when we try to be experts ateverything, it doesn't go well.
So when you're thinking about apartner, let's say you've gotten
to the point where you realize,okay, we can't do this all
ourselves, we do need somebodyelse to help us with that.
(23:04):
What's the danger in seeking asingle partner for that opposed
to looking at maybe multipledifferent partners for different
solutions?
Ema Roloff (23:11):
Are we talking like implementation thought process,
or like one software solution torule them all? So to speak? I'd
say maybe
Greg Hamlin (23:20):
both, but I was thinking more along the lines of
what software solutions?
Ema Roloff (23:24):
Yes. So I mean, there is there just like
anything in life, we'll startwith the software side, there
are benefits and drawbacks toeither approach. So when you're
looking at, like, what aSoftware Solution Suite to bring
it in, bring in. And there areeconomies of scale that come
(23:44):
with having one platform andextending it into multiple
areas, as long as it has thosecapabilities. But no software
platform is going to be the bestof breed across every single
category, that's just notrealistic to expect that. So you
do have to kind of almost like8020 it in your mind to realize
(24:07):
that, like they might have 80%of what you're looking for. And
there might be something thatyou're going to like feature
Functionality wise, potentiallyneed to be willing to make
sacrifices on if you want oneplatform to go across
everything. So that would bekind of like the the drawback of
the benefit of that is like youwere talking about, like from a
(24:27):
resourcing perspective, from atraining perspective. You have
the ability if you've got oneplatform to specialize in that
platform and figure out how touse that platform incredibly
effectively, to maybe even makeup for some of that 20% That
didn't have all of the bells andwhistles that you were looking
for from a feature andfunctionality perspective. And
(24:48):
your team can support thatplatform with a lot more ease.
Then if you go kind of best ofbreed approach and bring in a
collection of differentsolutions. But and the other
benefit that comes from havingthat one solution as we continue
to talk about this, like Steamhave an integrated experience,
if you're buying from oneprovider, they better have that
(25:10):
integration figured out betweentheir components of their
solution. And so you minimizethe risk that comes with that
communication back and forthbetween those different
components of the solution. Now,on the flip side, if you go with
the collection of softwareplatforms, you're likely going
to be able to go out and I mean,it's a bigger time investment
(25:32):
for you to search out that bestof breed capability in every
category, and bring in thoseplatforms. But then you do have
integrations across the board,even if they you know, again,
even if it's like an acceleratoror something that someone's done
before, there is a gray area onwhat that will look like and the
effort that it could take foryou to string those applications
(25:54):
together. But also, integrationsaren't one and done. And that's
I think, something that peopleforget sometimes. And so you
need to have the bandwidth onyour team to keep those
integrations up to date. Soevery time that something
upgrades, you need to be able todo regression testing to make
sure that that integrationdidn't break. And if you've got
(26:15):
multiple platforms, you'realmost always going through
something along that spectrum ofupdating. And then your your
team has to be dangerous enoughagainst each one of those
platforms to be able to keep upwith that maintenance that's in
place. Or you have to havepartnerships and kind of like,
you know, solution integratorrelationships that have the
(26:37):
bandwidth to be able to keep upwith that, which comes with
additional cost as well. So Idon't think that there's a right
or wrong answer. And typically,what I would see is that larger
carriers who have that bandwidthand have that budget, will opt
towards that best of breedapproach because they, they have
the appetite for it. But thenmid tier to smaller carriers
(26:59):
recognize that they might notget all of the bells and
whistles of those best of breed,but it's going to be more
manageable for them on the longterm scale.
Sam Neer (27:09):
Yeah, as someone who deals with a variety of
different vendors, and it'sreally that trade off, because
again, it's great idea of onesize fits all and have one
person to go to one set ofcontexts. But the same time, you
can sometimes be boxed in there.
For instance, we've all had workdone on our houses or
apartments, where there's thegeneral contractor who could do
literally everything, but thenthey're graded, you know, half
of what it is. And then you seelater oh my gosh, what the heck
(27:30):
was this? Right? And while it'sgreat to get specialists in each
area, but then you've got thenightmare of coordination, and
I've got a call and where's theplumber? Versus where's the roof
guy? Right? So again, I thinkit's fighting like you've talked
earlier about your culture ofyour organization. What's your
culture? Do you prefer just havethe one point of contact and the
old school? Let's pick up thephone and call this one person?
Or is it okay, having a varietyof contacts and being able to
(27:52):
get the best of breed? So I dolike that idea of being able to
match how your culture fits withwhat you're looking for there.
And then, like you said, alsosize considerations as well. So
Greg Hamlin (28:03):
from my end, I think one of the things I've
seen from the claims perspectiveis when there is change when the
frontline employees, and I thinkyou talked about this a little
bit about the importance ofvision, when they have
unrealistic expectations of howthings are going to work. It can
cause a lot of tension betweeneither your vendor and the
(28:24):
company or from if you have anIT department of some kind them
and your staff as expectationsare not realistic. So Emma, have
you seen that play out? Andwhat's the best way to avoid
getting down a path where thereare unrealistic expectations,
which will follow withfrustration?
Ema Roloff (28:42):
So another area that I would say I'm pretty
passionate about is this idea ofbuilding digital literacy within
an organization. And I thinkthat that is the best way to
combat unrealistic expectations.
And also to help spur what theart of the possible is going
back to that conversation thatwe had before to start to get
people to be able to think indifferent paradigms than they
(29:04):
have before. And so when I saydigital literacy, I mean, a
basic understanding of what ispossible with technology. And
where are the bounds in whichit's going to offer us benefit
to the business. And that's notto say that, like your
executives, or every singleperson working in your claims
department needs to learn how tocode or needs to learn how to be
(29:27):
a technical resource. I don'tthink that that's appropriate.
And I don't think that that'sthe right path. But you do have
to understand how technologyworks at least a foundational
layer or level to be able to setthe right expectations for your
team to be able to understandwhat is realistic from a
(29:49):
business outcome perspective, tobe able to set the right
timelines and the right budgetsand all of the rest of that
comes from Having that basicunderstanding of again, that
category that I call digitalliteracy. And if you are
spending time, even if it's asmall amount of time, learning
about emerging technologies,going to conferences and
(30:12):
learning about what othercarriers are doing and having
conversations where you're justunderstanding that digital
landscape at a better level,then you're going to be able to
come back and then work withyour experts that you have in
house to start to ask the rightquestions to set the right
expectations, because I don'tthink it's intentional that we
don't set the rightexpectations. I think we're
(30:34):
overly optimistic. And we don'tknow how to ask the right
questions to set ourselves inthe right lane. And so that's
why I'm so passionate about likethere's, you know, the executive
team, and leaders within anorganization learning that but
then also building those skillson your team so that they can
support your digitalinitiatives, again, kind of all
(30:55):
rowing in that same directionback to your vision again,
Greg Hamlin (31:00):
that's great. I think, you know, that's one of
the things I've seen in my ownstaff, different places that
I've worked is just if they canunderstand what's coming, and
they have enough of anunderstanding of of how it gets
done. You don't have to beexperts, like you said, but if
you don't know how it gets done,then it makes it really hard.
And I can even think of timeswhere we've had somebody
suggest, well, why can't we havea button that if I click, it'll
(31:22):
do this? And then we talk aboutokay, we could do that
anything's really possible. Butdo you realize how much time
that would take let's talk aboutif we were to spend this much
time doing that? What otherthings could we be doing for you
that might benefit you more andin understanding that piece?
Because I think for a lot offrontline employees, they may
look at the technology side asalmost wizardry, right? Like,
(31:45):
like somebody's waving a wandback there and just making that
happen. And they don'tunderstand that like, well, that
ask is possible. But we wouldhave to sacrifice some other
things. Because there's going tobe trade offs in how much time
we have to make the magichappen. Anything you want to add
to that, Sam, you're on thatother side.
Sam Neer (32:01):
Yeah. And again, it's like we'd like we wish we had
our magic wands. Like I wake upevery morning wishing for the
genie and just asking for amagic wand for product
development. And then my wifewas, uh, you should probably get
better wishes next time. Allthat to say is from the
technology side, right? It'slike, you know, expectation
setting is so important. I lovewhat you said. And many of you
as well, Greg, is we need tokiss, you know, pick apart these
items, the big red button thatsolves my world hunger? Well,
(32:23):
maybe you don't know about theregulatory reporting component.
And underneath that, maybe youdon't know, hey, downstream
vendors rely on this step to beable to fill in this field. And
maybe Greg, we talked about thiswhen I was on the on the
podcast, maybe there's 11 steps.
Maybe we don't need all 11. Butmaybe we still need these three.
Right? So it does sometimes wethink about absolutes, like it
has to be an all or nothing. Butcan we pick it apart? Just to
(32:44):
try to get underneath thesurface there? So sort of
building on this am I would sortof ask, like, selfishly, I'm
very interested to think is, arethere any practical ways that
you can use to ensure this useradoption, right, like, again,
like, you know, there's everyonewants it, everyone says, Yeah,
I'm on board. But then you know,when rubber meets the road,
sometimes there's a big gapbetween everyone verbally buying
(33:05):
and actually making thecommitment to do so. So have you
seen anything that's worked inthe past to be able to actually
rally and rally around that ideaof actually, you know, putting
boots on the ground and get intogetting your done.
Ema Roloff (33:19):
So, again, I kind of mentioned is that there's a
couple of things from like achange management perspective
that I boil it down to, and I'vesaid those before. And I can
kind of dive into specificallywhere I think they'll support
this idea. So again, it's havingthat clear vision and a why
behind the change. And that isgoing to be I think, honestly, I
think that that's the biggestpiece. And like as an executive,
(33:43):
you set that vision, you are notsolely responsible for making
sure that that y gets down toevery level. And so you have to
have tight alignment with yourleaders and your managers within
your business to help make surethat they're doing the work to
get that why actually down toevery individual within the
company. And so once you havethat, again, you've got that,
(34:03):
why, then the communicationpieces again, where I think the
rubber hits the road in terms ofhow to truly make sure that
you're getting that adoption.
And I always say you have tocommunicate The Good, the Bad
and the Ugly along the way. AndI don't think you can over
communicate during animplementation. And I think part
of that communication has to bebi directional communication as
(34:26):
you're going through animplementation. That's not to
say, because it's not realisticto have every employee provide
their feedback. It's notrealistic to say that
everybody's in design meetings,because we know that you'd never
get anything done if that wasthe case. But where I do think
that you need to be thoughtfulis as you're working with
(34:47):
departments, pulling key peoplein that, you know, have that
kind of like we all know thatperson and the department that
everyone goes to to askquestions that has all of this
instance notional knowledge, andknows the why behind everything.
And, you know, we all know whothat person is in a department.
And they're usually also a bigpart of getting adoption. So if
(35:10):
you can get that person that hasthat institutional knowledge and
has all of that gold side oftheir mind, into the engagement
in some capacity, even at like atesting, or, you know, planning
sessions, whatever portion ofthat process that you can bring
them into, and genuinely taketheir feedback, not everything,
(35:33):
you don't have to, like, youknow, do exactly what they're
telling you, but genuinely taketheir feedback, hear it, and
adopt some of that into thesolution, then you have the most
important advocate for adoptingthat solution on your side. And
the reason that I say that thisis so effective is that
sometimes those people are thepeople that are the hardest to
(35:55):
win over to the change, becausethey're the ones that are used
to the way that it's done. Theydon't want it to change, they
don't want their status as thatknowledge source to be
questioned or taken away. Andthat can be a scary thing. But
if they feel like they've been apart of shaping that solution,
some of that fear starts todissipate. And again, it's kind
(36:18):
of like the leader of the pack,all of a sudden starts to see
the value in it. And then theyonce they feel that the solution
is going to make their jobeasier, and that it's developed
in a way that's going to helpthem be effective, they're going
to adopt it, and they're goingto tell other people why they
should do it. And they're goingto help you get that why
communicated across thedepartment far more effectively
(36:40):
than you ever could, as a leaderwithout living and breathing in
their shoes every day. So thatcommunication that bidirectional
communication, I think, is themost important part, but then
also kind of going to thatcelebrating small wins along the
way, celebrate the fact thatthey were involved in being a
part of shaping the solution,they thank them for the time
that they put forward and makingit something that's going to be
(37:03):
really effective for the rest ofthe team. And use that as an
additional communicationmechanism to get people to know
that you didn't do it in a silo,and that you had that bi
directional communication tomake sure that you were ending
up with the best product thatyou could. And it sounds
released that like, again, tome, it sounds kind of easy. It's
not necessarily easy to do. Butit's also not the most difficult
(37:26):
part of your transformation thatyou're going to have. And when
you can win over those hardpersonalities, it makes the rest
of it so much easier.
Greg Hamlin (37:35):
I think you're spot on I each place that I've gone
to work I've had to come in. Andpart of the reason I was brought
in was to make change. And eachtime and maybe not on the
digital side. But each timethere's some real challenges
with that. And I think you hiton one of the keys that has
helped me is you do have to findthat really knowledgeable
(37:55):
skeptic, and get thatknowledgeable skeptic on your
side. And I can remember acouple of times I remember one
specific time, we had laid outthe vision of what things were
going to change to make thingseasier for people. So they had
time and they weren't sooverloaded and they weren't so
overworked. And this oneparticular employee came into me
and she was like, she looks somad. And she was waving her
(38:16):
finger at me going, I'm going tohold you accountable that this
is going to happen. And I said Iwant you to I want you to come
in my office each week. Andlet's talk about it. And it was
amazing to see it took timebecause these things don't get
fixed overnight. But when shestarted to feel like you know
what is changing, and it ishappening, and I'm part of that,
things got a lot better.
Ema Roloff (38:37):
And she waved her finger at you. Oh yeah. We all
know that. finger pointing,
Greg Hamlin (38:45):
I remember thinking, oh boy, what have I
got myself into. But it thingsgot tremendously better after
that time. But, you know, therethere does need to be some trust
that has to be built and forchange to be successful. So I
think we've talked about this alot already. But just maybe to
top it off. We've talked aboutwhat makes change hard versus
easy. And I think we've we'vehit that pretty, pretty well.
(39:08):
But I wanted to end each episodethis year, talking about
something that people aregrateful for. I'm really a big
proponent about putting goodvibes in the universe. I feel
like there's so much negativityout there. And so if the one
little thing that Greg can do isto make sure we put something
good out there every couple ofweeks. I want to do it. So I
(39:28):
wanted to ask you that question.
What's something that you'rereally grateful for?
Ema Roloff (39:32):
I mean, I could give like the really obvious answer
of my family, which I hopeeveryone knows is also a part of
my, my absolutely gratefulnesspractice. But I so this is gonna
sound a little woowoo but again,going back to putting good into
the world, right? I am reallythankful for a tic toc that I
found a couple of months ago.
That was about like kind of likethis idea of manifestation and
(39:56):
gratefulness wrapped into oneUm, I made a post about it on
LinkedIn and Tik Tok, and it'scalled Lucky girl syndrome.
Okay. And it was this tic tacthat these like college girls
made. And it became a trend ononline. That was this idea of
like, if every day, you say toyourself, I'm the luckiest girl
in the world, or guy or whateverphrase you want to use for
(40:18):
yourself, but like I'm theluckiest person in the world.
And things are always workingout for me, even if I don't
realize that, the way that yousee the world changes. And just
even saying that statement, whenyou say that statement, you
immediately start to reflect onthe things that you're very
grateful for in the world. Andit just like starts your day off
in the right direction. And thenalso just kind of manifesting
(40:40):
that belief that things willcome back to you in a positive
manner. And that mindset issomething that like I would say,
has been in place for the lastcouple of months. And it just
makes you appreciate the thingsthat are happening in your life
and makes you see opportunitywhere you might not have seen it
in the past. And it makes youagain, kind of going back to
(41:00):
that idea of what you'regrateful for gives you a
reminder every single day on whyyou're the luckiest person in
the world. And if you canreprogram your brain to think
that way, I think it's a reallypowerful thing. So when I'm
thinking about that, immediatelywhat pops into my head every day
is my family. And then it goesto something really positive
that happened the day before, orpeople that I have relationships
(41:22):
with that are in the industrythat I know are building me up
friendships that I've had foryears, you know, each day of
your brain will go on a slightlydifferent direction. But it's
just this like really nicemindfulness activity. And my
husband thinks it's really funnybecause I go for a walk around
our neighborhood and I say itout loud. Crazy person
Greg Hamlin (41:44):
talking? No, I think it's so important, what
you know what we say out loud,and how we think about the world
changes who we are. And that'swhy I'm really big proponent of
of trying to put those goodthings out there. One of the
people I interviewed in apodcast, oh, it's been a couple
of years ago, was is a partialpolygenic, parabolic
quadriplegic, and you know,helps people deal with pain. And
(42:07):
the one thing she said, and Idon't know if she came up with
it, or got it from somewhereelse. But I thought about it so
many times since then, is thatwhich we focus on, we enlarge
and empower. And I reallybelieve that. So if you're going
to focus on pain, you're goingto make that pain bigger if
we're going to focus on thethings we're grateful for. We're
going to blow those things upand make them bigger. And so I
love that idea of being theluckiest person in the world. So
(42:28):
I might try that. See how itgoes. I'll say luckiest guy
Sam Neer (42:32):
stealing that as well.
Trust me, there's a lot of goodmileage on that one.
Greg Hamlin (42:36):
Well, I'm gonna thank you so much for spending
some time with us. Sam, thankyou for CO hosting with me
today. I think this is a greattopic and we were able to talk
about some things are reallyimportant in the industry. Just
remind people to do right thinkdifferently, and don't forget to
care. And that's it for thisone. Thanks, everybody.
Hello, everybody and welcome to adjusted. I'm
your host Greg Hamlin coming atyou from beautiful Birmingham,
Alabama and Berkeley industrialcomp. And with me is my co host
today, Sam near Sam, do you wantto introduce yourself today?
Sam Neer (00:26):
Everybody, Sam, they're coming from Raleigh,
North Carolina where it's gottenway too hot, way too fast group
Product Manager with Berkeleyalternative market sec, and
really excited about today'sconversation.
Greg Hamlin (00:37):
Yeah, it's gonna be fun. We had Sam on as a guest
recently. And since today, we'regoing to be talking about
digital transformation. Ithought I'd bring him on to be
our expert co host. So he's heretoday. And with us, we have our
special guest today, Mo Rohloff.
She's the director of NorthAmerican property and casualty
sales and host of her ownYouTube series called leading
(00:59):
change. So Mo, we're glad tohave you here.
Ema Roloff (01:03):
Thank you for having me, guys. I'm excited for the
conversation.
Greg Hamlin (01:06):
Well, I am too, I had the opportunity to do a
short interview with you on yourpodcast. So I thought it was
time to turn the tables. So gladto have you. I always like to
start by asking this question.
How did you end up in theindustry? Because I'm guessing
like when you were in yourcareer day in like second grade,
you weren't like this? Is it? Iknow, I'm going to do I'm going
to be in the insurance space. AmI right?
Ema Roloff (01:28):
You are right, I wish that I was one of the like,
I've met a couple of people thatactually do have those stories.
And now I'm almost a littlejealous of them. Much more
unique than everybody else whokind of stumbled their way in.
But you're right. So I actuallyback to those second grade days
was planning on being a teacherand went to school for
(01:49):
education. So I actually have acertification to teach sixth
through 12th grade socialstudies. Okay. And I started
that down that path and wasplanning to do that. And really
truthfully, it was because Ireally enjoyed public speaking
and liked kids. And, you know,that was kind of the the initial
(02:10):
like, this is a great career foryou go for it. And so that was
just kind of like my operatingassumption for a long time. And
then it again, kind of liketwisty windy to get me here. But
I ended up taking a position outof college as a corporate
trainer. So I had done a coupleof internships while I was
finishing out my studentteaching and realized, like,
(02:30):
Hey, I actually kind of likebusiness. And there's a lot of
stuff that's applicable to whatI do in the classroom. It's just
bigger people that you'reteaching now. I was like, Okay,
I kind of like this. And it'snot necessarily that I just love
kids, I like people. And so thatwas kind of my first step into
the business world. And I didthat for a couple of years, and
then was ready for a change andwanted to get into technology.
(02:52):
And I always joke that myhusband, my father in law, and
my husband's uncle sat me downfor an intervention one year at
Thanksgiving, and they told meto go into sales. And at the
time, that was something thatsounded like really not
appealing to me. But they werelike, if you find something that
you're passionate about, andyou're actually helping people
solve problems, while you're insales, you're gonna really enjoy
(03:14):
it. And you can do all of thethings that you're good at from
like your other positions inyour other jobs that you've had
in the past. And so I applied toone sales job to get them to be
quiet, and ended up finding avery wonderful company that was
focused on Process automation,and enterprise software
implementations. And I was withthem for about eight years and
(03:37):
really caught the bug fortransformation and technology.
And finally, this really windypath to lead us into insurance.
When I was like 24 years old,just took this job brand new to
tech brand new to sales. Theysaid, You know what, there's a
big need for Process Automationwithin the insurance industry,
but we don't have anybody that'sa specialist in that area. Would
(04:00):
you like to learn about it? Andthe answer to that is like,
well, you, you're giving me anopportunity. So yeah, I'm gonna
take it and I'll figure it outfrom here. And over the course
of the last handful of years, Iwould say that the insurance
industry has done what it doesto a lot of people. It's pulled
me in again, my affinity forpeople, there's so many
wonderful people, and thebusiness is so relationship
(04:20):
driven, that I feel like now I'mstuck and I'm just not gonna
make my way.
Sam Neer (04:26):
You can't get out.
Greg Hamlin (04:27):
That's a lot like your story. See, I'm too because
I think you kind of got pulledin sideways, too.
Sam Neer (04:31):
Yeah, very much. So again, it wasn't like, again, my
podcast a few episodes ago, itwasn't like I grew up thinking
about insurance. But again, youstart getting in here and you
start getting the people you getseeing the change that's being
affected. And like you said,Emma, it's you know, once you're
in you can't see yourself goinganywhere else, which is the
exciting part about it. So lovethe journey to get there. Right.
And the one application just theone application and then the
(04:52):
rest is history, correct? Yeah,exactly.
Greg Hamlin (04:56):
So the big topic for today is digital
transformation and And I knowthat like the concept of digital
digital transformation is beingtalked about all the time. And I
don't know if a lot of ourlisteners even know what that is
or what that means in relationto the insurance industry. So I
thought maybe we just startthere, what what do you define
(05:16):
digital transformation as andwhere does it fit in the
insurance industry?
Ema Roloff (05:20):
Yeah. So I would say my definition, you know, when
you like Google it, part of thereason that it's this, like big
ambiguous buzz term is like, ifyou look at Wikipedia, just like
kind of says, like processoptimization through the use of
technology, which is a greatplace to get started, but where
I really kind of look at it, andI'll give you the soundbite
(05:41):
definition, and then dive in alittle bit further into kind of
why I'm so passionate about theway that I phrase this. So to
me, it is making your peoplemore efficient, and improving
your processes throughtechnology. And I lead with
people in process because thoseshould ultimately be the area of
focus, and we're enabling themwith technology. And when you
(06:05):
start to kind of, again, unpackthis idea of people and process
tied to it, the reason that Ithink it gets so fuzzy is
because we start to bring inthese really big intangible
ideas, like improving ourculture, or customer experience,
again, through this lens of howdo we improve it with
technology. And those things arekind of buzz terms in their own
(06:28):
right, as well. And so it getsreally muddy, when you start to
think about it through that lensof like, we're enabling these
big intangible things throughtechnology. And that's why I
always like to bring it back tolike people first and foremost,
in all of it. And because we gettricked by the use of digital on
the front of the term, so we optdirectly towards technology. But
(06:52):
if you go with a solution ledapproach, you're going to lose
sight of the fact that yourpeople or your technology is
being used by people, yourcustomers, or people, your
employees or people, yourpartners, and I can go on and on
not the people that aredeploying it are people. So it
all comes back to that idea. Andit's enabling that all through
(07:14):
technology. And the tools arethere, I promise that there's
wonderful and I mean, maybe Ishouldn't say this as a software
salesperson, but there's a lotof platforms that will meet your
need, if you focus on the peoplein the process side of it first,
and you know what you'reactually trying to enable. But
if you lead with the technology,you forget about that other
(07:34):
stuff, and then you getfrustrated that it didn't do
what you wanted it to do,because you started it with the
wrong part.
Greg Hamlin (07:40):
Yeah,
Sam Neer (07:40):
I love that. And I think it's really the idea of
extension beyond the software,right? It's the idea of, it's
not just gonna get saying thisprogram, the the code, the lines
of code, the product as aproduct manager, myself, it's
like, look at the cool buttonand look what it can do. But
what how you go beyond that nextstep, and the people centered
approach or the human centeredapproach, I think, is really
awesome. I think the buildingthat I made a follow up question
(08:02):
may be is there anything elsethat extends besides the
software? I know, you mentionedpeople in process, but have you
found anything else that helpscomplement the technology that
most people wouldn't think ofoff the bat?
Ema Roloff (08:14):
Good question. You know, I obviously just went on
my monologue about people. Butcoming from my starting point
within a process consultingcompany, I cannot like stress
the importance of also tyingyour technology implementation
to process improvement at thesame time. To your point, again,
we can like afterwards, likelook at what this really cool
(08:36):
button can do. But like, are webuilding a button to do a step
that's unnecessary in the firstplace? And I think that that
question sometimes gets fed pastto and within the insurance
industry, you know, I guess Ididn't address this part of the
question at the beginning of howdoes it relate to our industry.
But when you look at theinsurance industry, we have this
(08:57):
concept that what we do is socomplex, that there's no way we
can simplify it. And we havethis propensity to use that I
think, as an excuse to keep usfrom asking the hard questions
of why are we doing it that way,anyhow? And is there a simpler
way for us to manage this? Now,don't get me wrong, there are so
(09:18):
many layers, and there iscomplexity, we can escape that.
And part of that complexitycomes from things like
regulation and all of the restof that, but I can't tell you
how many times I've been in ameeting, where I've asked the
question of like, okay, so whyaren't we doing it that way? And
someone will start to tell you astory about like, well, 25 years
(09:40):
ago, and you're like, Okay,well, I get that, but have you
thought about maybe doing itdifferently now. And so, I mean,
again, I went on my big peopleconversation, but I also can't
stress how important it is foryou to really truly stop and
think about what's the mosteffective way that we should be
managing this and then bringingin the technology to enable that
(10:02):
efficient process.
Greg Hamlin (10:03):
I couldn't agree more Emma and I, you know, what
you said really stood out to me,in that I, one of the employers
that I worked for in a differentlife, I remember that people
were so married to a certain waywe used to do things. The
example I always gave is like,if you had done everything in in
Word, and then I gave you excel,and then you try to take
(10:25):
everything that was in that Worddocument and put it in one cell.
And you're frustrated that itwasn't working the way that you
wanted it to. It's like, well,that's that's actually not how
this tool works. And we're somarried to doing it this one
way, we're not even looking atthe possibility. So I think
that's hard for people to dojust in general, as we get
comfortable with how we dothings. And then thinking about
(10:47):
it a different way can be hard.
From your experience, where doyou think digital transformation
can make the largest impact?
Ema Roloff (10:53):
So I think within again, going back to like kind
of where we're at within theinsurance industry, I think a
lot of carriers. And this is notsaying that this is the wrong
approach. But a lot of carriersfelt intense pressure to improve
their customer experience. Andwe're still seeing that today. A
lot of the conversations thatI'm having, whether it's
(11:15):
speaking at conferences, ortalking to customers during, you
know, discovery, and that kindof thing, it's this idea that we
have to have a digital firstapproach to customer experience.
And I think that many carriershave at least some component of
a digital experience on thefront end of how they're
interacting with theircustomers. Because they were
(11:35):
told that that was like theultimate spot to start, the
Amazon effect is real, we're allused to dealing with technology.
And if you didn't do that, you'dprobably be in a lot of trouble.
But where I think many, manycompanies have an opportunity
right now is on the back end.
And fixing what those processeslook like and improving their
employee experience toultimately impact the customer
(11:57):
experience down the line.
Because again, if you've doneall of this work, and it's
massive lifts in many scenarios,to build a digital experience
and integrate it back to theback end. But if you're not also
in tandem looking at are weupdating those core systems that
are in the background ofeverything? Do we have the
(12:18):
appropriate integrations andconnections to make this as
seamless as possible for ouremployees to be effective,
there's still a lot of room foryou to improve that customer
experience by shortening yourclaims lifecycle with how you
manage things in the back end.
So I think that that is going tobe something that we start to
see also tied to many of thethings that are just kind of
happening at a macro level, youknow, I think we're out of the
(12:39):
great resignation. But thatmentality of workers really
seeking a different experiencefrom their jobs, whether that's
remote work, but also inefficiencies, I see a lot of
stuff popping up. And we couldmaybe go into a different but I
do a lot on tick tock, I createa lot of content there. I see
comments there. And then alsointeracting with people when
(13:00):
it's not tied to their employer.
And being in that likemanagement leadership side of
tic toc is very interesting,because there's a lot of
conversations about people in mygeneration, having zero ability
to deal with inefficiency, andlike just getting angry and
deciding to leave jobs becausethey can't handle inefficient
processes. And so I think, as westart to see those younger
(13:23):
generations that are used tothose seamless experiences as
customers coming into leadershippositions, we're going to see a
shift toward that seamlessemployee experience being more
important as
Sam Neer (13:33):
well. Yeah, to really double click on something you
said there am I really like yousaid around the not just the
shiny veneer, not the you know,again, digital front ends and
the customer first experience isimportant. We all agree on that.
But sometimes the book says thenon scintillating ways the
backend writes the dataprocesses, the API's, the data
transfers, right. But that'sreally what can impacts the
(13:56):
things that you do think aboutwith speed. Right now, again,
we're blessed to be able to havewebsites that load like that. So
if you're waiting for like twoseconds, or going back to your
tick tock example, if you'rewaiting, and it's waiting, like
three seconds, the short formcontent, this is a lifetime,
right? So it's sometimes theimportance of not necessarily
having, hey, we've got the coolfront end, which everyone likes
to see. But then if you hearit's taking too long, or it's
(14:17):
not integrating, and now youhave five of these systems, it
all really does tie together. SoI really liked what you double
clicked on that area.
Greg Hamlin (14:24):
What are some of the challenges of a digital
transformation? I think you'vehit on a few of those. But I
know that if you're creating aroadmap as an organization
realizing we need to do somethings different from your
perspective, what are some ofthe pitfalls or challenges that
you've seen that carriers gothrough?
Ema Roloff (14:40):
So I would say the first piece is maybe lacking a
strong vision at the leadershiplevel. Now that's not like into
all of the details of exactlyhow we execute on our digital
transformation strategy. Buteven just that clear Your vision
from your leadership team ofthese are the most important
(15:03):
things, and how we're going toenable them through the use of
technology in a way that giveseach and every department leader
and each and every person in thecompany, a Trendle, to pull
from, of, we're all steering inthis direction. And some
companies do that really, reallywell. And other companies will,
(15:24):
you know, have the imperative todigitally transform, or we're
going to become a digitalcarrier, or we're going to, but
that's too vague in the way thatit doesn't help your team
prioritize what's going to bemost important for you. And it
doesn't help your team, pull outtheir own individual
initiatives, and then down tothat individual level, to make
(15:45):
sure everyone's going in thesame direction. And if you just
have like a very vague vision,what's going to happen is
everyone's going to interpretthat their own way. And each
department's going to startinnovating in a silo. And then
what you're gonna get back to alittle bit of that conversation
of lack of integration and lackof continuity, you're gonna have
everybody kind of going in thesame directions, and then just
(16:08):
even coming down to like the itlevel of it, they might not even
know all the systems that arebeing used, they might not even
know what's happening in thatlike, nasty little shadow IT
thing starts to pop up. And so Ithink that all bubbles back up
to that vision at the top. Andit needs to be specific enough
where everybody can use it tostart heading in the same
(16:30):
direction. And then I would saythat's closely tied to and I've
already ranted about people. Sohere I go again. But I think
change management is anotherpiece that I'm very, very, very
passionate about being a part ofa transformation strategy. And
that ties really closely to thatvision. So part of the reason
(16:51):
that I feel so passionate aboutthat vision being something that
people can latch on to is yourteam, every single person on
your team needs to understandwhat's in it for them, if
they're going to support aninitiative. And they can't do
that if they don't have the endvision in mind. And if they
don't know how that relates backto their job, and how it's going
(17:11):
to improve their job, makestheir job easier, help them make
more whatever that what it is,what's in it for me statement is
apt for that individual. And Ifeel like everybody knows Change
management is important. Andeverybody knows that they should
be focusing on how to help theirpeople adapt. But even just like
(17:33):
Greg, the conversation that youwere having with like word
versus Excel that's attached towe have a thought process, we're
creatures of habit, and we'rewe're scared of change, because
we don't know what it means. Andif that change feels
threatening, we're going toresist it. If that change feels
like a mandate, we're going toresist it. And so there's all of
(17:56):
these different directions thatif you don't manage that change
appropriately across your team,suddenly, you're going to start
to see all of these behaviors.
And it's really easy to chalkthose behaviors up to like, Oh,
our team is so on, likeunwilling to change when it's
like well really like if youjust did the piece of making
sure that they understood whereyou're going, why you're going
there as a company, and thenhelp them figure out how it was
(18:17):
going to impact them, youprobably wouldn't have this
issue. And we overcomplicatechange management sometimes,
too. So I think it can be thatvision, that why having a strong
communication strategy, and thencelebrating small wins along the
way so that they know yourecognize the work that they're
doing. And just that can helpyou get so much more adoption
(18:38):
towards your transformation asyou're going through the
process.
Sam Neer (18:43):
I love that, especially with the recognition,
right? It's the first step torecovery, as everyone says. So
again, silos change management,clear leadership really connects
with a lot of that, Emma, butsort of taking this to the next
step is we as you know, carriersand insurance organizations
can't do this all of ourselves,right? As much as we want to
solve world hunger. We can't bespecialists, it's everything. So
I think that leads to maybebuilding off the idea of
(19:05):
challenges. How do carrierssuccessfully choose who to
partner with who to assist withthis process? Because it always
seems easy, you know, it's like,Hey, everyone, just plug and
play. It'll just be quick spinup. But I think there's more
than meets the eye in regards tothat partnership. So building
off the challenges, how do youknow who to work with at a broad
(19:25):
level?
Ema Roloff (19:26):
Well, I would say one thing, very frankly, and I
will tell my customers this totransformation is not easy. It's
not for the faint of heart. Andif somebody is telling you that
something is going to be like,so easy, don't worry about it.
There's likely something lurkingunder the covers. So I mean,
when I'm talking to mycustomers, I will regularly say
(19:49):
like, well, you know, we need todive into that a lot more detail
to understand like in theory, weshould be able to use an API to
integrate their or we'veintegrated in this capacity. In
the past, but I don't knowenough about your environment.
And I don't know enough about,like, what endpoints you're
going to have, becauseeverybody's environment is
different. And there's uniquechallenges that come with every
(20:10):
organization. If you're notsharing acknowledgement of what
those potential challenges couldbe, and hearing the things that
you need to hear, to know thatthey're going to work through
challenges, and not just bethere, when it's like the happy
path, then I think that thatmight be a signal to you that
you need to dig deeper into thatrelationship to understand what
(20:32):
it's going to be like, ifsomething doesn't go according
to plan. No salesperson is evergoing to say, you know, of
course, this is going to be likethe worst experience of your
life. And so like, that's not areal. And I would never say that
to a customer, because you neverwant that to be the scenario.
But they should be willing totalk through with you like,
(20:52):
okay, so if we run into achallenge, what does your
mediation process look like? Or,you know, what, what would be
potential pitfalls that you see,based off of our timeline and
our scope that we're talkingabout, they should be
comfortable talking through thatwith you. So that again, you
know, it's kind of like amarriage, like you shouldn't get
married without talking to them,like your spouse about how
(21:15):
you're going to work throughconflict, and what that's going
to look like, and figuring outhow to communicate effectively
with one another. When you'regoing in, especially for
something like a coretransformation or really big
project, you almost have to gothrough that due diligence of
like, okay, what do ourcommunication strategies look
like? What are our cadence forcheck ins going to be? How do we
escalate on both, and so ifyou're not getting what you need
(21:38):
from us, like you know who to goto, and vice versa. And just
working through some of thosecomponents, I think can be
really important. But I alsothink part of it is like culture
of the carrier and culture ofthe company that they're
partnering with, there's goingto be software companies that
work really well with a specificculture of a carrier, that might
(22:02):
not mesh well with another. Soyou also kind of have to be
honest with yourself of like,who are you as a company? And
what does your culture looklike? And what are the who are
the vendors that you've seen beeffective from a cultural fit in
that perspective? And how do youreplicate that with other
relationships?
Greg Hamlin (22:19):
I think that's great. And I, you know, I think
one of the things you hit on ismaking sure that you are picking
the right partner and planningfor things that might not go
right, and making sure you havethe open communication channels,
things are gonna go sideways,change is hard, you know, some
of the places or carriers thatI've talked to think of trying
(22:41):
to do it all themselves. Sothere's always that approach,
right? Like, well, we'll buildit ourselves, which is great. If
you have the resources to dothat. I often think that we're
in the insurance space. Andthat's what we're experts at. So
when we try to be experts ateverything, it doesn't go well.
So when you're thinking about apartner, let's say you've gotten
to the point where you realize,okay, we can't do this all
ourselves, we do need somebodyelse to help us with that.
(23:04):
What's the danger in seeking asingle partner for that opposed
to looking at maybe multipledifferent partners for different
solutions?
Ema Roloff (23:11):
Are we talking like implementation thought process,
or like one software solution torule them all? So to speak? I'd
say maybe
Greg Hamlin (23:20):
both, but I was thinking more along the lines of
what software solutions?
Ema Roloff (23:24):
Yes. So I mean, there is there just like
anything in life, we'll startwith the software side, there
are benefits and drawbacks toeither approach. So when you're
looking at, like, what aSoftware Solution Suite to bring
it in, bring in. And there areeconomies of scale that come
(23:44):
with having one platform andextending it into multiple
areas, as long as it has thosecapabilities. But no software
platform is going to be the bestof breed across every single
category, that's just notrealistic to expect that. So you
do have to kind of almost like8020 it in your mind to realize
(24:07):
that, like they might have 80%of what you're looking for. And
there might be something thatyou're going to like feature
Functionality wise, potentiallyneed to be willing to make
sacrifices on if you want oneplatform to go across
everything. So that would bekind of like the the drawback of
the benefit of that is like youwere talking about, like from a
(24:27):
resourcing perspective, from atraining perspective. You have
the ability if you've got oneplatform to specialize in that
platform and figure out how touse that platform incredibly
effectively, to maybe even makeup for some of that 20% That
didn't have all of the bells andwhistles that you were looking
for from a feature andfunctionality perspective. And
(24:48):
your team can support thatplatform with a lot more ease.
Then if you go kind of best ofbreed approach and bring in a
collection of differentsolutions. But and the other
benefit that comes from havingthat one solution as we continue
to talk about this, like Steamhave an integrated experience,
if you're buying from oneprovider, they better have that
(25:10):
integration figured out betweentheir components of their
solution. And so you minimizethe risk that comes with that
communication back and forthbetween those different
components of the solution. Now,on the flip side, if you go with
the collection of softwareplatforms, you're likely going
to be able to go out and I mean,it's a bigger time investment
(25:32):
for you to search out that bestof breed capability in every
category, and bring in thoseplatforms. But then you do have
integrations across the board,even if they you know, again,
even if it's like an acceleratoror something that someone's done
before, there is a gray area onwhat that will look like and the
effort that it could take foryou to string those applications
(25:54):
together. But also, integrationsaren't one and done. And that's
I think, something that peopleforget sometimes. And so you
need to have the bandwidth onyour team to keep those
integrations up to date. Soevery time that something
upgrades, you need to be able todo regression testing to make
sure that that integrationdidn't break. And if you've got
(26:15):
multiple platforms, you'realmost always going through
something along that spectrum ofupdating. And then your your
team has to be dangerous enoughagainst each one of those
platforms to be able to keep upwith that maintenance that's in
place. Or you have to havepartnerships and kind of like,
you know, solution integratorrelationships that have the
(26:37):
bandwidth to be able to keep upwith that, which comes with
additional cost as well. So Idon't think that there's a right
or wrong answer. And typically,what I would see is that larger
carriers who have that bandwidthand have that budget, will opt
towards that best of breedapproach because they, they have
the appetite for it. But thenmid tier to smaller carriers
(26:59):
recognize that they might notget all of the bells and
whistles of those best of breed,but it's going to be more
manageable for them on the longterm scale.
Sam Neer (27:09):
Yeah, as someone who deals with a variety of
different vendors, and it'sreally that trade off, because
again, it's great idea of onesize fits all and have one
person to go to one set ofcontexts. But the same time, you
can sometimes be boxed in there.
For instance, we've all had workdone on our houses or
apartments, where there's thegeneral contractor who could do
literally everything, but thenthey're graded, you know, half
of what it is. And then you seelater oh my gosh, what the heck
(27:30):
was this? Right? And while it'sgreat to get specialists in each
area, but then you've got thenightmare of coordination, and
I've got a call and where's theplumber? Versus where's the roof
guy? Right? So again, I thinkit's fighting like you've talked
earlier about your culture ofyour organization. What's your
culture? Do you prefer just havethe one point of contact and the
old school? Let's pick up thephone and call this one person?
Or is it okay, having a varietyof contacts and being able to
(27:52):
get the best of breed? So I dolike that idea of being able to
match how your culture fits withwhat you're looking for there.
And then, like you said, alsosize considerations as well. So
Greg Hamlin (28:03):
from my end, I think one of the things I've
seen from the claims perspectiveis when there is change when the
frontline employees, and I thinkyou talked about this a little
bit about the importance ofvision, when they have
unrealistic expectations of howthings are going to work. It can
cause a lot of tension betweeneither your vendor and the
(28:24):
company or from if you have anIT department of some kind them
and your staff as expectationsare not realistic. So Emma, have
you seen that play out? Andwhat's the best way to avoid
getting down a path where thereare unrealistic expectations,
which will follow withfrustration?
Ema Roloff (28:42):
So another area that I would say I'm pretty
passionate about is this idea ofbuilding digital literacy within
an organization. And I thinkthat that is the best way to
combat unrealistic expectations.
And also to help spur what theart of the possible is going
back to that conversation thatwe had before to start to get
people to be able to think indifferent paradigms than they
(29:04):
have before. And so when I saydigital literacy, I mean, a
basic understanding of what ispossible with technology. And
where are the bounds in whichit's going to offer us benefit
to the business. And that's notto say that, like your
executives, or every singleperson working in your claims
department needs to learn how tocode or needs to learn how to be
(29:27):
a technical resource. I don'tthink that that's appropriate.
And I don't think that that'sthe right path. But you do have
to understand how technologyworks at least a foundational
layer or level to be able to setthe right expectations for your
team to be able to understandwhat is realistic from a
(29:49):
business outcome perspective, tobe able to set the right
timelines and the right budgetsand all of the rest of that
comes from Having that basicunderstanding of again, that
category that I call digitalliteracy. And if you are
spending time, even if it's asmall amount of time, learning
about emerging technologies,going to conferences and
(30:12):
learning about what othercarriers are doing and having
conversations where you're justunderstanding that digital
landscape at a better level,then you're going to be able to
come back and then work withyour experts that you have in
house to start to ask the rightquestions to set the right
expectations, because I don'tthink it's intentional that we
don't set the rightexpectations. I think we're
(30:34):
overly optimistic. And we don'tknow how to ask the right
questions to set ourselves inthe right lane. And so that's
why I'm so passionate about likethere's, you know, the executive
team, and leaders within anorganization learning that but
then also building those skillson your team so that they can
support your digitalinitiatives, again, kind of all
(30:55):
rowing in that same directionback to your vision again,
Greg Hamlin (31:00):
that's great. I think, you know, that's one of
the things I've seen in my ownstaff, different places that
I've worked is just if they canunderstand what's coming, and
they have enough of anunderstanding of of how it gets
done. You don't have to beexperts, like you said, but if
you don't know how it gets done,then it makes it really hard.
And I can even think of timeswhere we've had somebody
suggest, well, why can't we havea button that if I click, it'll
(31:22):
do this? And then we talk aboutokay, we could do that
anything's really possible. Butdo you realize how much time
that would take let's talk aboutif we were to spend this much
time doing that? What otherthings could we be doing for you
that might benefit you more andin understanding that piece?
Because I think for a lot offrontline employees, they may
look at the technology side asalmost wizardry, right? Like,
(31:45):
like somebody's waving a wandback there and just making that
happen. And they don'tunderstand that like, well, that
ask is possible. But we wouldhave to sacrifice some other
things. Because there's going tobe trade offs in how much time
we have to make the magichappen. Anything you want to add
to that, Sam, you're on thatother side.
Sam Neer (32:01):
Yeah. And again, it's like we'd like we wish we had
our magic wands. Like I wake upevery morning wishing for the
genie and just asking for amagic wand for product
development. And then my wifewas, uh, you should probably get
better wishes next time. Allthat to say is from the
technology side, right? It'slike, you know, expectation
setting is so important. I lovewhat you said. And many of you
as well, Greg, is we need tokiss, you know, pick apart these
items, the big red button thatsolves my world hunger? Well,
(32:23):
maybe you don't know about theregulatory reporting component.
And underneath that, maybe youdon't know, hey, downstream
vendors rely on this step to beable to fill in this field. And
maybe Greg, we talked about thiswhen I was on the on the
podcast, maybe there's 11 steps.
Maybe we don't need all 11. Butmaybe we still need these three.
Right? So it does sometimes wethink about absolutes, like it
has to be an all or nothing. Butcan we pick it apart? Just to
(32:44):
try to get underneath thesurface there? So sort of
building on this am I would sortof ask, like, selfishly, I'm
very interested to think is, arethere any practical ways that
you can use to ensure this useradoption, right, like, again,
like, you know, there's everyonewants it, everyone says, Yeah,
I'm on board. But then you know,when rubber meets the road,
sometimes there's a big gapbetween everyone verbally buying
(33:05):
and actually making thecommitment to do so. So have you
seen anything that's worked inthe past to be able to actually
rally and rally around that ideaof actually, you know, putting
boots on the ground and get intogetting your done.
Ema Roloff (33:19):
So, again, I kind of mentioned is that there's a
couple of things from like achange management perspective
that I boil it down to, and I'vesaid those before. And I can
kind of dive into specificallywhere I think they'll support
this idea. So again, it's havingthat clear vision and a why
behind the change. And that isgoing to be I think, honestly, I
think that that's the biggestpiece. And like as an executive,
(33:43):
you set that vision, you are notsolely responsible for making
sure that that y gets down toevery level. And so you have to
have tight alignment with yourleaders and your managers within
your business to help make surethat they're doing the work to
get that why actually down toevery individual within the
company. And so once you havethat, again, you've got that,
(34:03):
why, then the communicationpieces again, where I think the
rubber hits the road in terms ofhow to truly make sure that
you're getting that adoption.
And I always say you have tocommunicate The Good, the Bad
and the Ugly along the way. AndI don't think you can over
communicate during animplementation. And I think part
of that communication has to bebi directional communication as
(34:26):
you're going through animplementation. That's not to
say, because it's not realisticto have every employee provide
their feedback. It's notrealistic to say that
everybody's in design meetings,because we know that you'd never
get anything done if that wasthe case. But where I do think
that you need to be thoughtfulis as you're working with
(34:47):
departments, pulling key peoplein that, you know, have that
kind of like we all know thatperson and the department that
everyone goes to to askquestions that has all of this
instance notional knowledge, andknows the why behind everything.
And, you know, we all know whothat person is in a department.
And they're usually also a bigpart of getting adoption. So if
(35:10):
you can get that person that hasthat institutional knowledge and
has all of that gold side oftheir mind, into the engagement
in some capacity, even at like atesting, or, you know, planning
sessions, whatever portion ofthat process that you can bring
them into, and genuinely taketheir feedback, not everything,
(35:33):
you don't have to, like, youknow, do exactly what they're
telling you, but genuinely taketheir feedback, hear it, and
adopt some of that into thesolution, then you have the most
important advocate for adoptingthat solution on your side. And
the reason that I say that thisis so effective is that
sometimes those people are thepeople that are the hardest to
(35:55):
win over to the change, becausethey're the ones that are used
to the way that it's done. Theydon't want it to change, they
don't want their status as thatknowledge source to be
questioned or taken away. Andthat can be a scary thing. But
if they feel like they've been apart of shaping that solution,
some of that fear starts todissipate. And again, it's kind
(36:18):
of like the leader of the pack,all of a sudden starts to see
the value in it. And then theyonce they feel that the solution
is going to make their jobeasier, and that it's developed
in a way that's going to helpthem be effective, they're going
to adopt it, and they're goingto tell other people why they
should do it. And they're goingto help you get that why
communicated across thedepartment far more effectively
(36:40):
than you ever could, as a leaderwithout living and breathing in
their shoes every day. So thatcommunication that bidirectional
communication, I think, is themost important part, but then
also kind of going to thatcelebrating small wins along the
way, celebrate the fact thatthey were involved in being a
part of shaping the solution,they thank them for the time
that they put forward and makingit something that's going to be
(37:03):
really effective for the rest ofthe team. And use that as an
additional communicationmechanism to get people to know
that you didn't do it in a silo,and that you had that bi
directional communication tomake sure that you were ending
up with the best product thatyou could. And it sounds
released that like, again, tome, it sounds kind of easy. It's
not necessarily easy to do. Butit's also not the most difficult
(37:26):
part of your transformation thatyou're going to have. And when
you can win over those hardpersonalities, it makes the rest
of it so much easier.
Greg Hamlin (37:35):
I think you're spot on I each place that I've gone
to work I've had to come in. Andpart of the reason I was brought
in was to make change. And eachtime and maybe not on the
digital side. But each timethere's some real challenges
with that. And I think you hiton one of the keys that has
helped me is you do have to findthat really knowledgeable
(37:55):
skeptic, and get thatknowledgeable skeptic on your
side. And I can remember acouple of times I remember one
specific time, we had laid outthe vision of what things were
going to change to make thingseasier for people. So they had
time and they weren't sooverloaded and they weren't so
overworked. And this oneparticular employee came into me
and she was like, she looks somad. And she was waving her
(38:16):
finger at me going, I'm going tohold you accountable that this
is going to happen. And I said Iwant you to I want you to come
in my office each week. Andlet's talk about it. And it was
amazing to see it took timebecause these things don't get
fixed overnight. But when shestarted to feel like you know
what is changing, and it ishappening, and I'm part of that,
things got a lot better.
Ema Roloff (38:37):
And she waved her finger at you. Oh yeah. We all
know that. finger pointing,
Greg Hamlin (38:45):
I remember thinking, oh boy, what have I
got myself into. But it thingsgot tremendously better after
that time. But, you know, therethere does need to be some trust
that has to be built and forchange to be successful. So I
think we've talked about this alot already. But just maybe to
top it off. We've talked aboutwhat makes change hard versus
easy. And I think we've we'vehit that pretty, pretty well.
(39:08):
But I wanted to end each episodethis year, talking about
something that people aregrateful for. I'm really a big
proponent about putting goodvibes in the universe. I feel
like there's so much negativityout there. And so if the one
little thing that Greg can do isto make sure we put something
good out there every couple ofweeks. I want to do it. So I
(39:28):
wanted to ask you that question.
What's something that you'rereally grateful for?
Ema Roloff (39:32):
I mean, I could give like the really obvious answer
of my family, which I hopeeveryone knows is also a part of
my, my absolutely gratefulnesspractice. But I so this is gonna
sound a little woowoo but again,going back to putting good into
the world, right? I am reallythankful for a tic toc that I
found a couple of months ago.
That was about like kind of likethis idea of manifestation and
(39:56):
gratefulness wrapped into oneUm, I made a post about it on
LinkedIn and Tik Tok, and it'scalled Lucky girl syndrome.
Okay. And it was this tic tacthat these like college girls
made. And it became a trend ononline. That was this idea of
like, if every day, you say toyourself, I'm the luckiest girl
in the world, or guy or whateverphrase you want to use for
(40:18):
yourself, but like I'm theluckiest person in the world.
And things are always workingout for me, even if I don't
realize that, the way that yousee the world changes. And just
even saying that statement, whenyou say that statement, you
immediately start to reflect onthe things that you're very
grateful for in the world. Andit just like starts your day off
in the right direction. And thenalso just kind of manifesting
(40:40):
that belief that things willcome back to you in a positive
manner. And that mindset issomething that like I would say,
has been in place for the lastcouple of months. And it just
makes you appreciate the thingsthat are happening in your life
and makes you see opportunitywhere you might not have seen it
in the past. And it makes youagain, kind of going back to
(41:00):
that idea of what you'regrateful for gives you a
reminder every single day on whyyou're the luckiest person in
the world. And if you canreprogram your brain to think
that way, I think it's a reallypowerful thing. So when I'm
thinking about that, immediatelywhat pops into my head every day
is my family. And then it goesto something really positive
that happened the day before, orpeople that I have relationships
(41:22):
with that are in the industrythat I know are building me up
friendships that I've had foryears, you know, each day of
your brain will go on a slightlydifferent direction. But it's
just this like really nicemindfulness activity. And my
husband thinks it's really funnybecause I go for a walk around
our neighborhood and I say itout loud. Crazy person
Greg Hamlin (41:44):
talking? No, I think it's so important, what
you know what we say out loud,and how we think about the world
changes who we are. And that'swhy I'm really big proponent of
of trying to put those goodthings out there. One of the
people I interviewed in apodcast, oh, it's been a couple
of years ago, was is a partialpolygenic, parabolic
quadriplegic, and you know,helps people deal with pain. And
(42:07):
the one thing she said, and Idon't know if she came up with
it, or got it from somewhereelse. But I thought about it so
many times since then, is thatwhich we focus on, we enlarge
and empower. And I reallybelieve that. So if you're going
to focus on pain, you're goingto make that pain bigger if
we're going to focus on thethings we're grateful for. We're
going to blow those things upand make them bigger. And so I
love that idea of being theluckiest person in the world. So
(42:28):
I might try that. See how itgoes. I'll say luckiest guy
Sam Neer (42:32):
stealing that as well.
Trust me, there's a lot of goodmileage on that one.
Greg Hamlin (42:36):
Well, I'm gonna thank you so much for spending
some time with us. Sam, thankyou for CO hosting with me
today. I think this is a greattopic and we were able to talk
about some things are reallyimportant in the industry. Just
remind people to do right thinkdifferently, and don't forget to
care. And that's it for thisone. Thanks, everybody.
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