What’s up, everybody? My question for you today is are you a producer or are you an order-taker? Today, I’m going to give you three things that separates producers and order-takers, and in the end, the good news is if you’re not doing them, you can do them and implement them today and change the way you look at the commercial insurance game. When you’re in the sales game, you can be one of two things. You can be a producer, or you can be an order-taker. In my mind, three things separate the two.
The first thing is that producers produce. Producers go out, and they happen to things. They don’t sit back and wait for something to happen to them. If you’re a producer, you’re going to be out in front of the trends. You’re going to be out in front of your competition. You’re not going to be sitting there waiting for your phone to ring, waiting for an email to come in, waiting for somebody to knock on your door, begging you to sell to them. That’s what order-takers do. There’s a place for them in the sales game, but usually, it’s in call centers or someplace where there are a lot of inbound leads, and there’s just not room for a producer and an order-taker in a commercial insurance operation.
The second thing is producers believe they can, and order-takers talk about why they can’t. A producer’s not going to sit back and let obstacles get in their way and keep them from being able to go out and do what they do, which is produce. An order-taker is going to give you all the reasons why they’re not able to get new business. They’re going to tell you that it’s a problem with the lead mechanisms or a problem with the sales process or a problem with some of the training and development that they’ve got. The difference is a producer goes out, and they take care of themselves. They seek the training. They find the knowledge. They seek the ability to be better today than they were yesterday, but not as good as they’re going to be tomorrow. Don’t let things happen to you, happen to things. And don’t think about why you can’t go figure out how you can.
The most important thing is producers create victims. Order-takers are victims. Producers go out, and they crush the competition on the streets. The competition is their victim because they are happening to things and figuring out why they can. An order-taker sits back waits for things to come in. They tell you how come they can’t get business in the door, and they begin to have a victim mentality. And once that happens, that’s when the death spiral hits. They’ll tell you all the reasons why the organization has failed them as opposed to them going out, doing everything they can for the organization.
In the end as well, as it turns out. The producers are the cream that rises to the top, and the order-takers just sit back and wait for that phone to ring, which may never happen. My challenge to you today is to become a producer. It’s not that hard. Be proactive, do the things you need to do to drive business, have a process, make sure you stick to that process. You buy into that process, and you never abandon your process. Do those things and follow the three tips that separate producers from order-takers, you’re going to kill it in commercial insurance.
In the middle market, producers don’t lose because the competition has better pricing.
They lose because the competition understands people better—their motivations, their fears, their priorities, and what makes them say yes.
The cyber insurance market has softened in recent years. Requirements that were once rigid — like mandatory multi-factor authentication (MFA) or endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools — have been relaxed by many carriers. But here’s the danger: just because carriers aren’t demanding these safeguards today doesn’t mean businesses can afford to ignore them.
The insurance industry is entering one of the most transformative seasons in its history. For decades, our world has been shaped by carriers, underwriting cycles, prospecting methods, and the grit of producers willing to outwork their competition. But today, a new force is reshaping the landscape—and most producers, agency leaders, and industry professionals aren’t ready for it.
The commercial insurance world isn’t for the faint of heart. It’s unpredictable, chaotic, and constantly demanding producers to manage competing pressures—client needs, renewal deadlines, life events, prospecting goals, and agency responsibilities. And if you’re a middle-market producer, multiply that by ten.
In the middle market commercial insurance space, the role of the producer has never been more critical—or more misunderstood. Too many producers still view their job as selling policies instead of what it truly is: protecting the assets and livelihoods of the businesses they serve.
The middle market rewards depth, not breadth. Yet many producers still approach it like a volume game, quoting everything that moves, chasing price, and hoping activity turns into production. From the outside, it looks like hustle. From the inside of the underwriting and wholesale world, it looks like noise.
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