I have a lot of people ask me questions about how we lead with worker’s comp and what kind of questions should they ask to drive a wedge and all of that stuff. So I thought I’d take today’s video to talk to you, give you three things that you can ask that are going to make somebody’s head spin when you want to lead with worker’s comp.
Look. It is no secret at all that at Florida Risk, we like to lead with worker’s compensation, but you need to know the questions to ask when you go in that are going to make somebody think twice about why you’re asking them. Today I’m going to give you three questions that you can ask regarding workers’ comp that really don’t have anything to do with placing workers’ comp insurance.
When I go in, one of the first things that I do for a company that’s having a problem with performance is I ask them to explain their employee benefits plan to me. I want to understand what they are doing from a benefits perspective because that could have a direct impact on the worker’s compensation. For example, if a company has a deductible of $10,000 on their benefits plan, there may be a problem. There’s a pretty good chance that on Monday morning, the beer league softball claims going to get reported, as my buddy Derek Hayden said in his video, I posted on LinkedIn earlier this week. Beer league softball claims are not worker’s comp, but, unfortunately, when we have a negative financial incentive for our employees, they become worker’s comp.
The second one that I ask is, what type of disability products do you offer your people? Everybody in life is sitting on the fence. They’re sitting on the fence that they could fall one way or the other when they have a claim. It’s up to us to help them fall on the right side of the fence. If you have a disability product, there is a very high likelihood that those claims will get funneled to that product. In fact, studies have shown that loss ratios drop by 65% when a disability product is in place for an employer. The reason being, the person who got injured, wants to get better or even if it’s somebody looking to collect a quick buck, they can get the money a lot faster on a disability product than they can through worker’s compensation. Find out what’s going on with disability.
The last one that I always ask about is auto. Tell me about your auto performance because if I go into a company that has terrible workers’ comp claims, again, there’s a very high likelihood that there are auto accidents with bodily injury involved. Auto rates are going up all over the state of Florida, and I’m sure they’re going up in other places in the country, too.
By asking about these three questions, you’re talking about things that can help improve comp performance without affecting your bottom line. If you can do those three things, you’re going to kill it in commercial insurance.
For years, commercial insurance producers could survive by being good enough across a wide range of industries. They could write a little construction, a little manufacturing, a little hospitality, and a little habitational business and still build a respectable book.
The commercial insurance industry is in the middle of a quiet evolution.
While most conversations still revolve around premiums, deductibles, limits, and carrier appetite, a different category of risk transfer has been gaining traction beneath the surface—parametric insurance. It is not new, but it is finally becoming accessible, relevant, and actionable for middle market producers who are willing to think differently about risk.
In a recent episode of the Power Producers Podcast, I sat down with Brian Thompson from Descartes Underwriting to unpack what parametric insurance actually is, what it is not, and why producers who ignore it may be leaving their clients—and themselves—exposed.
This article breaks that conversation down into practical, producer-friendly language and shows how parametric insurance fits into modern middle market risk management.
The last several years have reshaped the landscape of property insurance across the country. While most national carriers have retreated from coastal states, wildfire zones, and other catastrophe-exposed regions, a handful of disciplined players have taken the opposite path—leaning into difficult markets with a strategic, data-driven approach.
For most entrepreneurs, the decision to start a business is rooted in the promise of freedom. Freedom from a boss, freedom to control income, and freedom to build something meaningful. Yet for many business owners, particularly in service-based industries and middle-market companies, that freedom slowly erodes. What begins as ownership eventually turns into obligation, where the business demands constant attention and the owner becomes the single point of failure.
The insurance industry is full of shortcuts. Some producers look for ways to streamline the quoting process, others avoid hard conversations with clients, and many rely on endorsements or extensions because they are “easier” than diving into the details. Nowhere is this more dangerous than in the world of cyber insurance.
Too many agents assume that a cyber endorsement on a BOP or commercial package policy is “good enough.” It isn’t. In fact, treating a BOP cyber extension as a replacement for a standalone cyber policy leaves clients dangerously exposed, puts producers at risk of losing accounts, and opens the door to costly errors and omissions (E&O) claims.
Cyber threats evolve faster than any other area of risk, and endorsements simply can’t keep up. If producers want to protect their clients and themselves, it’s time to understand why standalone cyber insurance is non-negotiable.
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.
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