The Standards YOU Set are the Standards YOU Get.

Remember this golden statement while recruiting agents and building your dream team. Let me show you some of the most common mistakes in agency recruitment.

Flexi Time

One of the most common mistakes that team leaders (SBAs, development officers, CLIAs, COs, unit managers and other agency team managers) make is to sell the concept of flexi time in the hope that the potential agent candidate will get impressed and interested. Pamphlets, flex boards, advertisements, all emphasize that in agency business you can work as per your convenience and there are no rigid working days or hours.

Now imagine you were applying for a job and your interviewer told you that there are no demands on your time. You are allowed to work when you feel like. The corollary to this statement is that you can also not work if you felt like not working.

So you are telling a budding agent: Please do not work if you feel so.

Team leaders complain that agents don’t work, after the agent has joined the organisation. Why should they work? They were told that not working was a legitimate option, right at the beginning, before joining the organisation. Now, after the agent has joined, if he or she chooses the option of no work, there are no grounds for complaining. The agent is only doing what he or she has been told.

Team leaders have set the standard: Work or do not work – the choice is yours. The standard you will get from the agent is exactly that – No work

Not Having a Vision for the Team

All great teams are built around a vision. The Team Leader sets the vision. The team works for that vision. The vision is bigger than individual goals of earning commission or incentives. When the vision is stated with clarity and an emotional link between the agent and the vision is created, the team is charged to perform beyond their capabilities.

The vision should be told to each individual agent joining. Only those believing in the vision should be selected.

How often do team leaders complain that agents do not attend meeting, do not attend training, do not even respond to phone calls? All such experiences are nothing but a vote of no-confidence in the team leader.

A vision helps an emotional bonding, which leads to greater involvement of the agent in business and greater satisfaction of doing work.

The standard set is: Here we only talk of business. The standard you get is: Okay in that case I am not really interested.

Not stating the Conditions of Working in your Team

Team leaders are shy of stating the conditions of work that they want the joining agents to follow. All team leaders know that selling life insurance is a difficult job. All team leaders know that selling life insurance requires self-discipline, regular training, regularly attending team meetings, etc.

For some unknown reason, team leaders feel that they will lose the candidate if they specify that agents should agree to conditions of training, meeting attendance, and a rigorous disciplined schedule. So team leaders do not specify these as non-negotiable conditions of being a team member. As a result the team consists of members who do not “listen” to the team leader. There is no team spirit and every one works or does not work, purely on his or her fancy.

The standard you have set is: No rules of work. The standard you get is: No work.

The Standards you Set are the Standards you Get

Much of your team’s success is determined by what you say and do at the recruiting stage. For the agent, the first impression is the lasting impression. Get the first impression right. Develop a good process of recruitment that gives you a fighting fit sales team, full of positive energy and a burning desire to reach great heights.

Happy Recruiting!