In this week’s podcastepisode, I talk about how insurance agents can help their policyholders prepare for hurricane season. Here are a few excerpts from the podcast, along with resources that appear at the end of the post:
Did you know?
Hurricane season begins on June 1 in the Atlantic and on May 15 in the Eastern Pacific. In all locations, it ends on November 30.
The biggest threat during a hurricane is storm surge–especially at high tide.
The National Weather Service reports that the number of hurricanes keeps growing each year.
During high winds, the 4 biggest areas of weakness in any building are its roof, windows, entrance doors, and garage doors.
Not all property insurance policies provide coverage for wind–especially in coastal states.
NO standard property insurance policies provide coverage for storm surge caused by a hurricane. This is because, in most states, it is considered a form of flood–which is an excluded peril.
No, I’m not drinking two beers. One was my sister’s (she’s the photographer) and, in fact, I was drinking a soda. The photo was taken during a writer’s conference where I learned exactly what Writing Community means to me.
Conferences
I love going to writers’ conferences. Ironically, the best ones I attended were in New York City with RWA the year one of my daughters turned 11 (she’s never forgiven me for going away). The other two were in New Orleans, one with RWA and one in connection with my award nomination for my first mystery, Second Time Around. (Second Time Around will be re-released early next year.) There’s no greater feeling than the satisfaction of chatting with other writers.
Groups and Organizations
I was almost thirty years old before I experienced that feeling. Until I stepped into my first writer’s meeting, I’d always felt just a step out of whack with the world. Certain things would tickle my funny bone in a way no one else understood. I thought my imagination was wonderful thing. Sometimes, other people thought it was scary. Then there was the fact that I couldn’t go anywhere, and I mean anywhere, without a notebook and half a dozen pens.
Here’s what writing community means to me: The first moment I stepped into the monthly gathering of a group of writers, I knew I wasn’t really a step out of whack with the world. The disconnect I’d been feeling only occurred with people who weren’t writers. The immediate sense of understanding, the way we all looked at life from a quirky perspective, the unique (and often bizarre) senses of humor and imaginations … what a relief to know I wasn’t alone!
Since then, I’ve felt that same connection with not only writers but also musicians, artists, and those with a creative bent to their minds. It’s the community of writers. We all understand community in the sense of society, social standing, and in business.
We see that hashtag #writingcommunity all over social media (I’ve been using it a lot lately) and it’s no small thing.
Fellow Writers
Recently, I’ve become very involved in a couple of the writer’s groups of which I’ve been a member for years: Sisters in Crime New Englandand the New England Chapter of Mystery Writers of America. The interaction on Zoom during this pandemic has done a world of good for me. My boyfriend brought this to my attention. He said I seem happier and more engaged with the world. I’ve also become more productive–not only with my writing but with everything.
So, thank you, my fellow writers. You who have appeared on my podcast, who have welcomed me to your online meetings, who have helped me promote my own books and events. Together, we support each other and can accomplish anything!
Regardless of what business you’re in–whether you write and sell insurance or novels–customers are only going to buy you and your product if you earn their loyalty. No one is automatically entitled to trust.
How can you earn trust and loyalty?
Be authentic and sincere. If you’re a vegan selling Angus beef, that fundamental contradiction is apparent–if only in a funny feeling prospective customers sense.
Be open and honest. The popular word these days is “transparent.” And it’s appropriate. You don’t want people to lie to you, be deceptive, or withhold important information. So, don’t lie to, deceive, or withhold from others. The imbalance of treating people in a way you won’t tolerate being treated is going to topple you eventually.
Understand people. Do you know how your customers communicate? Would they prefer a phone call, a text, or an email? What do they believe? What do they want? What do they NEED? What do they consider important? If you don’t know the answers to these questions, how can you possibly give them what they want and need … or what they value?
The most important things to remember about people are that they want to:
Be viewed as important.
Know you care.
Be heard.
I talk about this subject in more detail in episode 14 of my podcast, Taking the Mystery out of Insurance. You can find it here.
If you’d like to read more about the subject, check out Dale Carnegie’s book, How to Win Friends and Influence People or any of Jeffrey Gitomer’s sales books (gitomer.com).
This week, I ventured down a slightly different path on my podcast. I talked about COVID and insurance, but more about what I believe we need to consider for the future rather than about what is happening today.
In America, we either brag about our independence or gripe because we feel we’re losing it. In reality, we don’t have it, never had it, and never will have it.
You might think I’m full of baloney, but I’m not. Just read the dictionary. When you’re independent, you’re free from the control of others. You don’t rely on other people for help and assistance. You are truly autonomous.
If we’re going to bandy about terminology, we need to understand the vocabulary we use.
We can’t live independently without the assistance, advice, and assent of others unless we march into the wilderness and set up home off the grid. Otherwise, we live in a community, which means we mutually depend upon each other for support and aid.
Regardless of where we live–off the grid or in the community–we all have the ability to choose a level of autonomy, a state of being where we strive to achieve independence to whatever degree we can while also living within the community.
Problem is, independence is costly in terms of time, effort, and humanity.
When we’re truly independent, we don’t adopt the opinions of others, we form our own. We listen to as many other perspectives as we can, weigh the variety of the input, and reach our own decisions. When we only seek out the voices of those who echo our own, we’re handicapping ourselves and leaving ourselves vulnerable to those who do not believe in independence.
This world contains people who exploit the fact that few of us will ever achieve true independence. They seek to control us to achieve what they view as their own independence. Clearly, they haven’t read the dictionary, either.
Throughout this pandemic, some of us have drawn closer to our community to work together to overcome the challenges to our health, financial survival, and emotional well-being. Others of us have chosen to withdraw from the community and strike out on our own, literally striking out in harmful ways. Harmful to ourselves, to others, to our community.
We all talk about our rights and how the government grants us our rights. Well, if we were truly independent, no one would give us anything. We’d obtain what we wanted for ourselves. Truth is, we were more independent thousands of years ago than we are today. The way people are behaving these days, our society will achieve total autonomy and, instead of advancing, regress. It’s already started that downside.
The very reason we formed society (aka community) was to improve the quality of our lives. The concept of community relies upon sharing, variety, and cooperation. Let me share an analogy.
A small, six-inch long critter found its way into my yard last week. He ventured from his own community into mine, without conducting any research. When my eighty-pound dog discovered the interloper, Angus thought he was friendly and wanted to play. As you can imagine, the critter was terrified. I chased Angus into the house and examined the little guy.
I thought the critter was a baby muskrat. (We live within 100 feet of a brook that connects two large ponds.) I snapped a photo of him and texted it to my brother, who immediately pointed out all the reasons why the little guy was a dark brown field mouse and not a muskrat. Or a rat. Or a beaver. Or any other type of rodent I thought he might be.
I investigated the interloper before making any type of decision about his future other than to save him from becoming my dog’s chew toy. I also walked the yard to see if he was the scout for a band of fellow interlopers. I didn’t rush to judgment. I didn’t run off in fear. I didn’t start screaming.
I conducted my research and relied on my brother, an outdoorsman and hunter, to provide me with information and knowledge I clearly lacked. And then I acted.
How would you have acted? Not if you were in my shoes and had just reviewed your brother’s information, but the moment you found your dog playing with the creature?
I suspect that the way any of us would have reacted in this situation is the same way we react when dealing with other people. Although we crave independence and control over our own lives, some of us do not hesitate to control others and take away their independence–oftentimes by jumping to conclusions and not conducting any research. Would you have let Angus continue playing with (aka tormenting) the mouse? Would you have chased Angus away and then killed the thing yourself? Would you have let him go? Would you have conducted any research in that moment? Or would you have done something else? Some of us realize there are always more options than we alone can see?
What did you do on Independence Day? Did you gripe about the lack of public fireworks’ displays and the inability to attend a large community barbecue? Or did you sit in your own back yard with a few people you love and celebrate your own personal independence … and/or community?
