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Insurance Journal blogger David Connolly says sales agencies should be well into their projections for 2011, while reviewing production results for 2010. “Agencies with significant organic growth in this marketplace got there because they planned to get there. It was not dumb luck or just hard work, it was smart work.” Check out Connolly’s biweekly blog only on InsuranceJournal.com.

Insurance Journal Podcast

Harleysville Turns a Corner

Six years ago, things didn’t look too rosy for Pennsylvania’s Harleysville Insurance. It was coming out of the worst-performing year in its history, and the super-regional carrier was in big need of change. That’s when new CEO Michael Browne stepped in and oversaw one of the more impressive turnaround’s in recent insurance corporate history, culminating earlier this year as A.M. Best upgraded Harleysville to an “A” rating. Find out how he did it in this exclusive interview with IJ’s Ken St. Onge at: https://www.insurancejournal.tv/videos/4725/.

Readers’ Views

Do Today’s Entry Level Employees Lack Professionalism?

Students aren’t making the grade as professionals in the workplace, according to a survey on the state of professionalism among young workers. In 2009, 37.3 percent of corporate leaders felt that less than half of all new graduates exhibited professionalism in the workplace. The research is from the Center for Professional Excellence (CPE) at York College of Pennsylvania. The InsuranceJournal.com article on Dec. 12 (https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2010/12/15/115635.htm) received a lot of attention from readers this month. Here are a few select comments:

“Entry level employees lack professionalism… The bigger point I believe is that “Corporate Leaders” lack business ethics as evident by the Corporate Bailouts, Gulf Oil Spills, etc. Corporate Executives need to set the example, not be a false idol.”

“And yet large insurance brokers… like Aon, Marsh, Willis and others are slowly letting their “seasoned” personnel go and methodically replacing them with young-fresh-out-of-college-wet-behind-the-ears-don’t-know-jack-about-insurance people and calling them ‘account managers.’ I can’t tell you how many times in a week I wind up educating one of them on the basics of insurance.”

“No ethics in young people… My biggest problem as an employer is finding that young people today have no ethics! My most recent employee quit after screaming at me that I don’t understand poor people and that poor people shouldn’t be held to the same standards as non-poor people.. huh! She then attempted to collect unemployment and the state denied her. The unethical stuff we have found since she left is outrageous…”

Insurance Journal Video

Social Media E&O

Social media use is becoming more popular in the legal community with the use of attorn-ey blogs, Facebook, Linked In and Twitter. Michele Wade, executive vice president of Lockton Cos., and Kelley Martin, senior claims specialist in the technical resource center of Scottsdale Insurance Co., believe social media will become more of an errors and omissions concern. In an interview with IJ’s Andrea Ortega-Wells, they discussed emerging themes in legal malpractice at the PLUS Conference in San Antonio. To watch, visit: https://www.insurancejournal.tv/videos/4703/

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