With the return of the soft market, however, agencies will no longer have the luxury of sweeping underlying performance issues under the rug. Personality clashes, turf battles, back stabbing, lack of confidence and other human foibles can all impact sales, turnover and profitability. You can react to such threats as they arise, and hope for the best, or you can intervene proactively.

In light of changing market conditions, my consulting firm looked at these issues in a survey that we are previewing for the first time in this space. From September 2003 through February 2004, we asked 1,549 people at 26 agencies across the United States, ranging in size from 16 to 182 employees, to take a Performance Diagnostic Survey designed to identify attitudes and perceptions that might be inhibiting performance.

When we tabulated the results, three trends jumped out at us:

A general lack of understanding among respondents of the five-to-seven factors critical to their own success.

Respondents generally knew their job, but did not clearly understand what would make them successful in performing it including in the eyes of management. This reflects a situation where, as external competitive pressure puts a strain on people, issues of blaming others and losing confidence in management may well surface.

Poor communications within the agency.

The survey showed that agencies are not clearly communicating two key messages to employees their strategy and direction, and their specific expectations of individuals. Such confusion can erode confidence as personnel operate on the basis of misperceptions. Miscommunication is a potential black hole that, if quantified, could be an agencys single biggest expense.

Inadequate praise, rewards and recognition for work well done.

Interestingly, the lowest factor scored by PDS was how well agencies are reinforcing people's productive behavior. This finding was ironic since, before the survey was conducted, all but one of the agencies classified itself as successful, growing and healthy. The PDS data suggest an underlying issue that may lead to erosion in performance and profit for agencies if not addressed.

There were numerous other findings from the survey, some of which reinforced these problems and others which offset them to a degree. Overall, however, the survey presented a picture of agencies that have underlying issues that may hinder their performance as the soft market returns.

These issues, if not resolved, can throw an agency out of alignment. An agency may be organized to sell and service, but human issues that cut across the organizational chart can be distracting and subvert performance. The objective of PDS is to reveal these problems so that an agency can deal with them in a way that pulls everyone together and restores clear management-employee communication.

When that happens, an agency is back in alignment, organized to respond to the market efficiently rather than being held back by the political, psychological and social factors that invariably arise in the workplace.

While not everyone can be an all star, there are at least several thousand potentially great producers out there. Finding them should not be difficult for your recruiters. The question is whether you will develop your top producers in a team environment that is conducive to their individual achievement as well as to the overall success of your agency.

Randy Schwantz is president and CEO of The Wedge Group, a sales training and consulting firm headquartered near Dallas. Mr. Schwantz is author of “The Wedge: How to Stop Selling and Start Winning,” published by The National Underwriter Company. For a free copy of the PDS survey, NU subscribers may call The Wedge Group at 1-877-999-9334 or visit www.thewedge.net.

Reproduced from National Underwriter Edition, April 30, 2004. Copyright 2004 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.