Where do you turn for young talent? How do you mentor young agents?

Rob Cohen: We recognize the need to constantly attract and grow young talent in the insurance industry, as they are our future leaders. IMA has a very robust and atypical summer internship program that imbeds college juniors and seniors into our departments for 8 to 10 weeks. Every intern is assigned a team lead, peer mentor (a junior IMA associate) and veteran insurance mentor. Our interns work on critical assignments which include client visits, travel to other IMA offices and internal and external meetings. Additionally, they receive industry recognized technical education. The program culminates in a presentation of their experience to IMA executives. This isn’t your typical copy and errand type of internship. This past summer we assigned a young associate as the team leader for our summer intern resulting in a win/win situation where the IMA associate was able to act in a supervisory capacity to hone his future management and leadership skills.

When young associates join IMA they receive substantial training from a variety of sources including on-the-job training, formal training and educational insurance courses. Additionally, they are encouraged to reach out to senior associates to form informal mentoring relationships. Young associates also are often the recipients of individual success plans that specifically outline short-term stretch goals as a means to long-term career development and advancement. IMA strongly believes in promoting from within and looks to bring in the best possible “long-term” associate with each entry-level hire. In addition, IMA offers a full-time management trainee program designed to groom outstanding MBA candidates to become the next generation of leaders at IMA. Former trainees now hold executive positions at IMA.