Members of the First Citizens Insurance Services team. From left: Bill Connolly, Senior Commercial Risk Advisor; Julia Benfield, Manager-Commercial Insurance Service; Bill Fryer, Manager-Insurance Services; Kristen Charles, Commercial Risk Advisor; and Tim Hrehor, Manager-Commercial Insurance Sales.
Helping clients manage risk and prosper drives commercial growth
By Dennis H. Pillsbury
Raleigh, North Carolina-based First Citizens Bank formed First Citizens Insurance Services in 1999 to, as Insurance Services Manager Bill Fryer says, help “meet customer needs through a broad array of financial offerings.” To accomplish that, the bank bought a 100-year-old insurance agency with a strong history of service that aligned with the banking company’s focus on customers.
“Our value-add
to the bank’s customers
is our ability to protect their growth
through risk management and risk mitigation.”
—Bill Fryer
Manager-Insurance Services
Bill joined the agency 18 years ago, bringing with him both insurance company and insurance agency experience. First Citizens Insurance Services grew early on by acquiring four agencies within two years, and then focused entirely on organic growth. As head of the insurance operation, Bill’s job, he says, “is to strategically focus on growth that ties in with the expanding markets of the bank and to make certain that we remain relevant to the overall goal of helping customers grow and prosper.”
Commercial risk management and insurance are key focus areas for the agency. “Our value-add to the bank’s customers is our ability to protect their growth through risk management and risk mitigation. While we offer these services to a wide variety of commercial customers, more than 80% of our customers are introduced by the bank,” Bill points out.
“[W]e have been able
to put together teams of experts
that can handle the risk management
needs and services of a growing list of niche areas.”
—Tim Hrehor
Manager-Commercial Insurance Sales
First Citizens began in 1898 as the Bank of Smithfield, in Johnston County, North Carolina. From a single office, the firm has grown to more than 500 branches in 23 states. Celebrating its 125th anniversary this year, First Citizens Bank is one of the 20 largest banks in the United States and the largest family-controlled bank in the nation—having been led by members of the same family for three generations.
As First Citizens has grown in size, the risk management needs of its commercial customers have grown in sophistication and complexity. To address this, the agency formalized processes around risk and developed a tool to accurately determine the unique needs of its commercial clients.
“[W]e have been educating our clients about
the hard market … so they are all prepared for
possible rate increases or changes
in risk management approaches … .”
—Julia Benfield
Manager-Commercial Insurance Service
Four-step approach
“In order to provide the best in protection to the businesses, we established what we call our Beacon Program,” explains Tim Hrehor, manager-commercial insurance sales. “The program involves four important steps designed to determine the best risk management approach for each customer or prospect.
“The first step is the discovery process, where we sit down with the client or prospect and get to know them intimately so we can design a risk management program that meets their specific needs,” Tim says. “The second step involves looking at their existing program to see if there are any gaps or overlaps that could create problems in the future.
“The third step,” he adds, “is to install a plan that aligns with the client’s goals and that makes sense within the industry in which the client competes. And the final step is our continuous stewardship reporting of the results of the program, what we term our ‘promises made, promises kept’ phase, which is ongoing and includes a service timeline that is created to fit with the individual business needs of each client.”
To deliver the customer-first service First Citizens is known for, the agency offers a variety of concierge-level services, including loss control services, claims management, ongoing risk strategy meetings, workers comp experience mod review, cyber risk review, and technology tools that provide a client self-service capability to handle things like adding a vehicle or obtaining certificates.
Tim joined the agency nine years ago—moving from the banking side of the house. “The transition from the bank to the insurance operation was facilitated by the fact that our goals are aligned and quite similar in nature,” he explains.
“We are relationship-
driven at all levels of the bank, both
personally and professionally … .
(People) trust us like family and we treat them like family.”
—Bill Connolly
Senior Commercial Risk Advisor
“Basically,” he notes, “our job is to advise clients in a meaningful way, and to accomplish that successfully, you need to build a team of experts who can advise and respond with financial services solutions on the banking side and, more specifically on the insurance side, with risk management solutions that meet the unique needs of the complex commercial businesses we advise.
Niche focus
“We recognized that we couldn’t be all things to all people,” Tim adds, “so we reviewed our growing list of commercial clients and determined those niche areas where risk management expertise was needed and focused on educating our associates (First Citizens does not have “employees;” all its people are “associates” and integral parts of the First Citizens team) to become experts in our clients’ businesses.
“Thanks to the information about each client that we develop through our Beacon Program,” Tim adds, “we have been able to put together teams of experts that can handle the risk management needs and services of a growing list of niche areas. Some of our niches include medical, manufacturing, construction, property management, among others. We also have a small business unit that can take care of small commercial clients.”
Julia Benfield, manager-commercial insurance service, works alongside Tim to develop effective high-performance teams that can provide clients with unique risk management solutions not only for current situations but in anticipation of any projected changes. For example, “we can provide workers comp mod projections if they make changes in their safety program,” Julia points out.
“We conduct regular risk strategy meetings with clients where we’ll look at the impacts of growth on their risk management plan,” she adds. “In short, we take a proactive approach with our clients, including sending out our own risk manager to help them mitigate potential losses.”
Julia, who joined the agency two years ago from a major broker, notes that “it’s been a pleasure to work at a place that really cares about its people. Our service people get to pick the niches where they want to develop an expertise, so they have a strong desire to learn and grow in areas where they already have an interest.
“Our proactive approach also allows us to work on clients’ ongoing risk management needs, so that we can begin to talk about continuation —we don’t call it ‘renewal’—of the program at least 120 days ahead of time, resulting in a seamless program where we are seen as trusted partners by our clients,” she explains.
“It also means that we can educate our clients about the insurance market, so they know what to expect going forward,” Julia notes. “For instance, right now we have been educating our clients about the hard market and talking about solutions, both internally with team members and externally with clients, so they are all prepared for possible rate increases or changes in risk management approaches that could help alleviate possible financial impacts.”
Senior Commercial Risk Advisor Bill Connolly, who first appeared in the pages of Rough Notes back in 1999 for being an outstanding young agent, joined First Citizens 19 years ago. “I’ve been working in the insurance industry for more than 30 years,” Bill says, “and have been fortunate to have worked at two wonderful agencies where my input has always been respected.”
Solid relationships
“Here at First Citizens, one of the key factors for me is our partnership with a bank that has always treated clients with respect,” Bill says. “It certainly makes my job easier when I approach a potential client that already has a positive feeling about First Citizens. That’s probably one of the reasons that our retention rate is in the mid to high 90s.
“First Citizens has provided me with … a
team of great account managers who have
the expertise and the desire to continue to
learn and grow … .”
—Kristen Charles
Commercial Risk Advisor
“We are relationship-driven at all levels of the bank, both personally and professionally,” Bill adds, “so people don’t look to leave us if they have a problem, because they know that we’ll work with them to find a solution. They trust us like family and we treat them like family, and it’s hard to fire family.
“Over the last several years,” he continues, “I’ve developed a niche around community associations, particularly those in coastal areas. That’s always been a challenging market and more so today.
“My focus is to work with the clients to maximize their risk management program,” he adds. “It’s a team effort. I work with account managers who know this business inside and out. And the great thing about this is that there’s always somebody available who can answer clients’ questions or concerns.
“One of my first interactions at the bank was with Bill Fryer, when he came and asked what I was doing to be successful,” he notes. “He was genuinely interested in me and also wanted to know if there was something I could offer to help others at the bank to become more successful.”
“I don’t like it here,” says Kristen Charles, commercial risk advisor, who joined in 2018. “I love it here! I’ve been in insurance for 20 years and was looking for someplace where my love for designing large, complex commercial risk management programs could be fully realized. First Citizens has provided me with that and with a team of great account managers who have the expertise and the desire to continue to learn and grow and increase their understanding of the complex commercial markets we serve.”
Addressing the complex
“I’ve also been fortunate to have landed at a place where the leadership team is wonderful and allows me the freedom to create my own solutions for these complex risk management situations,” Kristen adds. “This is a place that appreciates the fact that none of us are vendors; we’re here to help and educate and provide the right service to help clients become better protected and successful.
“None of us looks to quote business. We are instead focused on providing the best risk management solutions. If people are looking for quotes, they’ve come to the wrong place.
“We establish a relationship based on goals and on a long-term strategy that means that clients will be with us over the long haul,” Kristen continues. “And we’re always looking ahead to anticipate what our client could be facing in the future.
“Just think about the fact that cyber liability used to be provided free of charge and by 2025 will be a trillion-dollar business,” she observes. “We need to anticipate what’s coming, so we can best advise and educate clients about what to expect.
“In my area of large, complex risks, we do a lot of work finding the right home for the business,” Kristen continues. “We represent more than 100 insurance company partners and know what their appetites are so we can partner them with clients that will be attractive to them.
“But I also use captive solutions for those clients that want those types of solutions,” she adds. “The captive market has been very important for me.”
Rough Notes is proud to recognize First Citizens Insurance Services as our Agency of the Month. The commercial division has built a premier team of experts that provides risk management solutions and develops long-term relationships that assures high retention rates for clients and for personnel.
Perhaps Kristen says it best: “At the last place I worked, I thought about retirement. Here at First Citizens, I think about how I want to keep on working, and am not looking to retire any time soon.”
The author
Dennis Pillsbury is a Virginia-based freelance insurance writer.
