“One of our divisions wanted to pilot a work from home model in 2019. They tried it and it was successful.

We made a decision that we would pilot that across our business and I remember working with others to figure out the guiding principles. When Covid hit, it’s not an overstatement to say that we had zero issues from a technology and productivity perspective”, says Andrew.

On the podcast this week, Andrew discusses his career journey from Wales to Fort Wayne as his transition from part-time consultant to joining the MedPro team full-time.

With a remit of overseeing external communications across MedPro’s 17 divisions, Andrew explains his role from an internal communications perspective too.

“It’s ensuring that employees understand the mission of the business and what's important to us. That became a bigger part of my job. We were a little bit behind in how we develop people, so we had pretty much a blank canvas, and so that's exciting, because you get to think, ‘Ok, what do we want to do to engage and make 1300 employees better’.

Andrew highlights MedPro’s areas of operation, the 5 values that underpin culture and the desire to maintain an entrepreneurial spirit.

“We want to be hungry and nimble, while leveraging the scale of our size. We fight against what Warren Buffett calls the ABC of business decline - arrogance, bureaucracy and complacency”.

Andrew clarifies MedPro’s approach to hybrid working and the benefit of in-office activity for younger team members.   

“We think there's value, especially for younger employees, just being in the office. If you're new to a job and you can hear someone in the next cubicle who's been doing this role for many years. To listen to them take a call or deal with a difficult situation and learning through osmosis.”

Andrew shares the impact of the hybrid model on talent attraction and retention and gives his advice to candidates interviewing to join the MedPro team.

“I think it's, ‘Have you understood the job and been able to contextualize your experience with what the organization is looking for?’ It’s really important to understand the mission of the role rather than the day to day tasks."

From an insurance hiring perspective, Andrew encourages industry colleagues to be flexible in searching for the best insurance talent.

“It's not one size fits all. We need a lot of tools in the toolkit. Beyond that is having the ability to explain what the organisation is doing and why it does it”

Acquired by Berkshire Hathaway in 2005, Andrew concludes,

“Being part of the Berkshire family gives us an incredible an advantage. They don't give us top line goals and say, ‘Run your business as if it's your family's only asset for 100 years. Do everything with complete integrity and ask us if you need any help'. That long term mindset underpins everything we do. We will only grow into new segments if we think we can become the industry leader.”

Connect with Andrew Booth on LinkedIn or find out more about MedPro Group

The Insurance Coffee House Podcast is hosted by Nick Hoadley, CEO of Insurance Search.

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