Go Deep, Grow Great™ Case Study
Eddy’s Journey to Significance
Age: 62
Profession: Insurance Agent
2004 Vital Signs Score: 27 (See Vital Signs Scorecard below)
2005 Vital Signs Score: 95!
What did Eddy do to make this remarkable life change? Following is what he had to say about his awakening...
Season of Self/Season of Drought
"I had a bad attitude. Didn’t want to hear anything from management, as I already knew that it was going to be bad. I felt that management had no idea what I was going through and didn’t care about me. I started staying away from the office more and more. Why go to work and be miserable? My wife told me she had never seen me this way."
To what do you attribute your change?
Season of Self-Awareness
"I had read enough to know that when you are truly tired of the place you’re in, it’s time to make a change. After I decided I was not going to retire and walk away with my tail between my legs, I decided I was going to get out of this bad place I was in and start back to living life and having fun in my business. Once I made this decision, I was receptive to hearing about ways to do this new job."
What are the symptoms of the reengaged Eddy?
Season of Significance
"Wow, life is great! My family life has greatly improved and my business is growing at a fast pace again. In 2005 I had the biggest life premium year ever ($75,000) and qualified for my company’s most prestigious performance awards. It’s May of 2006 and I have about as much life premium as I did in all of 2005 – tell me that attitude doesn’t matter!"
What did you do to get better? Season of Self-Awareness
- True relationships have honesty in them. I asked my management team to honestly assess my strengths and weaknesses. I wanted to know how I could get better.
- I realized that if I wanted better relationships, I had to take the initiative. I needed to take responsibility for myself and not blame others for where I was.
- Once I started taking responsibility and quit blaming others, my failures were fewer and smaller. Due to my ‘awakening’ I didn’t have time to dwell on the negatives, as I had much more positives in my life to tend to.
Eddy’s closing comments…
"Can you guess that I don’t like to listen to agents griping in our meetings? I try to make better the things I can and don’t spend time on the things I can’t control. I’m 62 and have no retirement plans. How big and good can I build this agency? I don’t know the answer but I’ll have a ball doing it!"
2005 Vital Signs Score: 95!
- Record year of production in his 38 years as an agent
- Starting having conversations with clients to help identify what they needed, what was important to them
- Quit selling and started developing relationships
- Got out of self and into others
Are you green and growing or ripe and rotting?
Take The Vital Signs Test (PDF)
