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TOP100 AGENCIES make every effort to get our prospects, our clients to understand that we’re not insurance sales people,” Grant said. “Our producers are people that go in and expose risk. We go to a client and look at their exposure and make sure they’re fully aware of what’s at risk. And then we provide options to insure the risk.” Embracing Technology SWBC has experienced tremendous growth since its founding in 1976, but in the past four years it has more than doubled in size. One enabling component of SWBC’s success is its total and complete embrace of technology, which both Dudley and Amato both see as yet another example of expansion into an area of business that complements the company’s existing strengths. “We’re a high technology company,” Dudley said. “We have 100 computer programmers on our staff, for instance, to design programs and keep our systems running.” SWBC in 2008 increased its technological investment by buying a stake in Pennsylvania-based Akcelerant Software LLC, which develops software, including collections software, for the financial services industry. And recently, SWBC made an additional investment to facilitate the purchase of one of Akcelerant’s Canadian competitors. “A lot of our financial institutions — credit unions and community banks — use this collections software,” Amato said. As a result of the investment, SWBC established a payment reminder services unit that makes after-hours soft collection calls for clients. The calls are made from a facility SWBC built two years ago — a spacious, light-filled, state-of-the-art contact center large enough to house 400 employees. The proprietary software tracks accounts that are past due and collection personnel make payment reminder calls. In addition, the call center staff can take payments while the customer is on the line.“The results have been remarkable,” Dudley said. “The financial institution hires us on their behalf,” he added. “We started that about two years ago before we knew what the economy was going to do, as a request from one of our clients. That has turned out be our fastest growing division.”
Basketball, Automobiles and the World
W
hile SWBC owners and founders Gary Dudley and Charlie Amato both acknowledge that the company is very much their life, they do participate in few side projects apart from SWBC. And like all other facets of their world, there are connections. The two are investors in the San Antonio Spurs basketball franchise, and Spurs’ star and point guard Tony Parker serves as a “goodwill ambassador” for SWBC, appearing in ads and marketing campaigns for the company. Dudley and Amato together also own four automobile dealerships in San Antonio, in which they employee more than 200 people. The dealerships don’t use the SWBC moniker, but in the spirit of interconnection, they do sell its products and the company handles the insurance for the dealerships’ properties. While world domination may not be the goal, expanding SWBC’s horizon is always in order, according to Amato and Dudley. SWBC owns a Bermuda-based reinsurance company, SWBC Re, and they are in the process of becoming a corporate name in Lloyd’s of London, Amato said. There’s the possibility of investing in a retail operation in London, as well. Also, says Amato, while “we’ve never taken the time to do it because we’ve been so busy, but the software that we were telling you about earlier that tracks for financial institutions? I truly feel that if we ever told that story in Europe, especially in the current economic crisis, there would be a demand for our software.” IJ
the referring employee gets $200. Once an employee successfully refers five new hires, they get an extra $1,000. So, for referring five people who are a good fit, the referring employee can make $2,000. SWBC also compensates its employees well, Amato says, “because we feel that’s the only way we can compete with the public companies. Some people here are making a lot of money and we’re proud of that. We have some people who over a period of years have made more money than Gary and I … and we love it.” SWBC encourages each of its 13 division leaders to run their units ‘We’re a high technology company. … We have 100 computer as if they owned them, Dudley programmers on our staff ... to design programs and keep said. It makes for a very entrepreneurial atmosphere and one that our systems running.’ allows the company to “turn on a dime,” as Amato says, and react An Entrepreneurial Spirit quickly and efficiently to their clients’ needs. Because SWBC is Like many business owners, Amato and Dudley are quick to credit privately held, if a manager comes to one of the owners — to distheir management team and employees for the company’s achievecuss ideas or for an investment in their division — unlike in a ments. “I’d stand up and put our 1,250 people against any company in publicly traded company, they can give that manager an immedithe country,” Dudley said. “They just have that — ‘I want to help, I ate answer. want to take care of the client’” — attitude. Amato said they’ve been encouraged to go public and have been Both Amato and Dudley stand firmly behind the notion that if “you approached by equity firms interested in investing in SWBC, but hire the right people, they hire the right people,” Dudley says. And so far they’re not interested. Going public would not fit the combelieving that talented people associate with talented people, they pany’s business model, Amato said, “because it would take some put their money where their mouth is — they pay their employees to of our entrepreneurial creativity away from us. If we want to refer potential employees to the company. form a new division and lose money for three years, that’s our If a referred employee stays on the job a minimum of six months, privilege — we can do it and we can afford it.” IJ www.insurancejournal.com
June 15, 2009 INSURANCE JOURNAL-NATIONAL REGION | N15