Robert Gaydos - and his agency, Benefit Group of New England - are about much more than pushing products onto employers.
It's right there in his company's mission statement: "BGNE has been providing long-term cost containment strategies, consumer-centric health care plans, and member health advocacy programs to small and mid-sized employers for the last two decades."
The key words here are "long-term" and "consumer-centric." And this is at a time when everyone seems to be all about short-term gains and regulators are threatening the very existence of consumer-driven plans (which have not only succeeded beyond the wildest of expectations, but remain more popular than ever with employees).
Gaydos, though, takes a longer, more-invested approach. For starters, his Colchester, Vt.-based company goes above and beyond in its approach to educating employees not only about their plans, but about the industry overall, in a bid to help make them better, more informed consumers. The company's Web site also boasts much more than the usual self-promotion and contact info, and features resources, which, again, are intended to educate and inform employers and employees alike.
"Employee education is the foundation of everything we do," Gaydos says. "I believe that if you increase the benefit literacy of the employee, then you increase the [return on your investment].
"More than 75 percent of our clients have implemented total replacement consumer-driven health plans. Many of those also have implemented incentive-based assessment and wellness programs. These places are different, and require planned, deliberate and thoughtful communications. Communications that are designed to increase the benefit literacy of the employees," Gaydos explains.
He even goes so far as to call himself - and his brokers - change agents.
"We motivate our clients to address the future, and to act," Gaydos says. "We believe that the current model is not sustainable, and the sooner an employer accepts that fact, the sooner they can address their challenges and move in a positive direction.
"Our model is growth. Only growth allows an agency to move forward when revenue per member is dropping. Our approach is to operate as a team. From the partners to our staff, we are all inter-connected. We do not operate in silos. We share information, concerns, visions and more. This keeps our company moving forward, and moving at a rapid pace."
And it's this concerted effort to bridge the communication gap between broker and client that has propelled BGNE, particularly, during times like these. Before everything tanked over the last year-and-a-half, Gaydos was already planning ahead, which is why his firm was well-positioned for the downturn. And it was his eager embrace of consumer-driven health plans that led the way.
"When we moved into the consumer-driven health plan space in 2001, it was on the premise that employers could not sustain their current plans and contribution models," Gaydos says. "Since 2001, we felt that an inevitable economic downturn would drive employers away from the past and into the future, and we felt that consumerism and health advocacy were the only logical solutions.
"We see the recession as an opportunity to reach new employers with our message. In 2009, we have spent more time and money on marketing than in any prior year. We expect dramatic sales increases for January 2010."
Gaydos' story - in the insurance business, anyway - begins back in January 1990.
"After a very short stint with the National Association for the Self-Employed, I entered a career program with Penn Mutual where I learned life, health and disability insurance," he recalls. "After spending six years in the restaurant business (including ownership), the insurance business felt natural for me. I knew from the start that I would work with business owners, and employee benefits became my passion within the first few years."
Gaydos was lucky enough to find a mentor early on, who helped him navigate what can admittedly be a complicated business. "I had a great general agent, Jim O'Malley, who mentored me, and also gave me great freedom to find my own way. He was a major influence, and I attribute much of my success to that relationship," Gaydos says.
By the mid-1990s, Gaydos left Penn Mutual to set up his own shop: an agency and consulting firm. O'Malley, his mentor, endorsed and encourage that move.
"Today, BGNE is a partnership between myself and Deb Loughlin," Gaydos says.
So, what's next? With all of this talk of mandates, exchanges and public options, what does the forward-thinking agent expect to happen next? Simple, he says - expect a huge dose of upheaval.
"It is our belief that the health insurance deliver system will change," he says matter-of-factly. "It must. The current model has run its course, and consumer-driven health plans are simply the early stages of reinvention. What we know as health insurance will change dramatically over the next five to 15 years."
And don't think your paycheck will escape that rising tide of change, either.
"It's not possible for broker compensation to remain as a percentage of premiums. It must move toward fixed fees based on membership. This will detach the compensation for medical inflation, and attach the compensation to CPI," Gaydos insists.
But despite this simple breakdown of how things will evolve, the end result will be anything but.
"Health insurance reform will complicate this business," he concedes. "Consumerism and health advocacy increase the workload of the brokers. This will create new challenges and new opportunities. The end result will be a move away from simple brokering, and toward active advisory roles that are connected to financial results."
But the overall debate surrounding reform and health care frustrates Gaydos no less than the rest of us.
"It is unfortunate that health care reform and health insurance reform have been combined into a single debate. They are two very different discussions," Gaydos says.
"We need health insurance reform that leads to a national marketplace with fair rules concerning pricing and underwriting, and eliminates pre-existing conditions. We do not need a government to reach those goals. By definition, a government plan will either limit reimbursements or limit procedures. The first is an unfair advantage against the commercial carriers. The latter is unfair against those on the public plan, as compared to those covered under commercial carriers.
"An employer mandate is very problematic. This fall will be a very difficult political process; however I believe the odds are high that some type of reform will pass. I fear the reform will be a mix of contradictions. There are simply too many cooks in the kitchen, and the president has not provided specific leadership, but rather he has been vague. This vagueness has created confusion and a vacuum for various parties to insert what is many times contradictory interests."
Despite all his success, and subsequent optimism, Gaydos' parting words aren't exactly encouraging.
"Brokers should prepare for the worst outcome, but work toward the best."
Sidebar: For those just getting into the business, Bob Gaydos offers the following advice:
For those just getting into the business, Bob Gaydos offers the following advice:
- First and foremost, understand that this business is changing, and with the right perspective and attitude, this change creates great opportunity.
- There are 80 million Echo Boomers (children of baby boomers). They are entering the workforce over the next decade. They see the world in a new way. They use BlackBerries, they tweet, and they connect 24 hours a day on Facebook. They do not use paper, land lines, fax machines or file cabinets. The Echo Boomers will see employee benefits in a new way.
- Peter Drucker wrote: "One cannot manage change. One can only get ahead of it."
- Learn the current business in great detail, and then question everything.
- Do not repeat the past.
- Make this business work in your world. Make this business make sense in your eyes.
- This is your story, not ours.
- Don't call him a broker. Robert Gaydos - and his staff - call themselves agents of change. He argues the current business model is simply unsustainable. And he's quick to tell his clients that, too.
