BRONZE Best Agency to Work For 2016 – Midwest: Insurance Center Inc.

Employees at Insurance Journal‘s pick for the 2016 Best Agency to Work For –Midwest: Bronze, Insurance Center Inc. (ICI), feel lucky to work at the Wichita, Kan.-area firm.

At least, that’s the impression one gets reading comments submitted to IJ’s Best Agency survey. In comment after comment, ICI respondents testified they are honored and fortunate to work at the agency, and that it feels like a second home.

“ICI is an extended family and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else,” wrote one employee who described their previous workplace as a “hostile environment.” At ICI, “I work with some beautiful people and have a President who truly appreciates his staff,” the employee added.

President Ryan Murry, who has followed his late father, Tom, in the leadership role at the company, describes ICI as a “family first” agency. “We’re as flexible as possible when it comes to caring for family members and attending children’s extra-curricular activities,” he said.

Murry said he feels “very honored that our employees nominated our company for this recognition. I’m very thankful and proud of our team.” He said the goal has always been to create an agency where people want to come to work, adding that over the last five or six years, management has worked hard to recruit talent “that we believed would be the ‘right fit’ for the culture we were trying to create.”

The strategy seems to have worked. One survey respondent wrote that ICI “does all that it can to take care of us as employees. Between salary, time off, training, and everything else in between they do an excellent job at making sure the employees are compensated and receiving what they deserve.”

To Murry, the agency’s “people are the core what makes us special. We strive to provide a great ‘client experience.’ It’s our job to provide our clients with sound advice, not just information.”

In fact, the importance of client experience is so ingrained, management and employees “try to avoid using terms like ‘customer service.’ Our joke around the office is ‘Walmart has customers. We have clients,'” Murry said.

In the end, he said, “our clients have to like doing business with us, or they can easily go somewhere else. We’re always looking for ways to make it easier for our clients to interact with us.”

One employee praised the client-centric focus, stating: “ICI truly cares about their clients and client care satisfaction. ICI has high ethical standards and sets the bar high professionally. It is an honor to work with such amazing people and for such an extraordinary agency as ICI!”

“We live in a small community. Everything we do is personal. The rapport we have with our clients, the relationship we get to have with them is what keeps our doors open. It’s very gratifying,” said another.

Several employees said one of the most positive initiatives at ICI is its “360 Safety” risk management program, through which the agency helps its business costumers control risk and workers’ compensation costs.

“360 Safety is an amazing product that we offer which provides exceptional risk management services,” wrote one employee.

“Our in-house risk manager is the only producer in Kansas running a successful 360 Safety Program,” said another.

Other employees praised the agency’s innovative culture and its support for employee education and professional advancement.

ICI is “always on the leading edge. They are dedicated to their employees and clients and always strive to achieve new heights,” one survey respondent wrote.

Another said ICI promotes “a positive culture for personal and professional growth. ICI encourages continuing education personally and professionally. ICI strives to move with the most advanced technology for staff to excel in every aspect.”