Good sports

If independent agents ever decide to designate a particular sport the Official Sport of the American Agency System, golf would handily win. Of course, there would be splinter trade associations lobbying for bowling and darts, but golf would win.

While most agents say they are drawn to golf because it is fun, and not because it is good for business [See “Independent agents sold on golf” on page N64], we suspect the sport also appeals to agents’ yearning for the twin experiences of competition and independence. Golfers rise and fall on their own skills and scores; they own whatever success or failure they make.

To excel at golf requires skill, dedication, composure and continuing education. Successful agents know all about these.

Agents also are partial to anything that gets them out from behind the desk and into their communities where they can shake hands and meet people.

Finally, agents feel comfortable traversing the links, where no one thinks their whale pants and white shoes are strange.

Now golf is not the only sport popular among insurance professionals. A recent unreliable survey of the insurance industry unearthed other athletic preferences.

While one insurance company CEO claimed to like races where he could pull a tractor with his teeth, a majority of CEOs are big on birling. This sport, also known as log rolling, requires participants to stay atop a rolling log floating down a river, while trying to knock the opposing log roller into the water. The contestant left standing, and dry, wins.

A whopping two-thirds of property casualty underwriters participate in cycling. Underwriters said they enjoy riding the hills and valleys and the rush they get when turning a corner.

State insurance commissioners (33 percent) and attorneys general (66 percent) report a growing interest in jousting. In this medieval sport, two horsemen — one government, one industry — charge at each other with lances to slay their opponent. These battles tend to draw blood and can go on for days.

Not surprisingly, customer service representatives have become adept at the boomerang. “We know that what we send out comes back,” said U.S. Boomerang Champ Donna Sturdy of the Bigeye Insurance Agency in Grand Rapids.

As is commonly known, insurance industry reporters admire their agent and executive subjects, and secretly long to be like them. That might explain why reporters have formed a Disc Golf League, a game where golf meets Frisbee meets basketball. Players toss discs across a 9- or-18-basket course with obstacles (trees, ponds, wind tunnels, etc.) with the aim of landing the disc in a basket (hole). The winner is the one who completes the course with the fewest tosses. It’s less work than real golf, and players can dress in t-shirts and jeans. Oh, and refreshments are included in the greens fee.

There is no denying that insurance is a serious business. Most days, insurance professionals are dealing with insureds in need of protection against evil and destructive forces of man and nature. Insurance Journal’s special Golf, Sports, Leisure and Entertainment Issue is meant to be a reminder that this is an industry where it’s OK to have some fun, too.

Disc golf anyone?

Topics Agencies