I am lucky to be involved in a lot of cool projects right now. I have FINAEO, a rad FinTech in Canada that’s coming to the US (FINAEO), my buddy Blake’s benefits agency (Maxwell Agency) where I get to grow my P&C skills, and I am proud to be a contributing member of the Insurance Nerds family which has immensely grown my network. My wise wife said I am only allowed to dabble in things around insurance for the time being, haha.
I choose projects by the knowledge that cane be gained, financial opportunity, and maybe most importantly, the team. Working at Maxwell Insurance we’re building a very tradition (though tech-driven) agency, the upside is understandable and the work is clear. Working with FINAEO, there’s a remarkable hill to climb, but the vistas from the top have the potential to be spectacular. On the FINAEO side, we’re looking to digitize something that has barely been touched by technology, the Financial Planning industry.
I believe the team is the most important part because with the right talent and mindset, I really believe a collection of people can solve just about anything. That’s why I am excited a fellow Rising Tide investment is working on something like Carbon Capture, but that’s another story. Not everyone on a team can be LeBron James, you need some Luis Scolas, some Richard Jeffersons, and Shane Battiers to win too.
I consider myself a grinder. I grew up sales-wise in the era (early 2010s) of knocking doors and making cold calls off of collected business cards and a 1 page paper script. Though analytics may have been driving some sales floors, it was not driving ours, the occasional desk pound and expletive from the bosses office got you back in motion, haha. We had our metrics, 2 hours of calls, go collect 30 cards, 2 hours of calls again. The base salary way llloooowww, and your only hope was commission, this was 2009 / 2010.
Sports, working construction and in restaurants, and that first year of sales all began making me a pretty good grinder. I stuck around my next job for 6 years, but go licensed in insurance to help lead generation in that roll, I helped a few startups on nights and weekends too. I kept having “5-9s” to get out of the “9-5.” The first true tech startup I helped was in 2014-2016, it gave me my first taste of trying to bring modern tech into a place where it hasn’t been, banking. My friend built a phenomenal data visualization product, and I was proud to have brought the first money in, but our first target didn’t want what we had built, and we ran out of time and couldn’t find another.
I have helped a handful of small businesses and tech startups now, The work I have done has never been sexy, it’s been spreadsheets, calls, sometimes off of a personal cell at lunch, while trying to sniff out knowledge and trying to be acutely aware of true traction. I say “carry a lunch-pail, and try and think like a VC” because your time is valuable. You will only get to invest your efforts into a handful of companies during your professional career, and in order for your teams to win, they’ll need every team members aware and alert.
Don’t be afraid to do the hard, potentially boring, monotonous work, but don’t stop thinking and considering your time an investment too.
-Broker Brett
Please feel free to add me on LinkedIn, and or to reach out with any startup or InsurTech related questions, and thank you for taking the time to read this article too.
Brett Fulmer
