Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Speaker A: Welcome to Alignment for Impact.
I'm your host, Matthew Naylor. I started this podcast because healthcare and leadership both come down to the same thing. Alignment. When people, purpose and performance connect, real impact happens.
On this show, we'll talk with entrepreneurs, brokers and change makers who are challenging what is broken in healthcare and in business and find new ways to make a difference for companies, communities and the people they serve.
So I'm Matt Naylor. I'm the host of the Matt Naylor podcast. I love interviewing people and talking about what's your passion, what's your purpose, what's your happiness and joy and how you're making an impact in your life, personally and professionally.
It's awesome. You and your firm are really shaking up the employee benefit space and specifically the self insured health plan space.
It's a pleasure to have you here today. Angie Martinez. Right, thank you. And you're with Dean and Draper?
[00:01:11] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:01:11] Speaker A: And how long you been with Dean and Draper?
[00:01:13] Speaker B: For 15 years. Going on 15 years.
[00:01:15] Speaker A: 15 years.
[00:01:16] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:01:18] Speaker A: How'd you end up in the employee benefits business?
[00:01:20] Speaker B: Funny story.
So I started in the auto and home insurance agency almost 30 or 30 years ago.
Interview, interviewed for receptionist position, started my career and then about a year later I was given an opportunity at an insurance agency that was only employee benefits. And I was there about five years and then I went to a PNC agency and developed additional career there.
Learn more about the pnc. But I missed, I missed just some of the employee benefits that I had been involved with.
And fast forward.
The agency that, that I came from, with that had a lot of, a lot of my foundation, they got purchased by Dean and Draper.
They were acquired.
And so I always knew that I had more of a passion for the employee benefits than the pnc, which is a wonder. Both are wonderful world. But I just missed the pn, the. I'm sorry, the, the employee benefits a lot. I want it to be my purpose to be, you know, servicing clients, helping them find solutions, exploring different, different avenues that they could take to help their, you know, their employees and their overall healthcare spend. So that's kind of been my journey, you know, almost again, almost 30 years later.
[00:02:54] Speaker A: Wow. It's a really great story. That's awesome. You know, health care is complicated.
Health care inflation is a real thing. Health care costs continue to go up, services kind of continue to go down. Experience for the members continue to be really problematic, hard.
What is it at Dean and Draper that you're doing that's unique or distinctive to help reduce cost, produce a better outcome? And create a better experience for the.
[00:03:21] Speaker B: Member, being more of an advocate for, for our members, our employers, digging more into data, finding out, you know, what, what specifically is causing some of the, the, the higher increases in particular, you know, pharmacy prescription cost providers, you know, access to providers. And so I think just digging more into the data and having more insight, having, you know, having, having more insight to be able to have those conversations with that employer of what, what is causing those, those higher numbers to show up on, on their reports and then what's, what are solutions?
[00:04:07] Speaker A: And when you say digging in the data, have you not had access to the data in the past?
[00:04:14] Speaker B: Not necessarily.
[00:04:16] Speaker A: And how so.
[00:04:18] Speaker B: You'Re contained, you're limited either by group size or some of the carriers, your hands are tied. You're given just very high level information.
So you may not know what's going on within the group. So you may be presented with a high cost or high renewal. Yet there's not a lot of validation or data to explain to that client.
[00:04:47] Speaker A: So why Crumbdale? Why are you working with Crumbdale? How did that come about?
[00:04:57] Speaker B: It came about through one, an organization that we're part of, Assured Global Partners.
And so just connecting with some of our partners, hearing the name Crumbdale just, it was the introduction to hearing something different.
Why Crumbdale?
I think you're trying to do the same thing that we are. We're, you know, shaking things up and looking at things that normally an employer may have not considered in the past because it was a, you know, you could be comfort comfortable with a certain product or service and sometimes you have to feel pain in order to be open to change.
[00:05:41] Speaker A: That's wonderful.
You know, for a young person that would want to aspire to get into the account, account management roles are really, really, really difficult role to be in. It's challenging.
You know, what would you say to a young person that was trying to get into that, that role to just.
[00:06:03] Speaker B: You know, I think just be steady, maintain why you want to do this, What's your goal, what drives you?
Account management is very difficult because you are presented with all of the pain that the employees are feeling. Hr, the entire group as a whole. And so I think for the account management team, I think to just show, you know, just show empathy, you know, show that you care for that client and those employees.
[00:06:43] Speaker A: And yeah, when you're in camp management you get pulled in a lot of different directions. You have your producers, you know, you have your clients, you have the members.
You know, I don't know what it's like a Dean and Draper, but customers for self insured health plans are inundated with like innovation and disruption. Now you know when you think about technology and you think about artificial intelligence and you think about all the point solutions that are nicking away at a self insured customer, whether it's case management or pre cert or disease management or narrow networks or reference based pricing or MSK or all the things that are merging in the space. Telemedicine.
H. How do you manage all that?
How do you handle all that?
[00:07:36] Speaker B: Probably just doing a better job at vetting, vetting the vendors.
Also, you know, not every shiny point solution you don't have to have, you know, just more the volume of the point solutions but finding, finding the right one that works, you know the, the ones that do work because you, you need several. Right. Because one is not a fit for all. But, but partnering, finding the right ones that do work, sticking to, to those vendors and you utilizing them and looking at what other, you know, what other other groups that you have on board, what they're doing and seeing what they, what that employer did or enhancing what we already have. So, so I think just narrowing it down to the ones that you want that will be preferred for your agency or for your client.
[00:08:31] Speaker A: That's great. Well Angie, it's a pleasure spending time with you today. Dean and Draper is a phenomenal firm. You guys have a super bright future in front of you and I appreciate you sharing time with us.
[00:08:42] Speaker B: Thank you. I appreciate you having me.
[00:08:44] Speaker A: Yeah, this is Matthew Naylor. You've been listening to Aligned for Impact.
Sam.
