Issues & Answers Special Advertising Section:
September 2021

Issues & Answers: Mutually Successful Partnerships

David Nelson, Senior Vice President, Contract Underwriting for Nationwide E&S/Specialty, said establishing deep relationships with agency partners are the cornerstone of the industry. “The connections and relationships built at the underwriting level are the backbone of Nationwide E&S,” he said. Following are excerpts of an interview.

David Nelson
Senior Vice President, Contract Underwriting
Nationwide E&S/Specialty

“Our strong relationships with partners are a key differentiator in the marketplace. Ultimately, this is a people business, and those relationships drive our mutual success.”

What does mutual success look like for a carrier focused on E&S and specialty markets?

More than anything, mutual success is based on trust in the partnership. It’s important for us to have the open communication and partnership in the relationship where feedback can be shared directly and we can learn from one another. With our distribution partners, there needs to be an ability to identify future market trends and unmet needs so we both can be prepared for what’s coming. Our joint capabilities and capacity as carriers and agents are critical to remain viable to each other and to our insured. Ultimately, this yields success.

With increased M&A activity in distribution, how does mutual success play out?

M&A is an active component in our industry and will likely continue to be going forward. We need to make sure we’re providing dynamic engagement with all sizes and scopes of agents to remain viable to a distribution channel with widening gaps of their operational models. One of the ways this plays out is through technology and our ability to transact business in a systematic manner, enabling ease, speed, and efficiency. Once an M&A is announced, as a partner we believe our ability to seamlessly participate in integrations is a value add.

What is the importance of focusing on underwriting profitability, and how can a carrier help distribution partners be mutually successful while managing profitability?

First and foremost, we have to remain vigilant in underwriting, matching price to risk appropriately. We need to continue to leverage all that data and analytics has to offer, using predictive tools to help our partners and underwriters continue to drive profitable retention. Further, we need to drive price adequacy by utilizing insights from advanced analytics, by actuarial work on loss cost modeling, and by sophisticated risk selection and modeling techniques. At the end of the day, if underwriting profitability doesn’t exist, we likely don’t have a mutually successful partnership.

How would you define Nationwide E&S/Specialty’s approach to top-notch service for partners? How are you working to add value for partners to achieve mutual success?

We define the optimal customer experience when an agency partner feels that their success and satisfaction is the No. 1 priority when interacting with us. This entails many aspects of the interactions, including proactive partnership management, customer engagement, the will and desire to creatively find solutions for the agency’s account issues, and the focus on collaborative, constructive, and frictionless interactions. We are heavily investing in analytical tools and resources while we’re leveraging 38 years of E&S-specific data to gain insights and to differentiate our engagement with our partners. Additionally, we’re investing in specialized talent and expertise throughout the value chain. Most importantly, we continue to invest in priorities that create value for our distribution partners and drive mutual success.