Insurance agencies and brokerages
Insurance agencies: two systems of record, one renewal calendar.
The book is spread across an agency system, carrier portals, and email. We take the CIO role: Microsoft 365, spend, and a renewal calendar someone actually monitors. Client-data rules are part of that role. We do not run the agency help desk.
Typical setup for this industry. Not a client count.
The setup
What we usually find in insurance agencies and brokerages.
Agencies are relationship businesses running on shared logins and institutional memory. The management system holds the book, the carriers hold the policy detail, and the renewal calendar lives with whoever remembered to write it down.
The AI exposure follows the same pattern. A producer puts a claim summary into an unapproved AI tool to make the email sound better. A shared carrier login sits in a document everyone can open.
What leadership gets
Three reports worth having first.
- ✓Renewals due and at-risk accounts by carrier, producer, and expiration month
- ✓Retention and lapse by carrier, line, and producer
- ✓Commission against production, with the gaps that need a conversation
Report names are typical for the industry. Yours come from the systems the applications assessment finds. The base dashboard also shows what your technology costs, so license and vendor spend sits beside the operating numbers.
The method, in your terms
How the work usually runs.
- Licensing review across the agency, since licenses rarely match the roster
- Microsoft 365 account review: admin rights, sign-in protection, outside sharing, and approved apps
- AI Use Policy written for client and claim data, with an exception owner
- Applications assessment maps the management system, carrier portals, and accounting
- Base dashboard set up with renewal, retention, and commission reporting
- Monthly watch: license and usage reporting, sharing changes, and apps awaiting approval
The order is fixed. Where you start is a decision, and the first meeting is where it gets made.
Where this has run
A profile from this industry.
Two Microsoft accounts, one renewal, and Copilot waiting.
Regional insurance agency · ~70 staff
The renewal set the order. The licensing review ran before the migration, because unused licenses would otherwise have been carried straight across the move. Copilot waited until the file permissions had been read, not the other way round.
Start here
What this industry buys first.
- Microsoft 365 licensing review · Advisory review
- Microsoft 365 tenant review · Advisory review
- Copilot readiness · Delivery · scoped from the review
- Microsoft 365 migration · Delivery · project
- AI Use Policy · Advisory review
- Base dashboard deployment · Deployment
- Microsoft 365 monthly watch · Monthly watch
Where we work
Insurance agencies and brokerages firms across the Carolinas.
Questions
Questions from insurance agencies and brokerages
We already pay for Microsoft 365. Where do we start?
If you already pay for Microsoft 365, start with the licensing review and then the account review, in that order. License counts rarely match the roster. Shared passwords and stale sharing links are the risks that matter long before anyone buys Copilot, and both reviews are written for the agency owner, not the IT vendor.
Is Copilot safe on our client data?
Copilot is as safe on client data as the file permissions underneath it. It reads whatever the signed-in person can already open. So the readiness work is closing files that are open too widely first, then piloting with a small group and measuring use against cost before buying licenses for everyone.
Can you report renewals and retention?
Yes, the dashboard can report renewals and retention. Most agencies start with three views. Renewals due and at-risk accounts. Retention and lapse by carrier and by producer. Commission against production. All three read from the agency management system you already run, so nothing has to be re-keyed.
Start here
The first step is the same in every industry.
Advisory first: a written assessment of your environment, the AI Use Policy, and a recommendation you own whether or not you continue with us.