Broking Review

Zoombombing and the art of the pivot

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Abi Greenhalgh,

director, Nest Financial Services

These last few weeks on lockdown, to me, feel like they have lasted an eternity – but I have to be honest, I am not really complaining.

There are huge benefits to be gained from not waking at silly o’clock to get the kids up for school, as well as having the privilege as a family to sit and eat an evening meal together.

There is already part of me that knows I will miss the simplicity of lockdown life.

What I didn’t know I would learn as part of a global pandemic is a brand new language.

Who would have thought at the beginning of March we would have even known what a ‘Covidiot’ was (someone who deliberately breaks lockdown rules) or that to ‘preremember’ is to refer to life before lockdown, or for me, that I would even consider myself the queen of the pivot!

Of course, I knew the word pivot. I even know that it’s a well-used term referring to those businesses that deliberately and specifically choose to change direction as a direct result of an external factor influencing their market – well, my goodness, if COVID-19 isn’t the largest external influencer on our market right now, I’m not sure what is.

My choice to pivot is not a bad thing, it’s a deliberate change of direction within my business which will ensure it continues to grow well beyond the end of this pandemic.

That change is, quite simply, a firmer commitment to protection.

Now, to be fair, protection is already well-embedded into my business and process – but as with any good business owner, I also recognise there are always areas to improve.

This is why, if you haven’t already, you need to learn the art of the ‘pivot’: 1) Consider how you think about yourself. Are you a mortgage and protection adviser, or a protection and mortgage adviser?

It’s amazing how this subtle change in language, when you repeat it to yourself hundreds of times a day, affects the opportunities you see which may otherwise have passed you by. 2) Time; we all want more, and now the world has delivered it, so use it wisely. Take that much desired opportunity to work on your business rather than in it – turn your business upside down and think about things

differently, set yourself short and longterm goals, create a vision board and dream big. 3) Work out your need-to-earn (NTE) and want-to-earn (WTE) figures, then apply this across your protection opportunities.

This becomes your new target – one a day or one a week extra, whatever is achievable to you. Either way it will be more than you are doing now. 4) Don’t assume anything. You have a client bank of un-tapped potential, you just need to make contact and ask if you can help. 5) Plan your exit – don’t be that broker who wakes up and realises the world has already gone back to normal. You need to be thinking about that post-lockdown re-entry to business fabulousness now.

And when you’ve done all that? You can feel free to dust off your best ‘upperwear’ and treat yourself to a ‘quarantini’or two whilst laughing about how the kids ‘zoombombed’ your client meeting. M I