The GRIT Factor by Insurance Group of America
🎙️ The GRIT Factor Podcast – Where high performers, bold leaders, and ambitious professionals come to learn what it takes to succeed.
Hosted by Drew Powell, this podcast dives deep into the core values that define true leadership and career excellence: Guts, Resilience, Integrity, and Tenacity. These are the values that drive high achievers and form the foundation of the culture at the Insurance Group of America (IGA).
Each episode features real conversations with industry leaders, top performers, and IGA team members who have embraced the G.R.I.T. mindset to overcome obstacles, take risks, and build lasting success. Whether you’re looking for leadership insights, career advice, or an inside look at what makes IGA a powerhouse of talent and culture, this is the podcast for you.
🚀 New episodes drop bi-weekly on Wednesdays.
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The GRIT Factor by Insurance Group of America
Courageous Careers: Alison Lyons on Risk-Taking and Growth
Courage isn't just a buzzword at Insurance Group of America—it's the foundation of exceptional careers. Our conversation with Alison Lyons reveals what happens when leadership sees potential and throws you into the deep end.
Alison's journey from MTSU student to insurance professional began with a single classroom question that caught Jamie's attention. After joining as an intern in 2017, she faced a career-defining moment when she was suddenly tasked with managing a million-dollar book of business comprising 70-100 clients. With minimal experience but maximum determination, she embraced late nights, countless questions, and the humility to tell clients, "I don't have an answer right now, but I will get back to you"—and always did.
What makes Alison's story particularly compelling is her perspective on risk-taking. "I took a risk on IGA as much as they took a risk on me," she explains, describing her decision to join a three-year-old company over a more established firm. The fast-paced environment and opportunity for accelerated growth proved irresistible. Even when she briefly left IGA to gain perspective elsewhere, she ultimately returned, drawn back by the energy and growth mindset that permeates the organization.
Perhaps the most valuable takeaway from our conversation is Alison's approach to failure: "The great thing about insurance is you're not doing brain surgery... nobody's going to die." This refreshing perspective, coupled with IGA's culture of "falling on the sword" when mistakes happen, creates an environment where courage flourishes. For professionals seeking faster-than-average career growth in insurance, her advice is clear—embrace challenges, ask endless questions, and remember that failing forward is part of the journey.
Ready to join a team where pushing boundaries isn't just permitted but expected? Listen to Alison's full story and discover if you have what we call the Grit Factor.
Welcome to the Grit Factor podcast. I'm Drew Powell, and here we explore what it takes to succeed through the lens of guts. Resilience, integrity and tenacity these are the values that drive high-performing leaders and shape the culture at the Insurance Group of America. That drive high-performing leaders and shape the culture at the Insurance Group of America. Each episode, we'll sit down with industry trailblazers, iga team members and inspiring professionals who have embraced grit to overcome challenges, seize opportunities and create meaningful impact. Whether you're considering joining IGA or simply looking for the tools to take your career to the next level, you're in the right place. So buckle up. It's time to discover the grit factor. Super excited to have Alison Lyons on the podcast today the second Alison of IGA, or the first Alison. You were here before her.
Speaker 2:Yes, just slightly so. Just a couple of months I came back, yes.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's right. Oh, that's right. You were the one that you left and came back. We should talk about that. Yes, and sister to Jessie.
Speaker 2:Yes, she's the mean one though.
Speaker 1:You're the kinder, nicer Jessie's. Yeah, we've. We've already talked to her, interviewed her and she was brutal. She was so mean it was. No, I'm glad you're doing this. We joked earlier that you were kind of voluntold to be on the podcast. I didn't know I was doing it. Well, here you are. We're going to talk about courageous careers. We're going to talk about just your journey and story and what you do at IGA and all that good stuff. You know the Grit Factor podcast. Grit is part of our, it's our mantra here, and so courage and taking risks and that kind of stuff is a big part of of your success and big part of what makes people successful here at IGA. So catch us up, tell us your story. Where did you grow up, how did you meet Jamie and get to IGA and all that fun stuff.
Speaker 2:Yes, so November of 2017 is when I started here at IGA um as an intern, actually.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Um, I met Jamie through at MTSU, through a professor. I was sitting in a sales class. I don't want to be a salesperson, that's not why I was taking the class, it was just for fun and I had asked a question that related to an internship that I'd had previously over the summer, related to insurance. And he reached out to the professor and got a hold of me through her, lucy Matthews, who we've partnered with before through MTSU, and it went from there. So I knew one person who worked here, who was also in some of my insurance classes and things, and then I went full time in May of 2017. May of 2017. Or 2018, rather.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So that was lots of fun.
Speaker 1:You've been here a minute.
Speaker 2:I had, and it was just part time because I was doing school and interning um both at the same time.
Speaker 1:Um may, when I went to go full-time.
Speaker 2:I thought I was starting at this level here below Um, and then Andrew goes psych. I'm going into sales and somebody had to take over his entire book of business.
Speaker 1:Um how much would that have been at that time.
Speaker 2:Um, in revenue it was about a million or so, give or take a little bit 70 to a hundred clients, um, and I had just interned at this point, so, um, I knew a tiny bit about insurance but needed to learn a whole lot more.
Speaker 1:So it was just like you're in, go for it. Well, they must've seen something new that were like she can handle it. But talk about that. I mean that takes that takes a lot of courage to step into something like that. Coming from an intern, you know that had to be a, you know, a daunting responsibility.
Speaker 2:Yes, there were lots of late nights and lots of frustrations on my end, like trying to learn, but also lots of questions and lots of not being afraid to fail and to know that I'm not always going to have the answer, and let my clients know that as well. I would straight up tell people I don't have an answer for you right now, but I will get back to you and I would, within a couple of hours, depending on how long it took me to find the thing that they needed, or if Andrew or Deidre at the time were in the office, ask them thousands of questions a day.
Speaker 1:Which that's been a theme on the podcast is is just the freedom to ask, the freedom to ask questions, the freedom to fail forward, to not to be okay saying I don't know how to do this at the moment, but help me figure this out. Has that been your experience?
Speaker 2:Yes, 100%. So I've had some great mentors along the way Greg Gorin, who's still part mentor here at IGA, and then Andrew, who's our COO now, and then Deidre. She moved back up north so she does not work here any longer, but between those three I had every question that I could possibly come up with answered.
Speaker 1:I bet. How does that shape that early experience? How does that shape just how you navigate some of the complex responsibilities you have now, because I'm sure you're on the other side of it now, right?
Speaker 2:Yes, it's helped in talking with, as we've gotten new people. That's what I try and encourage them to do is ask the same amount of questions that I ask them Like there's no question. That's dumb. There's no question that probably I haven't. I've probably asked the same question at some point because you don't know what you don't know.
Speaker 1:That's good. That's good advice. What risk have you taken in your career, both, maybe personally or professionally, whatever you're willing to share. But how is this idea of risk taking and courage showed up in?
Speaker 2:So being younger and in insurance it is often you think of age and you think of wisdom and those two go hand in hand. But I'm a very quick learner and a very quick like I know my things and it's hard sometimes to overcome that age. Persona of you look very young, so you must not know what you're talking about, but I did. Persona of you look very young, so you must not know what you're talking about, but I did. And so one thing here was taking on a rather large client, who they're still a client to this day and a great client. But just overcoming that, hey, I may be young and you may think I'm inexperienced due to age, but I do know what I'm talking about or I do know how to find the answers for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. Well, and I love that the leadership here are not afraid to trust people who have shown like and again, it's not blind trust. You obviously worked hard and showed competence and all those different things, but they're able to say, no, we believe in you, we believe in even in your youth, we believe that you have what it takes. We're going to give you some big responsibility here. We're going to coach you and help you along the way, but we're going to entrust you for that and that was your experience, right? Yes, I love that. What about some specific examples of time where you you took like a calculated risk to that paid off for you? I mean, that's obviously a big one, especially since they're still a client. Was there any other ones you you can think of?
Speaker 2:Um, I mean, just jumping in headfirst at the very beginning of of my entire journey was the biggest risk, and then coming into IGA in general. So IGA was about three years old whenever I came to IGA, so still a pretty young company, honestly.
Speaker 2:Yes, and so I took a risk on IGA as much as they took a risk on me. I didn't know what that was going to look like. It was a very somewhat calculated move on my part because I knew if this thing succeeded and it has, it's been tremendous, it's had a great growth path and all of that then it was going to be a great long-term opportunity. And versus going the other path, where I had another opportunity that I could have taken, where I would have been in the brokerage wholesale space, which is a little different than what we do here, but it would have been a more steady, stable, not very fast paced upward trajectory, like I've had here.
Speaker 1:Well, if you don't mind me asking, what was it about when you were making that decision? What was it about IGA that said, hey, I'm going to go with this young company that you know I don't know how it's going to pan out, you know, cause I've heard this story a couple of times now, where someone had two opportunities in front of them. One was the stable path. One was this we're going to follow this, this crazy Jamie guy done whatever road he's going, and but there's something about it that just made you say, yeah, I'll take that risk. What was it for you?
Speaker 2:I loved the. I loved that it was young. I love that everything. Once I started as an intern, I could see like it wasn't just mouth, like it wasn't just oh yeah, we do this, we do this. No, it was Jamie will invest and Jamie will do these things to make this better versus the internship I'd had prior to that. It was very antiquated systems and very it was very slow to make changes and you could tell that I mean they'd been around for quite a long time compared to here, and maybe one day we'll get to a point where things kind of slow down. But I don't anticipate that. It was just knowing that everything was going to move quickly. I'm a fast paced person. My background came from serving and waiting tables and the fast food industry, so you love the energy of it.
Speaker 1:Yes, that was really attractive to you. So it was like, hey, we're going to move fast, we're young, we're nimble, we're not locked into our old way of doing like we've been here for 50 years, so we're not. Yeah, yeah, we're not locked into our old way of doing like we've been here for 50 years, so we're not. Yeah, so that was I mean. Would you encourage someone that like, because a lot of people that are listening or watching this are are considering coming to IGA. Is that something that's still important in someone's like wiring and DNA, that they have some of that risk taking?
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So we had talked earlier that I had actually left IGA briefly and came back, and part of why I came back is because of the risk-taking and wanting to be in a more fast-paced environment. The other agency that I worked for for almost a year. I went there for the opportunity to work with their larger clients. They had faith in me to do that and I was very thankful. They were a great organization, but they have been around for a very long time and they they have the way that they do things. They're not construction focused and and ultimately I came back to iga because of the fast-paced energy that contractors bring to the table yeah, and I I love that.
Speaker 1:It speaks volumes of the culture here. It speaks volumes of you and your leadership, and jamie as well, and the team, that it ended well and it the fact that you but like that's uncommon, that someone comes back to an organization and it's like, yeah, you're, you're always welcome here, you come back when you know. So I think that's pretty unique, don't you like that, that that happens. You don't hear that story very often yes, and it was.
Speaker 2:It was funny enough because originally I wasn't considering coming back when all this went down and there were some personal changes going on and I'm like let's just reach out, because there was nothing bad about IGA, I just needed a change because you don't know what you don't know. I started here as an intern straight out of college, and so I needed to see the other side of the coin there.
Speaker 1:What was that call like? Were you afraid to make the call or did you kind of have an idea like, hey, no, I know they're safe?
Speaker 2:So Jesse still was here and I could gauge it based off of that, and what?
Speaker 1:was going on. Did you let Jesse do a little recon work for you? Yes, yes, I love that, that's great. Well, talk about a little bit like In your risk-taking now. You talked about taking a risk just joining here and coming into a young company, and we still are a young company, really, in a lot of respects. How do you assess risk-taking now? What does that look like, now that you've been here for a while and it's grown in the company? How do you assess that? How do you know when it's a good risk, a healthy risk? Do you have a process or a filter for that?
Speaker 2:No, so I don't. But the great thing about insurance is you're not doing brain surgery and you're not doing heart surgery and at the end of the day nobody's going to die. And so I guess that's kind of my mantra every day of if I fail, it will be fine and we'll fix it, and nobody's hurt and it's a problem that can be resolved.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. Well, this might feel like a little bit of a right turn, but I think it plays into this really perfectly because there's such a humility among the staff here. I sense it from you and from the leadership, and everyone else is like yeah, we take risks, but sometimes we fail, but we're open-handed and we move fast and we make mistakes, but then it just takes a certain humility. Could you just maybe unpack? I know humility is a hard thing to talk about, especially if you're humble, but what role has that played in your career when it comes to just being open-handed with risk-taking and being courageous?
Speaker 2:So being able to talk to your client and let them fall on the sword like that's the phrase Jamie uses a lot Just being able to say, hey look, I messed up, here's what's happened, and being able to face that directly with the client, I think is what sets a lot of people here apart, compared to other agencies especially. They just try to sweep it under the rug sometimes. Just try to sweep it under the rug sometimes, and that's not falling on the sword and taking that blame and explaining to them either why you did it or how you fixed it or how you're going to fix it Just is an important piece here.
Speaker 1:Yeah that's awesome. Talk a little bit more because you started down it. But I want to hear a little bit more for those watching or listening that might be looking to come on board at IGA in the future, exploring new careers here. Talk a little bit about how IGA fosters this environment where employees are actually almost empowered to take risks. How have you experienced that as an employee here?
Speaker 2:So in the very I don't know if I should talk about this part, but I will so in the very early days of IGA, yes, risk-taking was encouraged and it absolutely was fostered. But Jamie was a lot more wired maybe is the word for it and a little more quick to reprimand. You just have to have thick skin though. And so Jamie's calmed down a lot. I think his children have done a lot for that, and so he girls.
Speaker 1:Yeah, carly is a saint too yeah, so um well and I will say, can I just interrupt real fast, because I know jamie so well. One thing that I love about him that actually trickles down through the culture is he is always growing and learning and wanting to get better, and so I think if jamie was sitting he would say absolutely. And he would say I hope in five years from now there's a better version of me than what you're experiencing now. That's a part of the culture here.
Speaker 1:Wouldn't you say yes, so I don't think he would feel any kind of shame around that at all.
Speaker 2:Yes, no, just growing and stuff that's part of being here and he knows that and he knows and understands and I know that it was just a hard learning lesson sometimes at the beginning.
Speaker 2:Right right, he's not reprimanding you or talking to you to discourage you. It's hey, this is a learning lesson, we've got to get better. And so sometimes I just have a tender heart and I would take it a little more personally than I probably should have. Better, and so sometimes I just have a tender heart and I would take it a little more personally than I probably should have. Um, but he's, he has calmed down in the way that he presents those. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And his the heart here, just with Jamie and everyone else, because even as as a friend, I mean Jamie's been very direct with me through the years but the heart was always, like you said, out of love and to help me and to grow. And there's things that he said to me through the years that have really stuck with me, because most people are too afraid of people pleasing or whatever it might be, to just shoot straight with you. And so yeah, to your point for someone looking to be here, this is a culture of courage and you're allowed to fail. But it's also honesty, like, don't come here thinking you're going to get coddled. You know you're going to grow here. You know because the leader of the organization is growing, so his expectation is we're all going to grow. I mean, have you found that to be true in your experience? Yeah, absolutely. So what advice would you give someone considering coming to IGA about embracing courage in their work?
Speaker 2:Yep. So coming to IGA, you have to keep in mind that it's not about just the resources and things that they're going to provide to you. It's about what you do with those things. So pushing the boundaries and taking the initiative are very important factors. Coming here, it's not for someone who doesn't want to better themselves. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's really good. How do you encourage others to step out of their comfort zones and really to pursue ambitious goals? Because the thing I've learned in your story, even from the beginning, I mean when you look back it's kind of crazy, like coming out of college internship not knowing much about it, being thrown into the deep end of the pool pretty early. But this has shaped who you've become as a person. Right, even the courage to go try something else, the courage to come back, I mean all those are big, courageous decisions. What are some examples or some encouragements you would have for people?
Speaker 2:As I'm working with new people and new people are coming on, especially our very, very new to insurance people I always, always encourage them to ask questions that no question has ever done I have probably asked the same question and to try things on your own. It's okay. If you're going to fail, fail hard, it'll be fine. Just get back up. Dust off your, your pants and and you've got this. Yeah, it's just insurance and no one's going to die.
Speaker 1:I love that. That's great perspective, all right. Last and final question Again, just speak to people who are listening or watching about the opportunities for growth here in Courage, because what I love about your story is internship to where you are now, and I think what we want people to know is that when you work hard, when you demonstrate the grit factor, when you have courage, there can be a path for you here. What would you say to those people that are looking in?
Speaker 2:We have some big dreams for the next 10 years. So the first 10 years we reached 10 million and we want to 10x that. So that means we're going to have fast-paced growth. For people fresh in the insurance space, there will be plenty of opportunities for those that want to go faster than your normal trajectory within the insurance industry. Yeah.
Speaker 1:This is a spot for that. Yes, allison, thank you so much. Great job. Thanks for doing this. It wasn't so bad. No, it was great. You might even come back and do it again, won't you?
Speaker 2:No no.
Speaker 1:Well, thanks for your leadership here in the culture that you help curate. It makes a difference, so we're really grateful.
Speaker 2:Yes, perfect, thank you.