KIA&B 2019 November/December 2019 | Page 5

| EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR’S PAGE | agency demographics and more independent agencies established within the past five years, market access is vital to attracting new members. In August, Nationwide joined the market access program and many of our members have found success using them. ePayPolicy, which allows members to collect premiums without absorbing credit processing fees. This product can enhance the customer experience and bring some operational efficiency to members. LEGISLATIVE DAY In May, the board approved partnering with IntellAgent to provide members with a cost-effective resource for agency valuation services. Members can review a full agency valuation report for $3,000. The members that have taken advantage of this service have been very complimentary. As this edition goes to print, we are continuing to work with IntellAgent on a data analytics project that will offer the ability to more deeply understand your agency and benchmark your agency against other agencies in Kansas. Be sure to complete the Salary Survey that was sent to members in early November as our success with this program starts with our ability to gather compensation data. Our influence at the Statehouse comes from the ability of our members to connect with legislators on a grassroots basis. Because it is important do have our members present for Legislative Day, we didn’t want to prevent members from joining us due to the registration fee. We made the decision to discontinue charging the fee and focused on providing additional value-added content as well as coordinating member meetings with legislators. We saw an immediate response to the decision and had a very successful day. BIG “I” HIRES Finding, training, and retaining talent has been a universal challenge for our members. During this fiscal year, we were thrilled to be able to offer the Big “I” Hires recruiting platform with Idealtraits. Big “I” Hires has been a game- changer for our members’ ability to recruit agency staff. INTELLAGENT FY2019 was a busy year of evolution for KAIA and one of investing in our ability to serve members. Over the next year, we will continue to understand the challenges of our members and strive to provide solutions. Please don’t hesitate to reach out if we can help. EPAYPOLICY This year, we also rolled out a new relationship with 5