Can you spare 10 minutes?

Recently I was in San Francisco meeting with insurance underwriters gathering at the Professional Liability Underwriting Society meeting. While in the lobby of the San Francisco Hilton, it struck me as an excellent condition that summarizes the changing business environment.

Approximately 1500 registered attendees were present to discuss changes and challenges to the professional liability insurance market. Attendees were from around the globe but most notably east coast of the US and London.

Sitting in the lobby as an unregistered attendee to this event, waiting for my first 10 minute meeting, it struck about the time, effort and expense of such an event. Future to that revelation, I began to question the future of such events.

Business and more specifically the insurance business is at a cross road point where technology is headed toward more than a sophisticated calculator/typewriter that can play games toward an exponential explosion of “community” doing business.

The pressure to do more with fewer people has never been greater! The computer allows us to access information and markets never before available to the ship-owner on Main Street USA.

By networking with others, the grasp and reach is only as limited as is our imagination. Meetings with cameras and services like “WebEx” and “Goto Meetings” offer opportunities to capture quick and very effective information exchanges.

While the technology gives us the ability, are we using it effectively? I am in the middle of about four dozen mini meetings of from 2 to 6 people. The conversation is the reason but these mini meetings are the essence of business being conducted.

When I entered the insurance business forty years ago, Underwriters at Lloyds London created markets for professional liability entirely from “mini-meetings” between a real person and a Lloyd’s broker. The risk bearer literally signed their name and personal assets to the line slip describing the risk exposure to be insured. By writing their name blow the line slip, the became underwriters of the risk.

10 minute “mini-meetings” initially committed hundreds, then thousands, then millions, now billions to various risks. Just from a mini-meeting.

Where are mini-meetings headed? The on-line world of mini-meetings is found on the internet and creates the opportunities to meet and communicate faster and clearer.

Good luck on your next mini-meeting. May it be on the net with your next best customer!