How Strategy, Technology & Leadership Manage Risk - Michele Adams

In today’s episode, I chat with Michele Adams, Vice President of Walmart Claim Services in Bentonville, Arkansas. Before joining Walmart, Michele was the Vice President, Risk Management Services at Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida where she spent more than twenty years in the risk management organization. 

In 2017 Michele was inducted into the Florida Workers' Compensation Hall of Fame for her contributions to the betterment of the workers' compensation industry in Florida. And in 2019, she received the Summa Comp Laude award from Work Comp Central, recognized for the positive impact she has made to the national workers’ compensation community.

And that was the inspiration as we kicked off a wide-ranging discussion that covered transformational leadership, predictive analytics, and the importance of diverse teams. 

• The term 'business transformation' is frequently used in today's corporate world. In your perspective, what does it truly mean and how have you implemented it in your roles?
• Predictive analytics is playing an increasingly significant role across various sectors. In your work, how do you utilize predictive analytics, and how integral is it to your strategies?
• What have your past experiences taught you about leadership, and specifically, building diverse teams?

We addressed these and many other questions over what was a far-reaching and fascinating conversation and one which I hope you enjoy as much as I did recording it.

Michele Adams

Michele Adams joined Walmart, Inc. in 2020 where she is the Vice President of Walmart Claims Services in Bentonville, Arkansas. 

She has experience leading dynamic and diverse teams managing all aspects of risk and casualty claims and Michele is a national speaker on a wide range of topics involving risk management and workers’ compensation. 

Michele serves on the Board of Directors of the Workers’ Compensation Research Institute; is the past-Chair and Executive Committee Member of the Medicare Advocacy and Recovery Coalition; serves on the Boards of the Florida and Arkansas Self Insured Guaranty Associations; and is a past member of the Executive Committee of the National Council of Self-Insureds. 

Michele is a native Floridian and when she is not working, is an avid reader and enjoys writing, watching college football, biking, traveling, and spending time with her family.

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Matt Burns

Matt Burns is an award-winning executive, social entrepreneur and speaker. He believes in the power of community, simplicity & technology.

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Transcript

Michele Adams: And to make good decisions, you need to have a team that reflects the population that you serve. So I can't have a team that's made up of Michelle's because I don't serve a public and employees that are just like me. So that diversity is what makes us strong. It it's what makes us make better decisions, be more thoughtful and more inclusive about the way that we approach what we do.

Matt Burns: Strength, strive, innovation. Hey, everyone, it's Matt, here for another episode of Thinking Inside The Box, a show where we discuss the innovative ways organizations and their leaders overcome complex issues at work. If you're interested in checking out our other content, you can find us at our shiny new website, insidetheboxpodcast.com and on all of your favorite podcast platforms by searching Thinking Inside The Box. And if you enjoy the work we're doing here, consider leaving us a five star rating, a comment and subscribing. It ensures you get updated whenever we release new content and really helps amplify our message. In today's episode, I chat with Michelle Adams, vice president of Walmart's Claims Services in Bentonville, Arkansas. Before joining Walmart, Michelle was the vice president of risk management services at the Walt Disney World resort in Orlando, Florida, where she spent more than 20 years in the risk management organization. In 2017, Michelle was inducted into the Florida Workers Compensation Hall of Fame for her contributions to the betterment of workers compensation and the broader industry in the state of Florida. And in 2019, she received the Summa Cum Laude Award for Work Comp Central, recognized for the positive impact she has made to the national Workers'Compensation community across the United States. And that was the inspiration as we kicked off a wide ranging conversation that covered transformational leadership, predictive analytics, and the.

Matt Burns: Importance of diverse teams.

Matt Burns: How does Michelle define business transformation and how has she implemented it in past leadership roles? What does she feel, uh, are the most compelling use cases for predictive analytics? And what have her past experiences taught her about leadership and specifically building diverse teams? We addressed these and many other questions. Over was, uh, a far reaching and fascinating conversation, and one in which I hope you enjoy as much as I did recording it. And now I bring you Michelle Adams. Michelle, how are you doing today?

Michele Adams: I'm doing great, Matt.

Matt Burns: I'm looking forward to this chat. It's going to be fun. Before we get into it, let's learn a bit about Michelle's background, your experiences and what's led you to today.

Michele Adams: Yeah, thanks so much for asking. Um, I've had a pretty interesting and diverse background. I work in the claims industry, I lead Walmart Claim Services, and we're a third party administrator, um, of casualty claims. If you had asked me probably 30 years ago would I end up where I am today, I would probably tell you no way. I thought I was going to be a microbiologist. Um, when I was just getting out of high school, but landed in a claims organization in my hometown, which is Lakeland, Florida, kind of by accident. I was having a conversation, um, with somebody I was working with, and they told me about an opportunity to work in an office. And that sounded really great as somebody who was working retail and going to a community college, if I could have a nine to five job. Um, sounded controlled. Yeah, sounded great, especially in Florida. Um, and through just a lot of opportunity and what I call good fortune of working for people who retired, I moved up in that industry, moved to a different third party administrator, ultimately ended up at Walt Disney World, where after 24 years there, I left and joined Walmart. While I was at Walt Disney World, I led their, uh, risk management and claims operation. So that's kind of the path. There are a lot of pivots, a lot of experiences, a lot of different stories. Um, but that's what brought me from Lakeland, Florida, to Bentonville, Arkansas, working for Walmart.

Matt Burns: Well, we're going to get into some of those twists and turns along the way, but for those who may not be familiar with the claims industry broadly, and you've mentioned a couple of large, iconic brands, walt Disney and, of course, now Walmart. What does a day in the life of your role look like? We talk about managing claims. What does that mean in the context of a global brand?

Michele Adams: Yeah, I think it's a great question. So casualty claims is really any type of, um, workers compensation, general liability, property and casualty claims that occur with a business. So all businesses have to carry insurance, um, that protects them, and it protects, um, the people that they interact with. And in most cases, there's an insurance company or what's called a third party administrator who actually manages those claims. So when something goes wrong, something goes as unexpected and not as intended, and you have to bring in a third party to manage that process. That's what we do. So, if you can imagine, um, all of the associates that work for Walmart, US, we have about, I think, 1.6 million, um, and then all the customers who visit, um, our stores, our clubs, um, everything across the US. Anything that happens, my team is responsible for managing that. And it's a big task, um, because it's not just a matter of making a decision to pay or deny a claim. Um, you're making decisions about coverage, whether something is actually covered by the policy. Is this something that we actually owe? Um, and if we do, we want to do it in a manner that's consistent with our culture. Um, we want to remember that this is our brand that we're protecting. And, um, we want to make sure that our customers and our associates are taken care of and go on to go about their day and their life and are impacted as little as possible by this event. And it can be a challenging, um, occupation because what I always say is people don't come to us because something went well. Typically, it's because something unexpected happened and we have to intervene and manage that. Um, so it's always very important to me that we keep brand, um, front of mind and culture front of mind, because we pride ourselves in how we treat people and treat one another. And we want that to come through in our claims handling. But it's a big task. I, um, have a large team here in Bettenville, and we have a couple of people who are located in different parts of the country as well. And we're managing those each and every day. So when somebody asks me what is a typical day for Michelle look like? No day is ever the same. Um, I think that's why I enjoy this occupation so much, because I'm never bored. One day I could be dealing, um, with something that has to do with property. Another day I could be dealing with data insights. Um, another day I could be having a conversation with our operations. Um, so there's such a wide span of opportunity to do something different each day that for people like me, who might become easily bored, it's the perfect job.

Matt Burns: Well, and it sounds like, as you mentioned, it's full of challenges. I can fully appreciate that. Finding the balance between, to your point, dealing with a claim that can be challenging at the best of times. I mean, to your point, people don't choose that for themselves, whether they're an employee or a customer, but then to manage that in a manner that's consistent with the company values. Um, and to look at the bigger picture, obviously, it's a difficult balance to strike when you're talking about lawyers and accountants and claims and insurance and public relations and media. All those things come into play. Um, so bravo to you and the team for trying to find that balance. It's not easy. You mentioned this already. The amount of problems you're working through are diverse. The team that you're working with is diverse. As you think about leading teams. Um, I'm just curious about what your past experiences have taught you about leading diverse teams. Whether that's diverse in terms of functional expertise or even just geographically speaking, how are you reconciling all these complexities, but also at the same time leading a diverse team?

Michele Adams: Yeah, I think that's such a great question. And that's probably one of the things that I value so much about my role and this industry as a whole. There are so many different, um, opportunities within risk management, claims operation, insurance industry. And the people that we serve are the public and our own associates, employees. When I was at Disney, we call them cast members, at Walmart we call them associates. But in general, your employees. And to make good decisions, you need to have a team that reflects the population that you serve. So I can't have a team that's made up of Michelle's because I don't serve a public and employees that are just like me. So that diversity is what makes us strong. It's what makes us make better decisions, be more thoughtful and more inclusive about the way that we approach what we do. So it's something that I've always been very passionate about is really making sure that the team that I work with reflects the customers that I also work with, um, because that point of view is so incredibly important. So we have that dimension of diversity among our teams. But in addition to that, this career path has given me the ability to work with different occupations. And what I have realized is people who go into, let's just say, like tech roles, there's a lot of technology and data insight that's involved in this. In, um, insurance, they approach work and they think about work a little differently than somebody who, um, say is in more of an outward facing, um, interacting, um, role where you're dealing with the public, you might be dealing with regulators, you might be dealing talking to attorneys and medical providers, um, all day long. So there's very, uh, heads down cerebral roles and there's very outgoing and, um, interacting and more of that kind of almost like social occupation, um, so we have those types of roles too. So it's not just what we think of in diversity as the makeup of my team, but it's also the makeup of the roles. And it's something I've tried to really think about when I have leaders that join my organization or that I've worked with, is how well do you work with the different teams and different players, um, outside of your organization? Maybe within different verticals, within, um, risk management and claims. And for me, that's probably one of the things that I enjoy most is I'll have a day full of meetings, but every person that I'm dealing with kind of approaches problems differently, thinks about it differently. And I always say I have the best seat in the house because I'm able to see those connections and the way that we approach those problems differently and help them kind of come together to drive better solutions. Um, because we can't just all be head down in our silo and only thinking about the way that I'm a claims person. And so I only approach them in this very thoughtful manner of yes, no, and um, coverage, not coverage. And I'm a data analyst and I'm looking at the broad data and trying to drive insights. I need that analyst to be able to talk to that claims adjudicator and come together to drive greater solutions and problem solving.

Matt Burns: One word that's thrown on a lot in the kind of vernacular of today's business world is transformation. You can't go more than 3 seconds or scroll through a couple of seconds on your LinkedIn feed without seeing the word transformation somewhere embedded in an article or a headline. And when you look at the definition of transformation, dramatic change is a term that you see a lot comes up. Now, we think about transformation generally in bigger contexts. We think about it in terms of restructurings or M A activity, or perhaps, um, a large, widespread corporate activity. Transformation also applies to claims, we're going through a dramatic change. The time horizon is different. Maybe the population affected is different in terms of its impact, but the change is no less fundamental to the individuals who are in the activity. At the same time, you've been in a number of roles where you've been asked to transform the function in service to meeting organizational expectations, client expectations, stakeholder expectations, et cetera. How do you approach, from a leader's perspective, transformation? So I'm just curious about your thoughts about how do you approach the idea of having to transform a group, transform a function, transform a team? How do you approach transformation broadly in your role?

Michele Adams: Yeah, it's an interesting process. I tend to become very academic. So the first thing that and I've done this a number of times, and I found that this actually works for me, is I take a very objective look at the organization as a whole. And I love white papers, so just really just white paper. What is the current state of this organization? Whether what are strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats? We all learn that in school. But there's a reason it's effective because it does reveal a lot about your organization. And um, trying to take a current state and three to five year horizon, knowing what we know, okay, let's look past the last five years. What are the big disruptors that have come into play? Um, what can we anticipate? We don't know what they're always going to be, but what do we think the disruptors are going to be in the next three to five years? Take a very academic approach to understanding what is the current state of the organization, fairly evaluating kind of the competencies within the organization, what are the gaps, um, what are the things that we're leaning into and that we're doing really well? What are the things that we don't have and how do we correct that? And then really mapping out a process to say, okay, if this is current state, what is it going to take us to get to where we need to be, to be able to approach and manage all of, um, these threats or opportunities? And threats are we have threats to kind of spur us in activities, and those can also create opportunities, um, to kind of meet where we want to go in the next three to five years. So I tend to be very academic. I want to understand at the desk level what the experience is like for the people who are running this organization, because we all know the closer you get to the business and the way that it's being done, the better you're going to learn about kind of what really drives the business. I don't want to sit in my office and only consume data and only see what's in front of me. I want to actually talk to the people who are doing the job and understand what the pinch points are. So that's kind of my approach.

Matt Burns: Hey, everyone, it's Matt here. I hope you're enjoying today's conversation. And before we continue, I want to update you on my latest creative project, this Week at Work. Every Friday at 07:00 a.m Pacific Standard Time. That's 10:00 a.m. Eastern and 03:00. P.m GMT. My good friend Chris Rainey of HR leaders and I discuss the latest trending topics on the minds of executives globally, from organizational culture to technology and the future of work. We cover it all, and we invite some of our favorite colleagues to join us, from Dave Ulrich to Whitney Johnson and executives from iconic brands such as NASA, Krispy Kreme and WebMD. What can I say? We like to keep things interesting. And if you've been following us for a while, you'll no doubt recognize the fun partnership chris and I have developed over years podcasting together. We're not afraid to be real, share our own challenges, and ask the tough questions. Joining? Well, that part's easy. Follow me on LinkedIn, click the bell icon on the top right of my profile, and you'll get notified when we go live. And now back to our discussion.

Michele Adams: And then I also like to test assumptions, meet with people outside of my organization. What is your perception of how well we are or are not performing? What is your experience in working with us? Um, and this is internal stakeholders within my organization and external stakeholders outside of my organization so that I can get a real honest, um, picture of kind of what is our current state. Business transformation to me is a very humbling experience because I think we all like to think that we're doing a great job and we're running really well. But when you kind of set that aside and you open yourself up to getting that real feedback, that's where the opportunity lies, and that's where you can start activating and creating that path toward change. And what is that ideal state for business transformation? So that's kind of my armchair business approach. And then there's a lot of work, though, that has to be activated after that. And I will tell you one of the things that was a challenge for me when I joined Walmart. I joined Walmart in March of 2020. So that was just as the, um, pandemic hit. And I've written articles about this throughout on LinkedIn. So I'm not going to go through the history of it, but I came from an organization where I knew how to do things I knew what the schedule was for AOP planning. I knew who to talk to that, hey, this is the thing that I'm trying to do. What's the timing of going to make an ask or activating any kind of work? And when you come from that real action oriented mindset, but you don't know then how to activate it. M, that's frustrating. So fortunately, I had um, a lot of really great people that I was able to lean on and help me kind of, okay, Michelle, here's what you want to do. Here's how you operationalize that here. Um, so it's not just knowing how to do a business transformation map and kind of creating this roadmap. It's also understanding within the organization that you're working with, how do you then operationalize it? Because if you miss your window, you're going to be waiting probably another year before you can have that happen. And I'm not a patient person.

Matt Burns: Yeah, I hear you. And change management is a critical feature of every transformational project you lead, whether it's big or small. Um, and at the same time, I wish I could say we were operating within a time period where things are relatively stable, but they're not. It's disruptive externally as well as internally. And when I think about the insurance industry in particular, I think about an industry that has obviously gone through a significant amount of innovation and disruption, whether it's advancements like generative AI or machine learning. I'm just curious as you think about the more the macroeconomic effects, the outside the four walls of the organization, how have those types of technological innovations influenced your work or maybe how you approach the work?

Michele Adams: Yeah, I think that anytime we can drive greater insights, um, that's always a good thing because there's a lot of data in this industry, but how much of it is actually useful? And actionable is always the question that I have. And then, okay, when you have that information, then what do you do with it? What opportunities does that unlock for you? Um, I'm probably on a daily basis, receiving emails from different companies that are pitching ideas on different ways that they, um, can help us reduce costs, um, drive greater efficiency and weeding through all of that and understanding, okay, what is the real value here and what can we actually operationalize? That's the challenge. There's no shortage of great ideas, but actually seeing them come to life and being able to apply them, that's I think the challenge just not just for Michelle, but I think it's within, um, this industry as a whole, particularly when, um, there's state to state. Um, the system features that we work within are very different and so the challenges are very different. So challenges that I might have, um, in Florida, I'm going to use that as an example because that's where I'm from. Versus the challenges that we might see, um, let's say presented in Ohio, may look different, or California. California is, uh, a great example as well. So knowing that we can't just peanut butter spread the data, we have to be very, um, thoughtful about how we look at things and know that jurisdictional impact might also have something that's at play here. So I think that if we could harness all of this data thoughtfully, because, again, we collect a lot of data and then understand how it can be applied to kind of drive behaviors and outcomes, that's really the real unlock. And it's something that I think for years, as an industry, we've been trying to do, and I think we've done a pretty good job of it. But now, to your point, regenerative AI, machine learning, um, these language models, all of this, we're thinking about it on an even higher scale. There was an article written, it was probably three or four months ago, um, that I saw about a company that had adjudicated a claim. And that's basically when you make a decision, pay or deny and write a check. And I believe it was in less than five minutes wow. From the time that the claim was entered, and I believe it was a property claim. So these pretty easy to adjudicate and auto adjudicate. Um, but from the time that it was presented until it was paid, it was in minutes. So there was no human real interaction here. It was basically probably hit against a policy algorithm and then spit out a decision. And that's the type of thing that I think is out there. It's happening. And I don't know that as an industry, we've really gotten our arms around to say, okay, what does that really mean for us? And how is that going to change the landscape of this industry?

Matt Burns: Well, I think to double click on that, I'd be curious, um, where you were at with the evolution of your team, because you mentioned the broader industry and the fact that we're still very much like all industries, to be fair. Education, healthcare, retail, hospitality, transportation. They're all going through dramatic transformation as a consequence of generative AI, among other technologies. How do you think about this in the context of your team? Because one thing that I remember about being at Walmart that I was really impressed by was the tenure of the organization there's. Lots of people have been in that company for 10, 15, 20 plus years. And now we're introducing a degree of, uh, technological disruption that is going to place some of those skill sets potentially at risk, or it's going to require some upskilling and reskilling of the team. I'm curious how you think about technological innovation in the context of your team skill sets and how you help bridge the gap between perhaps where they are today and the tools that they're going to need to use to be effective going forward.

Michele Adams: Yeah, well, we actually, just within the last few months, implemented, um, a new, um, what I would consider best in class technology solution, um, for our organization. We've been on, um, since I joined about a three year journey, um, to get to this point. We had some legacy systems that have been outdated and, um, have been updated and replaced. So, from an existing technology perspective, I'm really excited about that, because I think it's going to create a lot of unlocks. I think it's going to actually make our jobs easier. When you bring on new technology, you're in that storming norming phase, um, probably the first four to six months, and that's where we are right now. Um, but I know that once this levels out and we get more adept and accustomed to how we're using this, it's going to make our jobs easier. There's data that I had a team managing reports and dashboards and insights, and just this single technology solution has reduced the number of, uh, those daily reports and routine jobs that we were doing, um, significantly. So that's freed up those associates to be able to do what I consider just more heads down knowledge work versus maintenance work that was necessary. But we do actually have a learning and development team that sits within my organization. And that's what we're focused on all the time, is making sure that, um, the value of the tenure, um, that cannot be understated. That is so important, especially in this industry, where, um, it's really hard to kind of learn how to do this. It takes a lot of years to actually feel comfortable that I know every day when I get a new claim, or, um, I'm dealing with a new issue, that I'm comfortable in my decision making, and I know how to manage through it. So tenure is something that I value because I know that this is somebody who's a subject matter expert. They've done this, they've seen it, and they know how to properly assess it. So we want to reinforce their education and learning while at the same time, not lose sight of the benefit that we gain from the technology to make their job easier. To take routine things off of their desk, um, that we're doing that probably can be automated so that they can spend more of their time on the really heads down, thoughtful work. It's something that we are thinking about all the time is how can we decrease the number of clicks, decrease the number of just non value added things that we're doing each day so that I can really amplify the thing that I bring you here on my team to do, and that's use your thought, your knowledge, your experience to make really good decisions quickly, um, consistent with our culture, to really drive great outcomes.

Matt Burns: Yeah. And to build relationships both externally and internally, which is a critical part of the role that you're, uh, forming in the organization. You mentioned your three year journey. Um, obviously starting things off in 2020 of the Pandemic. I mean, that's a tough ask for anybody. Um, but of course, in the role that you're in, in particular presents a different level of challenge. Um, you've talked about a technology transformation, you've talked about the maturation of the practice in the organization. You touched on this briefly, too, is the idea of predictive analytics. And when I think about organizations or functions within organizations that would benefit most from predictive analytics, yours might be at the top of that list in terms of being able to look at information retroactively to propose what could happen in theory in the future, and to obviously mitigate against that risk. I'm curious about where you're at in your thinking and evolution around predictive analytics, um, and how you see it shaping the practice that you're, uh, currently leading today.

Michele Adams: Yeah, predictive analytics has been around in this claims industry and risk management industry for a while. I'd say for at least, um, gosh, at least ten years. It's been part of every conference you go to. There's always going to be a section on predictive analytics, and it's used in the insurance industry. And it makes sense, right, because, again, we have a lot of data. It's about things that you don't want to have happen again in the future. Most often, these are claims. Right? So we want to prevent them from happening. Where I feel like, um, there's opportunity is more on the leading indicators, because we're looking at the past to predict the future, but what we really want is kind of understanding the near misses, understanding kind of the things that are more of the leading indicators to get in front of things before they develop and become worse. Uh, that's where I think the real opportunity within, um, the insurance industry is. I always think about it like a cliff, right? You're walking along, and when does that fall over the cliff? When does it become so bad that now you're just trying to recover? I want to stop them from ever getting there. I want to know about things before they become really severe and significant. Um, so that's probably where I would want to spend more time. I think that as an industry, that's where we are definitely in that spot right now. And now trying to have this conversation about how do we add Generative, AI and NML to this problem that we've all been struggling with and trying to solve, um, in different ways for the last ten or 15 years. Well.

Matt Burns: And it's a parallel journey in the function that I'm most familiar with, which is human resources, where many of the same questions come into play is we're trying to obviously mitigate against things like regrettable, attrition or you're trying to address things like absenteeism proactively and be thoughtful about employee wellness. Um, and a number of other things. Business continuity through talent attrition things of that nature. Traditionally, the insurance profession has been. Known to lean towards risk aversion as opposed to risk tolerance. I'm, um, just curious, have you seen a change in the methodology of the insurance profession with the advent of technologies?

Michele Adams: Um, no. I think that it's really individual and based on the risk appetite of the organization that you're talking about. So I would probably not be the best at generalizing for everyone on whether or not we're more risk tolerant or risk averse. A lot of that is pushed by the market. Right? So the availability of insurance in the market, that might, um, dictate whether or not you want to retain more of your risk or insure more of your risk. So, um, that tide tends to go back and forth. And again, it really is something that is more market driven. And the individual organizations, they're going to make those decisions on how risk averse they may or may not be.

Matt Burns: As we wrap up today's conversation, there are a number of people that I'm sure are listening to this going, this is interesting, and a career path that maybe I hadn't considered before, or one that I've explored, but want to know a bit more about. Um, we'll obviously, Michelle, link all the details to your background and experiences in the podcast Show Notes. But for the next generation of leaders in this space, what advice would you give to them in terms of readying themselves for opportunities within claims more broadly?

Michele Adams: Yeah, I think myself, I'm very biased, but I do consider it an excellent first career, particularly for those that are coming out of college and don't know what they want to do. They might think, I want to go into the legal arena, maybe medical, maybe, um, more social type of work, maybe. I am interested in analytics. We spent a lot of time talking about data and analytics. It's such a diverse field that I feel like it's a great first job to figure out what do you really like. And for myself, what I figured out is that I like a lot of different things. And that's why it's been so great for me, because I've had the opportunity over the years to I've worked in aviation risk management type of questions. I've worked with, um, the data analytics, regulatory training, Dot compliance that doesn't come up every day in conversation, but those are pretty interesting fields and areas. Business continuity, that's really interesting. Uh, especially now. I mean, we talk about it probably now more than we did in the last 20 years, but the resiliency of a business and its ability to continue running after an adverse event. So there's such opportunity within this field to kind of put your toe in the water, figure out what you are interested in, and then maybe hone that to decide. Okay, yes, this is the path that I want to go down. So in terms of readiness, I think it's being open and willing to try something new. Um, I don't think it's the first thing that occurs to people when they think about, um, their career pathing. Maybe as an industry, we haven't done as good a job as we could in marketing the diversity of it and the opportunity. But, um, like a lot of different industries, we have an aging workforce, and we really do need to cultivate and bring about those next leaders, um, within this space who are going to think about things differently and transform it to be better than I could or any of my peers could have imagined it today. I think it's an exciting time, too. We're dealing with business, um, dilemmas. And this has been, in the past what I would consider a very black and white industry in terms of kind of yes, no thoughts around coverage, not coverage. There are so many different things that are coming up now in business that are kind of blurring those lines and making us say, wait a minute. In the past, that would have been on this side of the house. Today it's actually on this side of the house. But I can actually see an argument where it's kind of gray and in the middle. So we need real thought leaders. We need people who are willing to tackle, um, these types of questions and lead us. And I think today is probably more exciting than it's ever been, um, to think about a career in insurance and.

Matt Burns: Risk management and claims, that's a great place to lead this conversation. Michelle, thank you so much for your time today.

Michele Adams: Thanks, Matt. It's been real fun having the conversation with you today.

Matt Burns: Ento HR is a digital transformation consultancy working at the intersection of strategy, technology, and people operations. We partner with organizations, private equity and venture capital firms to accelerate value creation and identify the organization's highest leverage initiatives. And this can take place in many forms, from strategic planning and alignment to technology procurement, implementation, and integration, along with organizational design, process reengineering, and change management. With our proven track record of working with complex high growth organizations, we provide a ah lens that goes beyond the balance sheet, increasing enterprise readiness, resilience, and value. For more information, check us out@bentohr.com.