I've been in insurance 11 years.

I just realized I never had a mentor. At least, not a real one.

And honestly? That's on me.

Not Alone isn't the Same as Mentorship

I had people I could go to.

Colleagues who were kind enough to let me interrupt their day with questions. But there's a massive difference between not being alone and actually being mentored. And I conflated the two for over a decade.

To me, here's what true mentorship actually looks like:

1. Consistency — someone invested in your growth week in, week out

2. Real investment — they actually care about you as a whole person

3. Honest feedback — the kind that stings, because it’s what you need to hear

What I had was people who were nice to me.

That's not the same thing.

My Ego Was the Roadblock I Couldn't See

Here's the part that's harder to admit.

It wasn't that mentorship was never available to me.

The truth is my ego got in the way. I had this mindset, you probably know exactly what I'm talking about:

Why split revenue when I can just do it myself? I can figure this out on my own.

That mentality will take you somewhere. It took me somewhere. A dead end.

Yes, agency and independence are great qualities. But, like most things in life, too much, and it becomes a problem.

At some point my ego became my biggest liability.

The Podcast Was the Unlock For Me

I didn't see my pride as a roadblock until a few weeks ago.

After interviewing a dozen producers over the last few months, one pattern kept showing up over and over. Almost every high performer I've talked to can point to someone, a mentor, a coach, an older producer who took them under their wings, and changed their trajectory.

It's a pattern, once you see it you can't unsee it.

That pattern forced me to get honest:

How much faster could I have gone?

And more importantly:

How much farther can I still go?

Turns out I'm not alone in wondering.

I was reading this weekend where 75% of executives credit their success to having a mentor. Mentees are 5x more likely to advance than those without one. And 25% of people in mentoring relationships saw a measurable pay increase, compared to just 5% of those going it alone.

I did 11 years going it alone.

What a miss.

What I'd Do Differently Starting Year One

If I could go back to year one, here's exactly what I'd do differently.

I would have found the most successful producer in that office and just asked:

Can I shadow you? Sit in on your meetings? Let me make calls for you. Let me help you with submissions.

A year or two of a front-row seat to how someone at the next level actually operates would have changed everything.

While the mentor-ship has kind of sailed for me (see what I did there?) the coaching ship has not. So, I'm currently interviewing coaches, and feeling out the landscape.

One thing I’ve noticed straight away is mentorship and coaching aren't the same thing.

Mentorship is the long game while coaching is more immediate.

Mentorship is all about career vision, pattern recognition, seeing around corners. Coaching is more performance, habits, and tactics.

Ideally you'd have both.

There are Levels to This Game

And I haven't touched most of them.

That's not me being hard on myself. That's just the truth.

Don't be me. Don’t wait 11 years.

Don't let the "I got this" mentality convince you that figuring it out alone is the same as figuring it out fast. They're not the same.

Find someone further down the road and get close to them. Be intentional about it in a way I wasn't.

Uncle Warren said it best:

"It's good to learn from your mistakes. It's better to learn from other people's mistakes."

A mentor collapses time. They help you skip the tuition. You get the lesson without paying the price. And the data backs it up.

And if you're still working on the foundation:

How to actually build a book of business and get prospects to care enough to even have a conversation?

That's exactly what we built the Producer Playbook for.

Most insureds don't want to talk to you. I show you how to change that using curiosity.

It's another shortcut I wish I'd had in year one.

You can snag it here:

→ The Producer Playbook 

Hope this is the motivation to get you off your rear and go find a mentor.

See you Friday.

Kick ass take names,

Micah

P.S. Know someone who would find this valuable? Pass it on.