Verhovayak Lapja, 1951 (34. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1951 / Verhovay Journal
PAGE 2 Verhovay IS FRATERNALISM IN CONTRAST WITH SOUND BUSINESS ??? Journal March 21, 1951 THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF THE VERHOVAY FRATERNAL INSURANCE ASS N announce with profound sorrow the death of JOHN KREMPLE APPRECIATED AND ILLUSTRIOUS MEMBER OF THE ASSOCIATION, the founder and faithful manager for many years of Branch 412, Flint, Mich., after a prolonged illness, on February 22, 1951. The Board of Directors, paying final tribute to the memory of oui Appreciated and Illustrious Fellow- Member, convey on behalf of the membership of the Verhovay Fraternal Insurance Association their deepest sympathy to the bereaved family. (Continued from page 1) The drawback is only that the members not attending the meetings, — and they are in majority — are not aware of “what’s cooking” and what the official meetings of some branches consisting of a minority of the members, claim as representing the opinion of the membership. If these of our valuable members were to make an exception and attend these branch-meetings, they would be amazed to hear some of the recommendations and resolutions offered and they would indignantly raise their voices in protest to proposals that, if carried, would be detrimental to their true interests. . MEETINGS EDUCATIONAL : These members in good standing would; learn at such meetings that the officers and directors of the Association are accused of trying to deprive the membership of its rights .by proposing to have the By-Laws .iainended by the constitutional legislative body of the Association to the' effect that Branch-Managers be selected. trained and appointed by the Home Office rather than elected by the branches as was the custom up to this time. They would be amazed to hear the counter-proposal most often offered, that the Home Office can select, train and appoint all the “organizers” it wants to, but the election of the Branch-Manager should remain the prerogative of the branch-membership as exercised by the branch-meeting. DIVISION OF LABOR The idea behind this counterproposal is that the Branch-Manager should collect the dues, service the Membership, and receive the regular commissions therefor, but that he should be relieved of the obligation to secure new members which should be done by travelling organizers whose duty would be to fill each Manager's quota for him. To some ■this may sound like a fair division of labor, however, it does not take an insurance expert to recognize the supreme naivety in this proposal. Our own experience after lengthy experiments along these lines has 'proved this procedure a boomerang years and years ago. It shouldn’t have been necessary to exoeriment either, because insurance business experience has shown a long time ago that the soundest procedure is to have the man who wrote the business service it at least during the first year or two. Why? Selling insurance is a highly personal business, much more só than selling frigidaires, automobiles, shirts, hats or grocery. The selling agent’s personality is a decisive factor in every sale made. If the same agent whose personality was instrumental in effecting the sale, does not personally attend the new member, or policyholder, during the crucial first year period, but is serviced by another agent, in our case the less trained Manager, it is a safe bet that the new business won’t stay sold, it will be lost within 3 or 4 months. SELF-DEFEATING COUNTER-PLAN Suppose, then, we adopt the proposal and employ a number of highpowered “organizers” to write the new business for each branch*. The ■‘fly-by-night’ organizer will be able to sell the Verhovay tp a lot of people whom the local manager is unable to approach. As he passes from one town to the other, however, the business written by him will be left to the local manager to maintain and preserve. What happens is simply this: in most cases the local manager will not be able to re-sell the Verhovay to the new' member. Personality factoi's are involved in this, but experience has proved beyond a shadow of doubt that business secured by one man cannot be preserved by another, especially' not during the crucial first year period, unless he is es good a salesman as the one who wrote the business in the first place. If he is as good a salesman, he does not need the help of a trained travelling organizer. If he isn’t, the travelling organizer won’t do him any good, because he won’t be able j to . keep . the new business on the bocks, anyhow. j Other factors enter into the pic! -ture, too. Ma»yU- of the manager’s ! elected by their branches ary unable to appreciate the- efforts of a travelling organizer. In fact, they resent being “showed up.” As a result, the temptation is near to let the new business lapse’ without making any' effort to .retain it. And the Home Office, not having control over the managers, is unable to do anything about it. Here’s one example of the many I have seen. A Branch-Manager told me that years ago one of our travelling District Managers spent a week in his branch and wrote forty new members, “Why,” he explained indignantly, “they: expected me to run rfter them day after day to collect their dues. Then he laughed proudly7 like one who had shown the district manager up, “I lapsed each and everyone of them.” In other words, that district manager sold the Verhovay -to 40 new members. The manager, who according to the then prevailing System received half of the commissions on all such new business, proudly declared that not a single one of those new members remained long enough to have the Association pay commissions on them. In other words, the travelling district manager lost the earnings of the entire week, plus his expenses- during- his stay in that town. And the manager? Well, he cut off his own nose to spite his face* just to show that the District Manager was a poor organizer. Now then, if the Association is going- to divide labor, and pay the Branch-Manager fox- collecting- and servicing the membership, and pay the trained travelling organizer for securing new business, how many travelling organizers will make a living if they have to depend on the branchmanager for the preservation of their new business?? MORE FIASCO This experience has led our Association to change the system, for a time, our travelling- ‘organizers’ were paid a cash salary and the branch-managers received the entire commissions on all now business written by the travelling1 men. Boy, was that a fiasco! The ^elected.* branch-managers, jealous of the security7 enjoyed byT the organizers, gave them even less cooperation just tó show them up as ‘parasites.’ Then everybody started screaming about the high costs of promotion, not realizing that the crux of the Trouble lay in the .‘division of labor’ because of which two men had to be paid for the job one was supposed to do. The fact remains that new business can be preserved only if the man who sold it can closely supervise it1 at least during the first year period. BUSINESS VS. FRATERNALISM? Now we won’t go into technical details but our new field management system, if given a chance to. be. properly developed, will accomplish just that. Branch-Managers appointed by! the Home Office will -realize the need for cooperating with their districti managers who operating in a limited area, will be able to personally see to it that new' business will not be lost. Field Supervisors operating over a larger area will be able to see to it that the District Managers not only write but also preserve new business. And the much objected to Field Manager’s task will be to see to it that the proper individuals be selected, trained and appointed as managers, district managers and field supervisors. “Ho-ho,” the critics cry, “this is insurance business and not fraternalism. Our Association was founded and developed as a fraternal organization. We demand that it be kept as such. Don’t come to us with proposals taken from the books of commercial insurance experience.” Now we have heard everything. Since when is fraternalism in contrast with sound business methods and experiences? BUSINESS IN SPIRITUAL WORLD Years ago I attended a large church convention. As we know', the church is a spiritual, religious institution. Yet the highest dignitarian of that church proclaimed: “The financial affairs of the church must be conducted on a sound business basis1 aiql in this you, my brethren, will do well to learn from commercial enterprises.” Apparently, the high dignitarian of that church did not think that sound and honest business methods are in contrast with the eacred principles of religiaus brotherhood. Consider the Quakers who are noted for their closely knit religious fellowship as well as their far-reaching humanitarian and charitable enterprises. Yet, the Quakers also are noted for their shrewd business sense. BROTHERS AS BUSINESS PARTNERS Or suppose four brothers pool their financial resources to jointly start a business enterprise. Will brotherly7 relationship prevent them from equally contributing financially to the joint enterprise and will the brotherly relationship excuse any of the brotherly7 partners for not assuming his share in labor and efforts in advancing- the enterprise? Certainly not. When four brothers jointly enter into a business agreement each one is expected to do his share and the fact that the partnei’s are brothers, is actually assumed as some sort of guarantee that they will live up to the agreement, otherwise not onV the enterprise, but even the brotherly relationship may be damaged due to the disloyalty of the one who refuses to cooperate with the others in the common enterprise. VERHOVAY BROTHERHOOD Then why do some fraternalists sd vehemently oppose the application of sound and honest business principles and methods in the business in which our Association happens to be engaged in? Are we not all members of the same fraternal association and, as such, brothers? Is the man appointed by the Home Office less of a Verhovay brother than the man elected by the Branch? Are we, all of us, not brotherly partners, and as such, equally responsible for the progress of our joint enterprise? Is it really fraternalism that keeps some from cooperating with a plan, based upon tried and proved methods, designated to advance and improve our Association? Or are the slogans of fraternalism simply7 used to cover up for the betrayal of our general partnership on the part of those who don’t want to assume their share of responsibility' but don’t want anyone else to assume it either? Is any branch bigger than the entire Association? Does any branch have a rightful claim to more consideration of its preferences than the entire membership of the Association? Does any7 branch meeting have the moral right to say “we don’t want to cooperate w'ith other branches in any7 joint enterprise because we want to operate on our own and we don’t want to have anything to do. with other branches in our community?” BECAUSE WE ARE A FRATERNAL ASSOCIATION, NO BRANCH HAS A MORAL RIGHT TO TAKE SUCH AN ATTITUDE. BECAUSE WE ARE A FRATERNAL ORGANIZATION NO BRANCH HAS THE MORAL RIGHT TO DENY ITS COOPERATION FROM OTHER BRANCHES IN THE COMMUNITY OR FROM THE ASSOCIATION AS A WHOLE. BECAUSE WE ARE FRATERNALISTS NO BRANCH HAS THE RIGHT TO BE WRAPPED UP IN ITSELF AND CLAIM ITSELF THE RIGHTFUL OWNER OF AN INDEPENDENT KINGDOM STANDING ABOVE THE RIGHTFUL INTERESTS OF THE ENTIRE ASSOCIATION AND ITS MEMBERSHIP. UNFOUNDED ACCUSA TIONS ARE NO ANSWER TO A RIGHTFUL PLAN BASED ON FACTS AND SUBSTANTIATED BY EXPERIENCE. SOUND AND HONEST BUSINESS METHODS WILL NOT IMPOVERISH BUT ENRICH VERHOVAY FRATERNALISM. THEY WILL ENRICH VERHOVAY FRATERNALISM IF WE REALiZEt THAT WE ARE NOT MEMBERS OF THIS OR THAT BRANCH, BUT OF THE ENTIRE VERHOVAY WHOSE FUTURE ADVANCEMENT WÉ ARE MORALLY OBLIGED TO SERVE. HENRY F. W. RETTMANN, Field Manager.
