Today we went to the Aetna office in Woodland Hills for Aetna Career Training. Romesh Sagadevan, Atena’s top sales rep, greeted us and gave us an overview of Aetna’s history. He also explained his role as a Sales Director. Romesh is Gallagher’s point guy at Aetna. Whenever a consultant has an issue with an Aetna client, Romesh is the one who hears about it. He is the liaison between the brokers and the underwriters; the person who sells the plan to the client; and, most importantly, the person responsible for taking the consultants to Lakers games[i]. Romesh was our Aetna tour guide and organized the entire day.

Kevin McCaffrey was our first presenter. Kevin walked us through the various components of a request for proposal (RFP) and the process his team goes through to submit a quote to clients. Kevin told us that on average 7% of RFP’s turn into deals and in the Woodland Hills office they receive about 750 RFPs per year. He described some examples of case positives, such as carrier persistency and census data. He also explained some case negatives, like low turnover and participation waivers. It was interesting to learn what really happens once a RFP is submitted and Kevin helped us understand the carrier role and perspective.

After learning about the sales and underwriting process, we spoke with Dr. Barry Smith who explained Aetna’s unique approach to wellness. This session was especially useful because we have been researching wellness programs as an intern project. In theory, wellness programs are great and there seems to be a great amount of buzz about wellness; but finding return on investment (ROI) is almost impossible as it is, essentially, a moving target. The programs make sense in terms of cost control and prevention; but sifting through all the bells and whistles to find empirical data to support all the hype has been a challenge to say the lest. Aetna, however, feels so strongly about the benefits of wellness programs that they offer the program free of charge to their fully insured clients. Romesh explained that it’s Aetna’s money that is going to people with conditions that can be treated with simple wellness programs, so Aetna feels that the program is worth the investment. Aetna’s self-funded clients can access the wellness program for a fee.

Following lunch, we listened to Lisa Palmer discuss her role in Sales Support. Romesh said he receives approximately 750 RFPs a year. Of the 750, only about 65-75% are quotable. That still leaves about 490-560 RFPs to sift through, which is where sales support plays a key role. Lisa also helps close deals when Aetna makes finalist presentations to clients. Her team puts together all of the presentation materials. She said that carriers compete against to win over the client and that a sharp presentation is a tremendous asset. Lisa said the key to closing the deal is to know the “hot button” items and focus on those points.

Finally, we heard from Rob Radius about Account Management. He discussed some of his responsibilities by guiding us through a Standard Report for the City of Vernon. Rob is responsible for the operations of an account and to ensure that both the carrier and the client follow their contractual obligations.

It was an extremely long day but we walked away from Aetna with a better understanding of how all of the pieces of the insurance pie fit together.

- The Los Angeles Based Interns

Last week we went to Principal Financial. In case you have not noticed already, we in LA find ourselves to be constantly engrossed in all things wellness. Principal has a state-of-the-art wellness program and it was interesting to discuss it with Steve Behan, a vice president with sales-national accounts.

Steve, ever the salesmen, began by going through a wellness capabilities presentation. This is essentially the same presentation he gives to potential clients to convince them of the importance of wellness and his company’s ability to provide the best possible program. We, being well versed in the generalities of wellness programs, asked him several questions about his program and wellness in general. It was interesting to hear his answers and he adamantly asserted that Principal offers, bar none, the best wellness program of all time.

The program is extremely expensive to implement because they utilize biometrics in addition to self-reported Health Risk Assessments. Steve said that the only way to truly see the results of a wellness program is to use biometrics for both benchmarking and to identify people who need specific attention. Principal conduces the biometric tests at clients’ facilities provided the client who have at least 20 employees at that site. Principal also have relatively high participation rates compared to other wellness programs. Participation is the key to the success of the program.

On the whole, we were very impressed with the Principal approach to wellness and with Steve Behan.

- The Illustrious LA Interns