BOLD (Building Ongoing Leadership Development) is Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America’s intense seven-month learning program to provide a platform and exposure to empower Distribution attendees to become confident and capable leaders.
Program Details
The BOLD program comprises five foundational pillars:
- Lessons in Leadership
- Presentation Training
- Business Acumen
- Apprentice Project
- Management/Wholesaler Tracks
BOLD participants are nominated and must go through an extensive selection process:
- Applicants submit an application, essay, and sponsor forms.
- Distribution leaders narrow down applicants to a selected group.
- Selected individuals record a video explaining why they should be chosen for BOLD.
- Distribution leaders conduct final interviews and select final BOLD participants.
BOLD provides two professional tracks: a Wholesaler “external” track and a Leadership track. The programs are offered once per year and are limited to 15 to 20 participants from Allianz’s Distribution division.
The apprentice project in BOLD is designed to help participants think and work strategically. They develop their own project and present to leadership. The best ideas are selected, and teams are created from the BOLD participants to bring the projects to completion.
One example of a successful BOLD project was a participant’s idea to revamp mobile technology to increase productivity and provide easily accessible information to wholesalers and account managers. The BOLD team worked together to improve reporting, activity tracking, client information, and wholesaler onboarding. The new technology has been implemented in Allianz’s day-to-day business operations. As a result of her successful BOLD project, the participant was named one of LIMRA’s (Life Insurance Management Research Association) rising stars of 2017. The new technology has contributed to annuity sales, with Allianz being the first carrier ever to reach more than $100 billion in fixed index annuities and being the No. 1 sales leader of fixed index annuities for 16 of the last 17 years.
Results
BOLD has a strong track record of helping employees succeed. Some 63 percent of BOLD graduates from the previous year have been promoted to a new position in the company. Twenty-five percent of them are now in a manager role, and one person has moved to a vice president role.
The BOLD program has shown such success that the Operations Division now is partnering with the BOLD team to develop a similar program for high-potential, motivated employees in Operations. This new BOLD program will be implemented in 2018.
