Intern Confidential - AmWINS

As the summer is winding down, and my time at AmWINS as an HR intern is coming to a close, I felt it was only appropriate to reflect on my experiences and share that reflection with strangers on the internet.

AmWINS is the largest independent wholesale distributor of specialty insurance in the US. If you’re wondering what independent wholesale distributor of specialty insurance means, so was I. Here’s a scenario: you own a lumber yard, and insuring that lumber yard against fire damage is super expensive, since its practically a giant box of matches. What AmWINS does is finds a bunch of lumber yards, with owners like you, who can’t find someone to insure them, and bundles them together to bring down the rates. There you have it, an independent, wholesale distributor of specialty insurance.

During my first few weeks at AmWINS corporate headquarters working under both the Director of Events and the Director of Education & Professional Development, I was staffed on some intricate and time consuming projects. I came to truly understand the sentiment of the word “grind” — with my head buried in excel creating monster spread sheets, jumping into research projects and of course making time for the classic intern task: file consolidation and conversion. I was buried in v-look ups and heading home with new paper cuts daily. But I was hungry for more.

Jeff, the Director of Events at AmWINS, as well as my mentor and supervisor, had noticed my idleness and quickly came to my rescue. Understanding that I was a Journalism major, Jeff made every effort to assign me work that he knew I would find fulfilling. So, when he called me into his office late on a Thursday afternoon, I was excited.

Jeff had explained to me that my agreed upon 6-week time frame had limited him and Sarah, my other all-star supervisor, from assigning me projects with longer timelines and larger visions. “But you’re pretty quick, so I thought maybe we could at least get you started on this.” He said.

As the Director of Education & Professional Development, Jeff was responsible for supporting and nurturing the careers of his fellow AmWINS employees. With other members of the HR and marketing teams, Jeff had outlined a vision for the creation of two videos that would be used in company-wide on boarding for the 4,000+ person firm to both educate new employees on the organization itself as well as orient those who may be more unfamiliar with the specialty insurance world (um, me).

I was eager to get my hands dirty with this project, and after Jeff showed me the script drafts he had compiled with his team, I jumped on video construction software GoAnimate to learn as I went.

In the process of making those two videos, I learned more about marketing than I ever would have expected. During the rounds upon rounds of script and content revision, I was inspired by the marketing teams commitment to communicating the authenticity of the brand they had created.

The belief that employees are the foundation of any company is a core value at AmWINS. The team displayed an incredible passion for communicating this core brand belief to new employees: it was amazing to watch. This team was fired up about marketing whole-sale insurance: it started with internal communication and manifested in the realization of a strong external brand.

Unfortunately, having been introduced to the project with only a few weeks left of my internship, my time at AmWINS was coming to an end long before the project was completed. The second half of my summer involved heading to Raleigh, North Carolina to intern part-time in the office of U.S. Senator Thom Tillis.

In my final days, Jeff approached me with an amazing opportunity: To stay at AmWINS part time for the remainder of my summer so that we could see this project through to completion, together. Humbled by his desire to keep me on board, I happily accepted.

The next six-weeks involved quite a few commutes between Raleigh and Charlotte on Wednesday and Sunday afternoons, but seeing this project through to the end was well-worth the effort. In all of this, I established amazing relationships with Jeff and Sarah, who became personally vested in my career journey.

To Jeff, Sarah and the rest of the HR/marketing team at AmWINS - I cannot thank you enough for taking me under your wing. The passion behind your work has fueled my desire to perform on that level.

#MadelineStefan #intern #AmWINS