Rothbury broker Kim Matthews was awarded the broking professional of the year title at last week’s
ANZIIF insurance industry awards, and says the experience was very humbling.
Matthews, a commercial broker in Hawke’s Bay, joined more than 350 industry leaders at the 6th annual ANZIIF awards in Auckland last Thursday, and faced fierce competition for the coveted best broking professional title.
Rothbury managing director
Roger Abel said Matthews was a great role model, and really deserved the award.
“I’d personally like to congratulate Kim on being named broking professional of the year. Our culture and people are very important to us, and the reason for our success,” Abel said.
Rothbury also won the large broking company of the year award for the fourth year in a row, and scooped a training award for its learning development programme.
Matthews said she felt “incredibly lucky to work for a great company, doing the work I love. I have an awesome bunch of clients, and really enjoy the variety each day brings.”
Matthews has been in the industry for 38 years, starting out as a receptionist for Crombie Stephens and working her way up to her current role as branch manager. She said the best part of her job is talking to clients.
“Napier is a small place, and I love that! It’s through casual conversation that you often pick up things that are going on that might not have been discussed at renewal meetings, such as a kid going to university,” she said. “And I say, we need to think about that – how they might be insured, or if they’re heading overseas we need to look at travel insurance. It’s all about building and strengthening relationships with your clients, then they’ll always refer to you and won’t go anywhere else.”
Asking the right questions and collecting the correct information, Matthews noted, is always going to be the challenge to ensure clients are covered for any eventuality.
“Tailored, personalised advise in our market,” she said, “it’s what we’re good at, and where we provide the most value to add.”
Matthews is a keen advocate of continuing education and ensuring the financial advisory service is seen as a profession, and “not just an industry.” She said if she could improve one factor within the sector it would be to increase the level of professionalism by ensuring qualifications were measurable to make advice more consistent across the board.
Loving what you do, and treating your clients like friends is what makes a good broker, she explained. She added that insurance shouldn’t just be a transaction.
“You must have the ability to build truly authentic, personal relationships, and always have your clients’ best interests at heart,” she said.
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