Fast Focus
	Benefits guy shows he can sell at p-c heavy Brown & Brown.
	Paschke was often brought to first close the benefits deal before the p-c guys made their move.
	He excels in recruiting and mergers and acquisitions.

Operating on the Margins

Mike Paschke benefits from cultivating the ethos of benefits in a p-c world.

By  Leslie Werstein Hann

You could say Michael Paschke’s destiny was sealed on a basketball court, and more than once, he scored with unexpected plays.

Promoted last year to be a regional executive vice president of Brown & Brown, Paschke, 49, is the only member of the senior leadership of the world’s sixth-largest broker who has a true employee benefits upbringing.

Paschke’s height—a towering 6-foot-5—and his job title provoke two common questions. The first: Did you play college hoops? The second: How did an employee benefits guy get a seat at the leadership table of a dominant p-c broker?

Paschke did play college ball, but he’d rather talk about the growing importance of benefits to p-c firms and why he expects benefits brokers to start getting greater recognition and leadership opportunities.

“Principals now are finally realizing that the benefits world is a key ingredient for retention and relationships,” Paschke says. “And the margins in benefits are much better. Margins will get everybody’s attention. That is the almighty power of the green.”

Brown & Brown, for example, plans for employee benefits to eventually bring in a quarter of the company’s revenues, up from 14% today.

At Brown & Brown, Paschke says, talent and financial performance are all that matter, so if you’re good at the game and make the team better, it doesn’t matter if you sell property-casualty insurance or employee benefits. A benefits guy to the core, Paschke got a seat at the leadership table because Brown & Brown bills itself as “an American meritocracy” and doesn’t bench its best players. Paschke explains how the legendary chairman and CEO, J. Hyatt Brown, has cultivated an entrepreneurial environment where roots are less important than results.

“It’s the culture Hyatt created,” Paschke says. “I don’t care who they are: If they’re leaders and they’re salespeople and they can run something, let’s go for it.”

If the profile of benefits brokers is rising industry-wide, Paschke says, The Council deserves much of the credit. The astounding growth of The Council’s Employee Benefits Leadership Forum, being held this month, has exposed the benefits of benefits and the rising stars of the benefits business to the leadership of p-c firms. Paschke was chairman of the Council of Employee Benefits Executives from 2005 to 2007.

On the Court

Now getting back to that first question—the one about college hoops.

In the story of his college basketball days and then the unusual role that competitive athletics played in his early career, you can find the attitude that is at the root of Paschke’s success.