From PowerPoints to Proficiency:
THE CHALLENGE
The Sr. Director of Agency Operations at a leading insurance company manages a 300-person virtual contact center handling new and existing policies. When she stepped into her role, the training infrastructure was minimal: PowerPoint slides, a virtual classroom, and no simulation environment. Every new hire trained directly in a live production system.
The result: agents took roughly six weeks before they could handle live interactions independently. Scaling the team made this worse. Employee experience suffered, attrition risk climbed, and a small training team had no bandwidth to overhaul it alone.
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“If you have a training experience that does not feel cutting edge, it really can impact attrition and new employee perspective on the job they just took.” |
— Sr. Director of Agency Operations, Leading Insurance Company
WHY A MATCHMAKER
The Sr. Director had a 300-person operation to run. Vetting vendors wasn’t her expertise, and she knew a flawed evaluation process could cost more time than it saved. She met Think Forward’s founder, Gina Gibson, at an industry event — and quickly saw the value of having someone learn the business first, then recommend vendors. Not the other way around.
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“I felt heard. You didn’t come to the table with something already in mind. Your first step was: let me learn about your business.” |
— Sr. Director of Agency Operations, Leading Insurance Company
THE PROCESS
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Business Immersion Think Forward walked the company’s entire operation — from how leads come in to how the contact center runs — without any vendor in mind. That groundwork determined which vendors were worth the team’s time. |
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Curated Vendor Shortlist Zenarate was introduced as a fit based on the specific gaps identified: simulation-based practice for both phone and back-office workflows, and a strong L&D enablement model that wouldn’t leave the team to figure it out alone. |
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Business Case + ROI Model Think Forward built a business case and ROI spreadsheet that gave the Sr. Director the language to present to senior leadership and procurement — and to compare vendors they didn’t select. The document was later shared with other business units globally. |
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Flexible Implementation Zenarate ran a strategy session to align on goals and adapted the rollout to the company’s hiring calendar. The L&D team completed Zenarate Academy in full — building simulations themselves — which drove the strong month-one outcomes. |
WHAT MADE IT WORK
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Executive Co-investment The Sr. Director stayed close throughout implementation, kept her team aligned, and set clear expectations — rather than handing it off after contract signature. |
Dedicated Ownership One internal point of contact managed the vendor relationship. Team members were aligned to simulation types by skill set, improving throughput and reducing confusion. |
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Full Platform Investment The L&D team completed Zenarate Academy end-to-end. Understanding the conceptual framework — not just the features — drove faster simulation builds and stronger first-class results. |
Iterative Expansion After new hire wins, the team applied the platform to tenured rep upskilling, new product launches, soft skills, and continuous improvement — compounding the original investment. |
IN THEIR WORDS
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“Whenever we work with a matchmaker like Gina, the entire groundwork has been done. We dove straight into consultation. It jumps the conversation forward quite a bit.” |
— Luc Dallaire, VP Global Sales, Zenarate
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“We even had a rehire who went through the old experience and came back. She said that was so much better. Other agents started asking if they could go through the new training too.” |
— Sr. Director of Agency Operations, Leading Insurance Company