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Talent is the Difference

By January 18, 2021April 27th, 2021Armada Blog

At Armada, we take great pride in the protections our teams devise and the insurance coverages our brokers secure when mitigating risk exposures. But I would be lying if I didn’t admit that we find the greatest joy when we contribute to our clients’ growth.

One of the contributions we make is to foster the sharing of ideas, best practices, and growth insights among our clients and business partners, which became even more evident throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.  This is why we’re happy to relay the success of Banyan Technology under the direction of its CEO Brian Smith.
 

Way to Grow

In 2016 Brian Smith joined the then 15-year old software company with the charge of scaling the enterprise for robust growth. He recognized that the talents of his employees can serve as the company’s best differentiator, which is why he immediately looked to retool his human resource function. The function for the then 30 employee company had been mostly managed by a PEO or a professional employer organization, which is an outsourced service for employee management tasks, such as health and benefits, payroll and workers' compensation, recruiting, and risk/safety management. To replace the PEO, Banyan needed more than insurance.

“Our goal is to continue advancing in the ranks of the region’s top 75 employers,” says Brian. “Armada’s counsel is helping us get there. We offer employees a relatively rich benefits program that as we grow risked becoming too cumbersome. With Armada’s help and knowledge of the risk and insurance marketplace, we were able to drive out inefficiencies and capture substantial cost savings in medical, dental, vision, and long-term and short-term disability. They did it seamlessly and without any reductions in benefits or service.”

The now 50-employee automated freight management service is positioned for more growth and greater scale, allowing it to now embrace innovations, such as incorporating an electronic portal for automating its 2021 open enrollment.  This portal not only allowed for employees to personalize their benefits package, but also facilitated the smoothest enrollment process in years, which was jeopardized by the COVID-19 pandemic and limited on-site interaction and engagement.
 
“This added service is given to us at no cost, providing greater comfort and ease to employees while freeing resources to be invested elsewhere in the kind of growth that delivers even greater rewards to our employees,” says Brian. “Armada is our one-stop shop for insurance.”