A little history...

Well, after some computer problems due to severe weather we have had, I am back in business. So, this is my first blog relative to the new blog I created for a class I am taking at Drexel University on Electronic Publishing called Video Presence Learning Live. I went back and forth on several different subjects, but I thought it would be important and more efficient if I spent my time writing a blog about something that is related to my work, which already takes up too much of my time. But that is a blog for another day.
Using some of the guidance we received in our text, and specifically on the article called “Online Networking” on the website LifeHack.org.
The most important idea I learned from our reading is that blogging is really a different type of communicating. Building an on-line rapport is a special skill. I think I have found that our discussions within Blackboard are sometimes difficult to follow and blogging will be much easier in that sense. But again, I digress, back on topic, Marianne.

So I am a Claims Trainer for Commerce Insurance Company in Massachusetts. Commerce was a locally “grown” company that grabbed 33% of the personal auto policies written in Massachusetts. Since we really could not expect better than insuring 1 out of every 3 cars in Massachusetts, we began to buy some smaller insurance companies in other states. We began to be more national, now writing policies in 14 states. The last year we were purchased by Mapfre, the largest insurer in Spain and the leading insurance company in Latin America. The sale took the employees by great surprise! We were an employee owned company whose ESOP plan made a lot of money over the course of many years. We enjoyed regular quarterly dividends, two weeks bonus, and other great benefits. Obviously, there was apprehension amongst the employees, but, things have changed, but not tremendously. Mapfre respects the management and employees of Commerce and hopes we lead the way to Mapfre having an important place in the American market.One big change has been the creation of an Eastern and Western Claim office. Three offices have been consolidated into a Claim Center in Webster, Massachusetts and a Claim Center is Gilbert, Arizona. The Gilbert office opened in December, and that is where the growth of the number of employees will grow to match the 750 Claims employees in Massachusetts. The Claim Training Department in Webster had grown to a staff of 7 trainers and a manager. The entire department has an average of 10 years in insurance and 8 years in training. We are an experienced bunch. We did hire two new trainers in our Gilbert facility and we have been training them for the past 6 – 8 months. There has been a lot of travel between MA and AZ and back again. Expensive and exhausting, the company decided to invest in video conferencing. Since the bulk of the experienced trainers are in Webster and the bulk of the training is planned to be in Gilbert, AZ the company thought it would be more efficient to train via video conference. I’d love to say that the Training Department was the number one reason for the investment in video conferencing, but that would not be true. It certainly was a factor, but as we now need to collaborate with the entire Claims Team in Arizona, the video conferencing meeting rooms have been set up in our four major sites: Madrid, Massachusetts, Ohio, and California.So, I guess that is part one of the story of Video Conferencing and Commerce Insurance, a Mapfre Company (our new brand). My next post will discuss the first time I had to teach a four day module using video conferencing ~~~me in Webster, my students in Arizona.