Declaration of Independents: Jill Roth

• By: AnneMarie McPherson Spears
• September 1, 2025

Jill Roth

Executive Vice President

Ahart, Frinzi & Smith

Alexandria, Virginia

Roth, executive vice president at Ahart, Frinzi & Smith, started her career on Capitol Hill. Born and raised a Jersey girl, Roth graduated from George Mason University with a major in political science and international affairs and landed a job as staff assistant for a New Jersey congressional representative. She worked her way into legislative affairs, where one of the issues she focused on was the insurance industry.

Her congressional experience carried over when she joined the family agency—Ahart, Frinzi & Smith—and repurposed her passion for politics into serving Big “I” members on the state and national level. “I take my knowledge of the congressional side and the lobbying world and I use that in insurance,” Roth says. “I know how to discuss those issues that are so important to the industry and lobby on behalf of other agents.”

Roth is currently chair of the AAS Board of Directors and represents Virginia on the Big “I” Board of Directors.

Getting involved in the Big ‘I’?

I’m not one to sit back and complain and just expect everybody else to fix the problems. I’m a doer. I’m opinionated, but I can back that up. With my legislative background, I knew I could offer a niche service to the association.

Favorite part of your job?

I love policy, whether it’s reading a piece of legislation or a thick commercial auto policy. To get in there and find the win is what drives me. If I have a client who says they’re having difficulty with a claim, I can advocate on their behalf.

Chairing the AAS board?

The board oversees all the Big “I” for-profit programs. Market access has always been a big deal, but now that we’re in a hard market it’s at the top of everyone’s list. This year we dove into the significant initiative of the Big “I” Alliance. It’s incredibly rewarding.

How did you get into the insurance industry?

My family has been in this industry since the 1950s. I’m a third-generation agency owner. It wasn’t something I had aspirations for when I was little, but it made sense as I got older to dabble in the insurance industry. After I did a bit of marketing projects here and there and a bit of prospecting, I was hooked. Within six months, I was begging to be part of the perpetuation process.

I’m executive vice president, but honestly, my title could be anything—some days it could be receptionist. My brother and I wear every hat possible. In a little family agency, titles don’t mean as much to us as they might to those who are just getting started.

Being an agency owner?

I love being an owner. I love the people who work in our agency. They all bring something so different. If you have good staff behind you, you actually like going to work. Your job should never be a chore. Our agency staff members in both our New Jersey and Virginia offices are smart, sympathetic and empathetic.

Benefits of getting involved in the Independent Insurance Agents of Virginia (IIAV)?

Although I worked on Capitol Hill before coming into the industry, I was still in my twenties when I started in insurance. When you start in this industry, you have a lot of questions. And while I could absolutely keep going to my brother and my dad, getting involved in IIAV and meeting people who were going through the same experiences as me and reaching out to them—even if it was just to talk about the trials and tribulations of the day—knowing that I wasn’t alone was huge.

Service at the national Big ‘I’ level?

Being involved in the national Young Agents Committee (YAC) was such an integral part of growing as an agent. Knowing what people are going through in other parts of the country, listening to people from across the country and how they fix problems within their own agencies was eye-opening and so great for my career.

I also served on the InsurPac Board of Directors and saw on a national level where InsurPac dollars go and why that’s so important for our industry. Getting involved on a national level gives you a different perspective—the big picture. It’s super important to be involved in your state, and if you have the opportunity to be involved nationally, it’s definitely something that will catapult your career.

Objectives as chair of the AAS board?

It’s a board that historically doesn’t get much recognition, but it oversees the for-profit programs, which so many of our members look to the association to provide. It is a lot of work. But at the same time, it’s incredibly rewarding because it’s something that I truly know is going to be the future of the association.

Our objective is to continue growing the Big “I” Alliance. It’s been really fun to start a program from its infancy and watch it grow from a thought to a program that’s taking off. A huge objective is always going to be communication. There is so much the national Big “I” offers and you don’t want to throw so much information at state associations that they don’t know what to do with it.

What have you learned as AAS chair?

You have to have confidence in your people and in knowing that what we’ve created is going to work. But at the same time, you also need to have the confidence to know when something’s not working and to rearrange your resources into something better.

I like finding the win. I’ll do anything I can to get that. It’s been hard for me to know when to be flexible. It’s been hard to learn, but it has been transformative and is carrying over into my agency itself.  

What’s your leadership philosophy?

It hasn’t changed since I was 27 years old, and it’s that I don’t believe in monarchies. I don’t believe in top-down. I like to work together. My agency staff is great. The people I work with at the Big “I” are great. If you don’t have the right people in the right seats, then you’re not a good leader. A good leader finds the right people to do the tasks at hand, but then also provides the resources to allow those people to excel.

Goals for the next five years?

You have to have goals—that’s something we teach our kids. We have a 13-year-old and a 9-year-old and we make each of them write their goals down. They have to have a short-term goal and a long-term goal. For me, my short-term goal is to just get through a to-do list one day. But my long-term goal is to do more expert testimony work.

AnneMarie McPherson Spears is IA news editor.