Why Adding, Not Reducing, Headcount Can Fuel Growth in The AI Era

• By: williamjones
• February 1, 2026

By Pete Crowe

For years now, the insurance industry has been told a simple story: Artificial intelligence (AI) will automate and streamline service and allow organizations to reduce staff.

But as independent agencies adjust to rising customer expectations, market complexity and an aging workforce, a different reality is emerging. AI may reduce manual work, but it does not reduce the need for skilled people. In fact, it increases it.

This is why some of the industry’s fastest-growing organizations are adding underwriting, service and operational talent rather than cutting back. In late 2025, FOCUS expanded with 30 new experienced underwriters and strengthened its leadership ranks to meet accelerated demand from carriers, managing general agents (MGAs) and organizations looking for more scalable operational capacity.

The takeaway for agencies: growth in the AI era comes from deploying the right people in the right roles and using technology to make those people more effective.

Independent agencies today face a perfect storm of fluctuating market conditions, more complex risk profiles and clients who expect speed and expertise every time they reach out. AI helps agencies capture data, automate routine tasks and improve workflow efficiency. But the competitive differentiators, such as judgment, relationship-building, responsiveness and cross-selling, remain deeply human.

When account managers and producers have more support behind the scenes, they stay focused on clients rather than administrative work. When underwriters have more hands and experience around them, decisions move faster without sacrificing quality.

Expectations are only getting higher, which is why investing in an AI strategy allows agencies to automate the mundane while recruiting the best talent in the industry to not only fulfill services but also train and manage AI agents. AI is helping us work smarter, but people are what make our business grow.

For many independent agencies, adding headcount isn’t about hiring more internal employees. It’s about partnering with specialized teams that act as an extension of the agency, providing underwriting support, customer service, accounting, catastrophe response or back-office operations without the overhead of recruiting, training or managing additional staff.

This type of flexible, high-skill staffing model has become even more important because AI has fundamentally changed the nature of insurance work. As automation removes low-value administrative tasks, agencies need more licensed talent to act on AI-generated insights, manage increased submission volumes, deliver proactive service that improves retention and support clients through catastrophes or seasonal surges.

The real shift underway is not more people versus fewer people. It’s more of the right expertise, deployed at the right moments, enabled by the right technology. AI will continue to reshape how independent agencies work, but not by eliminating people. Instead, it is creating a new operational model where human expertise has an even greater impact.

Pete Crowe is president of FOCUS Insurance Services.