Elliott has been a driving force in the Big “I” community on both the state and national level, from chairing the Young Agents of Kansas (YAK) and national Young Agents Committee (YAC) to championing political advocacy in his current role as chair of the state government affairs committee.

His leadership has improved both the independent agency channel and his local community but he acknowledges the power of community to make a difference. “I can only do so much myself,” he says. “But when we tap into other communities, that makes a much bigger difference than I can on my own.”

In recognition of his leadership, Elliott was presented with the Young Agent of the Year Award at the 2025 Big “I” Legislative Conference in Washington, D.C.

At the time I joined, it was mostly beer and golf. But I felt like we could do a lot more. People were not showing up, the program was dying, and it’s because we were focused on beer and golf . I started coming to national events and I learned about the annual YAC Give Week and InsurPac and how we can give back to the insurance industry and the greater community.

As YAK chair, I picked a charity to support for the year and mine was Noah’s Bandage Project, which raises money for pediatric cancer and provides fun bandages. I challenged another young agent across the state to see who could raise more bandages and more money. The loser had to get a bandage-themed tattoo. We collected over 1 million bandages and about $10,000 in under 30 days. We got to take the bandages to the kids and they got to see the tattoo. They loved it.

I work primarily with mid-market commercial. We can’t just be insurance agents anymore. We need to shift to offering more solutions outside of just selling a policy.

I’m a third-generation agent. My grandpa started our business in 1974. My dad joined him in 1984, and I have been here since 2012. This was absolutely not what I always wanted to do. My dad always seemed to enjoy his job, but it didn’t seem like it was a very fun job. And that’s an issue that we’ve got with the industry altogether: We don’t talk about what we actually do, and so people think that we sit behind desks all day and return emails—that’s what I thought it was. 

I went to college for a couple of years, spending a lot of money to do something I didn’t enjoy doing, and realized that wasn’t going to work. I tried my hand at a few other things, and I didn’t care for those either. I figured “What’s the harm? I’ll try it. We’ll see if I like it. If I don’t, I’ll leave.” For the first couple of years, I hated it. It took me a long time to find my stride in this business, and it was almost like trying to fit a round peg into a square hole. I was just in the wrong position. I was doing the wrong things. But when I got in the right seat on the bus, it turned into a business that I love.

When I started here, I’d just turned 21 and they needed somebody in a sales role. Once I got my license, they put me in a back cubicle, gave me a telephone book and said, ‘Start making calls.’ That was truly awful. I just didn’t know what to do. Then I got moved into a service role at the front desk, answering phones and checking mail. I figured out pretty quickly that detail’s not my strong suit either. But we did figure out that I like to help people and customer service is a big part of that.

We had an account executive role, and I moved into that. I got to foster relationships, wasn’t stuck in an office all day. As I got more comfortable, I moved back into the sales role and had a lot more success with it. I’d learned a lot of things and that time it was a much more natural fit.

There’s a ton of different roles in the independent agency channel, and not all of them are the same as mine, but mine has a ton of flexibility. I don’t necessarily have office hours. Every day is something different. The compensation is almost unlimited. I get to work with people that I like—and if I don’t like them, I don’t have to work with them.

A lot of people need their why. Compensation’s great, flexibility’s fantastic, but why does it matter to you? Not very long ago, a guy was driving down the road, had a medical issue and ended up driving through a building. Unfortunately, there were two people in the building and it resulted in a loss of life to one of them. I insured the building and the workers compensation on the two people that were inside. They were friends of mine. I went to high school with the guy that passed away. We played football and baseball together. It was sad. But about a week later, I was able to make a call to that business owner—that happened to be his mother—and say, “The workers comp policy is going to max out on benefits. I know it doesn’t make it better, but hopefully it makes it easier and at least you don’t have to worry about the bills.” That was a huge deal to her. When we say that we get to help people, it goes way beyond fixing a dent in a car.

I was a committee member during that weird time when a little something called COVID-19 was going on. We did a lot of virtual things. We had some great events. I served as chair in 2022 and 2023. We did some good things in that time. My whole thing is understanding people where they’re coming from. We did a lot of personality tests and strengthened relationships. 

I didn’t have a real interest in politics before I got on that committee, but seeing how the sausage is made got me a lot more interested. I hate the political part of it, but the statutes, the bill writing, all of those behind-the-scenes things, are so incredibly important. They directly impact us on a day-to-day basis. If you don’t have your finger on the pulse of those things, you’re really missing out.

Participating in the annual YAC GIVE Movement? 

GIVE Week in general is my favorite week. Watching the pictures come in from that week and seeing what impact this industry makes on many different people across the country is very powerful. There’s more good in the world right now because of what we’re doing than there was a day ago. And that’s hugely impactful. If everything we do changes one person’s life, then it’s all worth it.

Get involved immediately. If your state doesn’t have a YAC that’s already set up, maybe you’ll feel a pull to do that. With this industry, there are things you don’t know until you know, and I learned a lot of those at these events.

I have lifelong friends from this. They’re family to me. I know there’s a lot of anxiety that goes with walking into a room where you don’t know anybody, but this industry is made up of the best people and some of the friendliest. Somebody is going to come up and talk to you. 

I’m in a transition stage in my agency. My dad is thinking about slowing down and retiring. We’re working through how to perpetuate this agency internally. In the next five years, I would love to have work be optional for him—if he still wants to do things, that’s great, but if he wants to take off for 60 days at a time, that’s great too.