Insurance Firm Makes the Connection for Small and Diverse Businesses

Merriwether & Williams Insurance Services has been helping small contractors for 30 years.

Ingrid Merriwether is the president & CEO of Merriwether & Williams Insurance Services. When asked about dealing with the anti-DEI movement sweeping across the country and how to address it, she had a simple response, a quote from basketball coach, John Wooden

"Don't let what you can't do stop you from doing what you can do," said Merriwether. "I think this is the time to be thinking that way."

She continued, "I mean, we all have seen the effectiveness of withholding our dollars from companies who dropped their DEI and how much that got their attention-that's something we can do."

Recently acquired a year ago and now a HUB International Company, Merriweather & Williams is a property and casualty insurance brokerage firm. They work in risk management consulting and have programs they administer on behalf of public agencies such as the city of Los Angeles, L.A. Metro, L.A. County and more.

"We do a lot of construction industry-specific technical assistance and then we also provide for bonding that's required for contractors and we do contract financing for contractors with a multitude of public agencies," said Merriwether.

She entered the insurance industry trying to make an exit from her job at the time. Her story shows how sometimes, an accident can be the beginning of the best thing that could've happened.

"I was working for a small finance company, wasn't happy, had the classified ads, basically just called the company that indicated they had an entry level opening as a typist or something like that and came to realize 1 had dialed the number wrong," said Merriwether.

"The company wasn't hiring, but the manager said he believed in fate and asked me to just come meet with him anyway and they kind of created a position and hired me. I had to take the typing test three times before I passed and then, that was my first job in the insurance industry that many years ago."

Born and raised in the Bay Area, Merriwether has 46 years of working in the insurance industry. She takes pride that her company has overcome barriers for small and emerging contractors to participate in public construction.

"We've been administering these programs for close to 30 years with these agencies and demonstrated that you can remove barriers, you can create access, opportunity and inclusion of small and diverse contractors," said Merriwether.

She continued, "When you do so, they grow and they also increase competition because now, they can compete for contracts and increasing the pool of competition saves money because public agencies award contracts on a low bid basis.

"The more people, who are eligible to bid because they don't have so many barriers obstructing them, it drives contracting costs down and it builds the capacity of small, local businesses and that's good for local economic development."

Her firm has obviously been performing well as the proof, as they say, is in the contracting. Merriwether and Williams was acquired by 4th largest insurance broker in the world. The firm's track record is a testament to their success within the insurance industry.

"They hired us because of these programs where we work with these public agencies basically enabling small and diverse contractors to access and participate in public contracting," said Merriwether.

She continued, "We're a year into this, I have to say that all the commitments that were made during the courting session have been met and for the most part, they wanted us to just keep doing what we were doing, just trying to do more

of it." Merriwether also shared that her firm has operated in a way that make anti-DFI actions void. The one thing she stated that they are dealing with is perceptions.

"Other than perception, it doesn't have a direct effect for us because we've been operating these programs in California now for 28 years under prop 209 so, we already operated in a race and gender-neutral environment," said Merriwether. "So, all of our programs are small business programs, yes, they certainly addressed the needs of diverse businesses and we still have many of them that are in the program that we assist because they're also small businesses.

"Of course, there is a perception and so, that's really what we are having to respond to now is a perception that these kinds of programs are for minority businesses when in reality, they ve been for small businesses that just also include minority businesses because almost all minority businesses

are small." Merriwether had some advice for other firms and businesses in the insurance industry and in general. She shared some ways of helping small and minority businesses flourish and create an economically profitable community.

"You have to do all the right things to create an ecosystem that's conducive for small businesses, including minority businesses," said Merriwether. "In the public contracting space, we call that the three P's: you have to have the right policies, the right practices and then you have to have programs.

"You can do all of that on the basis of small business or local small business inclusion and you will innately include and be able to help diverse businesses at the same time.

"It's just about doing the right things that have a track record of removing barriers for minority businesses, who are all small businesses."