{"id":471,"date":"2026-09-21T16:54:35","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T16:54:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/?p=471"},"modified":"2026-09-21T16:54:35","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T16:54:35","slug":"the-violence-it-took-to-get-to-this-calm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/the-violence-it-took-to-get-to-this-calm\/","title":{"rendered":"The Violence It Took to Get to This Calm"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some people walk into the insurance industry through a referral or a career fair. Marrissa Winkelman walked in through a second chance \u2014 a receptionist job she didn\u2019t even get the first time she applied, at a three-person agency in Grove, Oklahoma, that took a shot on a self-described wild card at twenty-four years old.<\/span><\/p>\n

Eleven years later, she\u2019s a co-owner of <\/span>Webb Winkelman Insurance<\/span><\/a>, running what she lovingly calls her \u201cgirl gang\u201d \u2014 eight women of different ages, backgrounds, and life stages who show up every day and, in Marrissa\u2019s words, just get each other. She was recently featured in Independent Agent Magazine under the headline Declaration of Independence. She won the Safeco Outstanding Female Principal award in her first year as principal. And she built an agency culture so intentional that babies have come to work, every other Friday ends at noon, and the waiting list to join the team speaks for itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

None of it happened by accident. And none of it was easy to get to.<\/span><\/p>\n

Six Generations. One Decision.<\/b><\/h2>\n

When I asked Marrissa where her drive comes from, she didn\u2019t hesitate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy mother is an addict, and she is still in active addiction to this day. My mom had me at 16, her mom had her at 16. There\u2019s a lot of abuse, a lot of addiction\u2026 My dad was my saving grace. He was a very driven, hardworking man.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Her father finished raising two girls on his own. Marissa was fourteen when her mom left the picture entirely. Her sister was seven. From that point forward, her dad made sure she had bills to pay \u2014 car insurance at sixteen, responsibility before she had any business having it \u2014 and cheered her on louder than the statistics cheered against her.<\/span><\/p>\n

She comes from six generations of addiction on her mother\u2019s side. She said it plainly, without drama. And then she said something that stopped me cold.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI grew up in chaos. I grew up in loud chaos, and so the violence it took to get to this calm is so wonderful. I have peace and I have calm in a way that I didn\u2019t think when I was a child that I would ever have.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She\u2019s not interested in using her past as a crutch. She knows people do \u2014 she\u2019s watched it happen with family members who are still running that course, letting where they came from become the reason they stay stuck. That\u2019s never been available to her as an option.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s something in me that\u2019s like, you weren\u2019t born to be like them. So sometimes you just got to change, right?\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Hire the Ones With Something to Prove<\/b><\/h2>\n

Marrissa has never hired a licensed insurance professional. Every person on her team came in without industry experience \u2014 waitresses, a daycare teacher, people who were handpicked or found their way to the agency because they wanted to be there.<\/span><\/p>\n

Her hiring philosophy is unconventional, and she\u2019ll tell you exactly what she\u2019s looking for in an interview.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNine times out of ten, if I am interviewing and they start talking about their children, I know right there that they have a drive that is just indescribable. Like indescribable to have the drive of being a working mother.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She\u2019s not hiring credentials. She\u2019s hiring fire. The hunger that comes from having something to prove \u2014 to yourself, to your kids, to everyone who counted you out.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou look for the ones that have something to prove because they\u2019re going to work hard for it and appreciate it. And for me, I\u2019ve had something to prove my whole life, and I\u2019ll have something to prove until I get to heaven\u2019s gates.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a coincidence that the philosophy she uses to hire mirrors the story she lived. She was the wild card who got a second chance. Now she gives second chances. The cycle \u2014 this one, at least \u2014 she\u2019s very intentional about repeating.<\/span><\/p>\n

A Partnership That Was Worked In, Not Bought In<\/b><\/h2>\n

About eight months into her time at the agency, the owners noticed Marrissa was doing more than receptionist work. She was selling. They pulled her back, brought in someone else for the front desk, and she kept building.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then a marketing rep came through \u2014 someone who noticed something the owners might not have fully seen yet \u2014 and pulled Randy and Christie aside.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe was like, \u2018You got to lock her in one way or another. You need to lock her in.\u2019 And that next year at my anniversary, I was actually gifted a percentage of the agency.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t buy in. She worked in.<\/span><\/p>\n

When Randy and Christie made that decision, Marrissa says they weren\u2019t losing anything \u2014 they were elevating what they\u2019d built. That reframe matters. A lot of agency owners hold equity close out of fear of losing what they\u2019ve created. What happened at Webb Winkelman is a case study in what\u2019s possible when the founders see it differently.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Randy and Christie brought that to me, it was not that they were going to lose anything. It was that they were elevating it.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

When You\u2019re a Coach, You Don\u2019t Get to Swing<\/b><\/h2>\n

Marrissa will tell you that the hardest part of where she is now isn\u2019t the carrier conversations or the retention numbers or the data. It\u2019s the identity shift.<\/span><\/p>\n

She loved producing. She loved the grind of it \u2014 the busy seasons, the quotes flowing, the relationships she was building one chinchilla story at a time. Moving into a leadership role meant giving that up, and she\u2019s still working through it.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a tricky thing because you\u2019re so used to playing on that team and you\u2019re up to bat. And when you\u2019re a coach, you don\u2019t get to swing. You have to make sure that all of them are swinging correctly.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Her day now looks like checking in with each person on the team, making sure their plates are manageable, redistributing when someone\u2019s overloaded. She calls herself the ringmaster of a perfect circus. She just went ten days on vacation and handed the agency off to one of her team members before she left \u2014 lists, expectations, authority to run it. It worked.<\/span><\/p>\n

The advice she\u2019d give to herself years ago, stepping into management for the first time:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCreate the space that you want to live in. As a manager or leader of any sort, you do have a say so in the culture that you are in. Make the culture that you want, create it, change it. Don\u2019t take no \u2014 sit down. Always go for the yes, even when you get the no\u2019s.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

The Girl Gang Is the Point<\/b><\/h2>\n

Webb Winkelman has a maternity program that Marrissa describes as \u201cout of this world.\u201d When she was pregnant with her son Lane, he came to work with her for eight months. She didn\u2019t have to choose between her baby and her career \u2014 she brought them together, and it changed her. Since then, two more babies have done the same. One of them, Iris, spent her first six months in the office.<\/span><\/p>\n

Eight women. Different ages. Different stages. Some have kids, some don\u2019t \u2014 and Marissa is clear that the culture extends to everyone. Starting April 1st, every other Friday ends at noon.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe world doesn\u2019t work for working moms as it is. School is from eight to three. Moms are from nine to five. They don\u2019t work for us. We just got to make spaces in that area.\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

She\u2019s not waiting for the industry to figure this out. She built the space she wanted to lead in, the same way she built herself \u2014 deliberately, stubbornly, and with a lot of love for the people she\u2019s doing it with.<\/span><\/p>\n

You can connect with Marrissa on <\/span>LinkedIn<\/span><\/a> and learn more about what she\u2019s building at <\/span>Webb Winkelman Insurance<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

At ia Blueprint, we work with agency owners who are ready to build a team that lets them step into the leadership role their business actually needs. If you\u2019re still doing everything yourself and wondering how to make the shift from player to coach, <\/span><\/i>book a discovery call<\/span><\/a>. Let\u2019s talk about what\u2019s possible.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some people walk into the insurance industry through a referral or a career fair. Marrissa Winkelman walked in through a second chance \u2014 a receptionist job she didn\u2019t even get the first time she applied, at a three-person agency in Grove, Oklahoma, that took a shot on a self-described wild card at twenty-four years old.… Continue reading The Violence It Took to Get to This Calm<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":473,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beaux-pilgirm","category-news","entry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":474,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471\/revisions\/474"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iablueprint.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}