Pros
People within the office and people from other Alera agencies are very knowledgeable and helpful. There is a strong collaboration culture that helps with internal strategies. If a client or you are stalled on an issue, just know there's a colleague at another agency or at corporate who will assist you. If you come from an independent agency, you will enjoy access to national resources. Overall, nice people!
Cons
Managing partners sell to Alera, but still retain control of the day to day operations of the agency. Similar concept to larger competitors like Acrisure or Assured Partners. Managing partners still decide on your growth and your pay. If you're looking for growth or a higher salary, you'll have a better chance at one of the larger houses due to a stronger corporate structure. Resources on the intranet gets moved around a lot. Very clunky. You have to dig through it to find what you need. For being a company that focuses on insurance, the benefits are sub-par to some of the other houses. If you're interviewing between Alera and another company, please do a side by side comparison between the benefits packages. Do this as a favor to yourself. You might realize you'll pay less in benefits, have a higher 401k match, and have stock options (not available at Alera). If we're preaching to our clients to attract and retain employees by having strong benefits, why can't we have the same here at Alera? I've worked at worst places and better places. Alera is just mediocre. If you're not a managing partner or a part of the leadership team at corporate, you could probably do better for yourself elsewhere. At the end of the day, it's what you make of it