Hope Aldrich has been president and CEO of Eastern Insurance Group L.L.C. in Natick, Massachusetts, and its predecessor agency, Allied American, for the past 20 years. In that time, the bank-owned brokerage has grown from a $5 million-revenue firm to a more than $80 million firm ranking as the 49th-largest brokerage of U.S. business in Business Insurance’s latest ranking. Starting on the insurer side of the business with Liberty Mutual Insurance Co. before moving over to the brokerage side with Aon P.L.C., Ms. Aldrich is the only female brokerage CEO in the Top 50. She recently spoke with Business Insurance Editor Gavin Souter about changes in the industry, Eastern’s growth and how gender-neutral policies benefit companies. Edited excerpts follow.

Q: How has Eastern managed to grow over the past 20 years?

A: We’re very fortunate in that we are a wholly owned subsidiary of Eastern Bank and we are able to take a longer view in terms of investing in people and also investing in acquisitions. When many banks have stepped back from investment in their insurance operations and even divesting their insurance operations, we have continued to grow and march forward.

Q: What enables you to succeed when some other bank-owned brokers have not?

A: I can’t speak to their challenges, but I know what has been successful for us. I had actually started a selling arrangement with Eastern Bank prior to (Allied American) being acquired by them. After our acquisition, we immediately worked on getting our commercial lenders and others in the bank licensed to sell insurance. They don’t sell it without one of our licensed reps, but they have become integral to our team. We are very material to Eastern Bank — we account for 15% to 20% of their profit. We’ve had great success through many methods in making the cross-sell work, which a few notable bank-owned agencies have done, and we are one of them. It’s all about how you tackle it.

Q: How has organic growth been for Eastern?

A: We are seeing tremendous organic growth. Our organic growth last year was bigger than all but two acquisitions that we’ve done, and we do that every year. We have a very active sales culture. Everybody sells here.

Q: How about acquisitions?

A: There’s been a lot of activity in acquisitions. And we don’t see that abating at all — I’m working on three right now ... We’re looking at one that’s out of state that would have continuing management. We offer the buyer a different value proposition for them and their employees. If they are looking to stay, we have a place for talented sellers and we have wonderful benefits for their employees, which means a lot to our sellers. Many of them care about how their employees are positioned after a sale.

Q: What’s your experience of the insurance market in the Northeast?

A: We are seeing rates in some of the areas go down; for instance, in workers comp the rates are going down almost 13% in July in Massachusetts. We’re seeing a real variation in appetite of insurers for certain lines. Particularly in new business, we’re seeing rates going down slightly, other than in property. What we’re finding in the Northeast, particularly in our area, the economy is terrific and we see that exposures are up. I’ve seen times that were a lot worse than right now. We have the wind at our sails with the economy, certainly.

Q: What proportion of your staff are female?

A: Of the senior managers, it’s 62%, and it’s 65% female (overall).

Q: That seems to be unusual in the insurance brokerage world. How have you achieved that?

A: We have always looked to hire the best people, and oftentimes the best people are women. We are gender-neutral in terms of how we approach hiring and advancing careers, and that is unusual in the brokerage business. The women do as well as men, and I believe it’s proven out in the facts that companies that have women on their boards, in senior management, throughout the management and the companies in general, do better. And we believe that.

Q: It was also unusual when you originally came in to run the agency to have a woman in the top position. How did you land the job?

A: I was known in the New England area for my years of selling and being active in the business, and I was approached by the predecessor company, Allied American, which was owned by an insurance company. The insurance agency at the time was challenged, and it was not doing great. I had a wonderful position at that time at Aon, but I was very attracted by the opportunity and also the fact that the leader of that insurance company was quite a forward-thinking individual. I took a chance, and I’ve been able to bring to Eastern Insurance very talented people from the industry, some of whom I hired into the business years and years ago. We have many from the big brokers, we have many from Liberty Mutual, we have a lot of talent. I know it’s one of the biggest challenges to get the people, but because of our reputation and the bank’s and the benefits that we offer our employees and the opportunities for advancing, both men and women, we have become what I consider an employer of choice. We have people calling us.

Q: Looking forward, what do you see happening for Eastern?

A: For Eastern, I have great optimism that we will continue to grow and make use even more of technology — in terms of data analytics and other technologies — to grow our business. We’re working with some of the best carriers to grow our business efficiently. We are investing in great things for our customers, and our expectation is that the business will continue to flourish. Our customers need our help, and I’m optimistic about the business in general, that things will continue well into the future.