"What's the most weight you've ever lifted?" and 9 Questions with Brian Brusoski
Question 1:
Where did you play football, and what position did you play?
Brian Brusoski:
I played football in college and in high school. I played running back and cornerback. In college, you start to gain a lot of weight, so I played strong safety in college. It was a lot of fun.
I went to a small university in southwestern Pennsylvania called Waynesburg University. Our mascot was the yellow jackets. You would've thought that we’d be yellow and black, but we were orange and black. I never understood that.
I don't know if they got the uniforms on sale or what, but we were the ‘orange and black’ yellow jackets.
Question 2:
Where did you grow up?
Brian Brusoski:
I grew up in western Pennsylvania about 20 miles east of Pittsburgh in a small, small town called Irwin in Westmoreland County. We were kind of a suburban farm community.
I was the baby of the family and I have two older brothers. We were all born four years apart. My oldest brother, Jeff, went to the Naval Academy, and middle brother, Dale, works for the state department of vehicles in Virginia.
My two brothers are smaller than me. I outgrew them when I was in eighth grade. They both took their senior pictures in the same sport coat. My oldest brother graduated in '76, and then my middle brother in '80.
I wore the same sport coat in my eighth-grade picture. These are up on my parents' wall. Jeff's graduation. Dale's graduation. And then my eighth-grade picture. Same sport coat.
Question 3:
What's the most weight you've ever lifted?
Brian Brusoski:
For bench press, I’ve lifted 405 pounds.
I had really short legs—but very thick—and I was kind of a powerful from that perspective. I remember doing the leg press, the 45-degree leg press, I did 1,000 pounds.
Looking back, it was kind of stupid. Leg press is kind of a meathead thing. Lots of guys could say, “I can do a 1,000-pound leg press." Yeah, but you know what? It's a 45-degree angle, so what does that really mean at the end of the day, you know? How much are you really lifting?
It's tough lifting weights as you get older. All the old aches and pains, the shoulder problems and everything else.
I lift with my wife now. We do more of an aerobic lift. We try to do 20-22 sets in 35 minutes, so you just continually move, move, move. You do medium weight and just high reps. The heavy weightlifting days are long gone.
Question 4:
How did you get into insurance?
Brian Brusoski:
I grew up in the insurance world. My father worked for CNA, and my uncle worked for Travelers, so I had some bandwidth as far as understanding the industry.
I went to college for accounting. I wanted to do tax. I was intrigued by the tax code. This was during the '86 tax code change, so I wanted to go into public accounting. Well, back in the day, you couldn't go directly into a “Big 8” firm into the tax area, so I went to work for the IRS in the corporate area. After a couple months of sitting in a room doing audits, I learned it’s just not my cup of tea.
I had also worked in an insurance agency through college, so I had some contacts on the carrier side, and that's how I hooked up with Travelers. I moved around working for travelers in Pittsburgh, Hartford and Columbus.
If you want to avoid talking to people at parties when they ask, "What do you do?" just say, "Oh, I'm an accountant for the IRS." They’re gone.
Question 5:
Why is Keystone partnering with Agency KPI?
Brian Brusoski:
What we see in AgencyKPI is the ability to solve a problem that no one else has been able to solve.
Too often, technology companies build a product and then they try to put the product into a problem.
AgencyKPI was developed with the problem already in its line of sight and to solve a problem that all networks have, which is being able to extract data, whether it's from the carriers, the agents, or the disparate agency management systems. All networks have this problem. The entire network chain of command had the same exact problem.
No one had been able to solve that problem. I don't think anybody really looked at the problem.
Question 6:
How great is a Tide To Go pen?
Brian Brusoski:
I’ve carried a Tide pen in my computer bag for probably 25 years. Back in the day, we'd have to wear ties everywhere. I'm a pretty neat guy, but for whatever reason, I just cannot eat without splashing food on my tie.
I don't wear ties anymore, but to this day, I still splash. In fact, I made a commitment to myself when I moved away from the carrier side, “I'm never wearing a tie again.” And I haven't. But I still carry a Tide pen because it's inevitable that I always splash my shirt. Always.
You would think that it would be only when I was eating something red or something like that. I can splash anything, even just water. Somehow, I will stain my shirt with water. So thank God for Tide pens.
Brian and his wife, Maggie, and their Super Dog, Lucy.
Question 7:
True or false: Is Howard Stern your preferred radio program when you’re driving?
Brian Brusoski:
It was. I listened to Howard Stern or sports radio. In the past two years, I've migrated a little bit away from it, just because I'm a little bit known as a cheapskate. I subscribe to SiriusXM, but I don't pay for the upgrade.
But I was an avid fan. In fact, I would have the app on my phone so I could listen to it even if I was in a rental car.
Question 8:
Best bourbon?
Brian Brusoski:
You can have your Van Winkle, and your Hirsch, and all of the Buffalo Trace, you know? Or those $1000-$3,000 bottles. They're great.
I like Maker's Mark. I've been a Maker's Mark Ambassador member for the last 25 years. I've been a member of their Ambassador Club. I just like it. It's smooth. It's not as oaky as some of the other bourbons, and it's not that expensive.
If you look in my bourbon counter, I've got Four Roses, Bulleit, Baker's and Booker's. Those are probably my mainstream types of bourbons that I go for. Of course, if somebody wants to give me a Van Winkle or a thousand-dollar bottle, I would take it. I would gladly take it.
You know what, I'll give you my bargain-barrel one that I always fall back on if I'm having a lot of buddies come over and they'll drink me out of house and home. People always scoff at this, but Jim Beam Black. If you've ever had Jim Beam Black, it's a very good bourbon for very low cost. Jim Beam Black is a really good bourbon. So if you're having a lot of people over and you don't want to go broke, that's my fallback.
Question 9:
What bothers you more, loud chewers or long emails?
Brian Brusoski:
Both. I can't stand either of them. Frankly, long emails are probably my biggest pet peeve.
With loud chewing, I can kind of look away and concentrate on something else. But long emails just drive me crazy!