Case Study: Insurance Industry Veteran Mike Shean of the Dormie Group in Chicago
The $30M Case That Changed Everything: How AI Helps the Veteran Agent Unlock Hidden Opportunities
Name: Mike Shean
Firm: The Dormie Group
Experience: 25+ years in life insurance
Specialty: Complex, ultra high-net-worth planning
Style: Entrepreneurial, legacy-focused, golf-networked rainmaker
“I've always wanted to be the best,” says Chicago insurance agent Mike Shean. “The advent of AI made it clear I had a choice. Use it or be replaced by it. So I found a partnership with Optifino where AI makes me better.”
A 30-year veteran of the life insurance business, Shean bemoans the glacial pace of change and innovation in the life insurance market. “The industry is archaic,” he says. “[As an agent], you do what you do because that's how you were told to do it, not because it works well. And you don't think twice about it. You don’t question it."
The “aha” moment that shocked him out of his comfort zone was meeting Optifino Co-Founder and Chief Innovation Officer Mike Doniger at a Finseca conference.
At the conference, Doniger explained how Optifino optimizes financial and life insurance planning with cutting-edge AI to streamline case design and portfolio management.
Shean said, “My first reaction was, ‘Oh, this is what’s going to replace me.’ And then it was fear. ‘How is it going to replace me? What are the other parts of my business that are archaic?’”
But the feeling was brief. As Doniger continued to explain Optifino, Shean became increasingly inspired.
“I immediately understood the opportunity. As our conversations continued over the next several months, and he was able to show me the platform, I thought, ‘How can I get in on this?’ Because this is going to change the game.”
The Problem
Shean works with ultra high-net-worth clients and extremely complex cases: legacy considerations, estate plans, and esoteric trust structures. They take a lot of time to design and execute.
“As someone who's been doing this for close to 30 years, you get used to what the business is.” he says. “You just accept it, until someone comes along and says, ‘No, we're not doing it that way anymore.’”
When Optifino showed him he could compare thousands of life insurance policy permutations with elegant, side-by-side visualizations, he realized what he had been settling for:
Legacy processes that were clunky, inefficient, and slow, which is particularly painful for large, complex cases
Frequent back-and-forth with case design teams and delays in responding to client changes and revisions
Limited platforms and the politics of BGA relationships
Archaic culture and outdated tech
The Solution
When Shean began working with the Optifino team, he immediately gained real-time visibility and control over case design and product comparisons.
Now, he can promptly respond to client zigs and zags during meetings. The platform gives him expanded marketplace access with objective, data-backed solutions. Being able to lean on a machine learning approach means that he has an extra check on his personal biases. He embraces Optifino’s AI to amplify his talents, not replace them.
And as an Optifino founding agent, he’s helping shape the platform and spread the word about this modern BGA platform that makes elite advisors “bionic.”
The Results
Shean says there were immediate wins.
"Early on, my old shop quoted across five carriers for a large case. The carriers all collectively said, ‘Sorry, we don’t have anything for this guy.’ He really needed much more coverage than the $10 million of insurance he’d gotten with another carrier the year before, and no one at my old shop called THEM to see if they might want to offer him more.”
It was a simple oversight, but one that illustrates his frustration.
“When I told my Optifino team, they immediately asked, ‘Did anyone call the carrier who sold him the $10m policy?’ They dialed up the carrier who promptly sold him another $30 million of coverage within a month.”
Helping clients secure their legacies for multiple generations is what gets Mike in his seat every day. With Optifino, he can confidently do that by helping clients transfer values, not just wealth. And here’s an unexpected result: He’s reclaiming his independence while building legacy for both his clients and his practice.
“I know there isn't a top with Optifino. As an agent, it can make me more efficient, so I can do whatever I want wherever I want. There is no lid on this thing. There are no limits except the ones I put on myself.”