ReAudio: ReAssess Your Workers Comp Toolbox
ReAudio goes beyond policies and regulations to explore the real impact of workers’ compensation. We break down key industry trends, workplace injury data, and best practices while diving into the human side of recovery. Through expert conversations and powerful stories, we uncover the challenges, emotions, and perspectives that shape the experience for employees and employers alike.
Whether you’re an industry professional or just curious about the system behind workplace injuries, this podcast brings you the facts you need and the stories that matter—because workers’ comp isn’t just about processes, it’s about people.
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ReAudio: ReAssess Your Workers Comp Toolbox
Continuous Learning: A Journey of Curiosity and Growth
Curiosity fuels career growth—that’s the key takeaway from Ronna Ruppelt’s inspiring journey through law, insurance, non-profit leadership, and now partnership at Freeman Mathis & Gary, LLP. From breaking barriers as the only female attorney at her firm to leading major organizational change, Ronna shares how asking “why?” has driven her success.
In this episode, she explores the difference between knowledge, skills, and competencies—and how professionals can strategically develop each. She also opens up about the power of vulnerability, the value of continuous learning, and how to create a culture that supports growth and curiosity.
Whether you’re starting out or seeking fresh momentum, Ronna’s insights offer practical strategies and inspiration for lifelong learning and professional development.
How do you get better at what you do?
Speaker 2:Time management assistance AI.
Speaker 3:Webinars, mentors, open platforms like Coursera Live and virtual Live training. Live course Online Online Online Online Online.
Speaker 1:Online Online Online Online Online Online Online Online Online Online Online Online Online. Focus, communication, regulation and direction.
Speaker 3:REA.
Speaker 1:Audio.
Speaker 3:Rana Ruppelt, thank you so much for being with me and us on REA Audio.
Speaker 3:We've been conversing a little bit back and forth for gosh, it seems like a month or two maybe to try to organize this, and the reason why I asked you to be a guest on REA Audio was because, near the beginning of the year, you had done an article that was posted on LinkedIn called the Value of Continuous Learning, and I imagine people can still find it on LinkedIn Very, very interesting article, because it touched so many different things with regards to learning, both in your employment, in your personal life, and that's what we really like to do at REA Audio is see how we can take beneficial information that you can use in your job but also kind of let it flow over into your life, and so I really appreciate you taking some time to kind of talk about that article and your thoughts on continuous learning and see if we might help a couple people that are listening on kind of on the path to continuous learning.
Speaker 3:So, ronna, thank you, and can you give us a little bit of background? So what do you do? How did you get there and what led you to write this article? That's a whole lot.
Speaker 2:I'll step back and let you go. Yeah, it is. First of all, thank you so much for having me. I'm thrilled to be here.
Speaker 2:So a little bit about my background, and I think it makes sense from a chronological standpoint. I went to law school thinking I was going to be a trial lawyer and soon realized and maybe it was because of the times, maybe not, but I found myself realizing that I wanted to have more of a work-life balance and that I looked at litigation and trial lawyers back at the time as a baby lawyer, as having constant homework, and I said you know, whether it was mature or not, I'm not sure, but I really didn't want to do that. So I went in-house and spent most of my career in-house at carriers. I worked at small regional carriers and large international carriers. I worked at small regional carriers and large international carriers. I worked at the largest carrier in the world at the time. I was there and was always in the claims legal space. I was very fortunate that I got promoted relatively young. I was 29 years old, seven months pregnant and once I got into management, really found that I enjoyed both utilizing my legal skills and knowledge, along with my people skills, my desire to help people become successful. And then, as I advanced in my career, I had the opportunity to do a lot more strategic type work, led at several system integration, led several organizational transformations and really enjoyed that.
Speaker 2:And I then had an opportunity and this kind of goes to how I look at continuous learning I kept thinking about I want to add something to my toolbox. I've been doing a lot of very similar things for many years and I just want to expand my knowledge, capability, skill set and I happen to see a position for a general counsel role at an insurance company and I don't think those come up real often and I applied for that job and left actually an amazing company. I had an incredible role, loved the people, but I wanted to do something different from a skill set standpoint. So I went to a small regional carrier as a general counsel for a few years and then something else arose again and had another opportunity to have input at more of an industry level. So I went over to an association that is in the claims legal space and was the CEO there and I did that for a few years, developed a lot of new skills because it was a not-for-profit something I'd never done professionally before I actually had done some volunteer work in nonprofits, but not professionally. And then I got to the point where I'm toward that later end of my career versus earlier and I said you know, I worked at a law firm when I was a baby lawyer.
Speaker 2:Things are very different now. I spent all my career from being in a carrier looking out at the industry. I want to take that and kind of flip-flop it on its head. So I was looking to go back into a firm and utilize that perspective that I had from so many years of being in-house. So now I joined Freeman Mathis and Gary last summer came in as a partner and responsible for client relations, which is really two components. One is working with our clients to make sure, along with some other, a lot of folks frankly internally, to make sure that we're meeting or exceeding their needs and as many carriers as they want as there are. That's how they define their success. Everyone does it a little differently and because of that they have different expectations for their outside law firms. So that's part of it. Expectations for their outside law firms, so that's part of it. And then the other part is business development is utilizing my knowledge of the industry, our data and external data to identify opportunities for the firm for growth. So that's what I'm doing.
Speaker 3:It sounds like to me that your desire to continue to learn is kind of coupled with a, an adventurism. It's something right, you know, having the having the um, the guts really to go from one role to another that aren't necessarily the exact same role. It doesn't sound like that was something that was done, uh, necessarily for just personal advancement, but it sounds like it's a sense of adventure. It's a sense of wanting to know more and wanting to grow within you as a human being and in your chosen career. And what I found was interesting in your LinkedIn profile it says that you are the person who's always asked why? Yeah, so you? It sounds like that's instilled in you as well.
Speaker 3:And you know, which leads me to kind of the question around the continuous learning. Do you feel like and we'll get more into the specifics of the piece in a few minutes but I'm just kind of curious with your approach to learning and your adventurous kind of personality. If there's somebody who might not have that kind of adventurous personality, who may be happy, just kind of doing their own thing and may not think about continuous learning, but yet kind of has a desire to grow and do more, are there things that people like that can do to kind of spark that adventure or spark that desire for continuous learning. Have you had any experience with folks like that?
Speaker 2:I, you know, I've never really thought of it the way you approach the question, but it makes sense and I think the answer is yes, and I think for people themselves, how to develop that sense of adventure, their curiosity. You know, I think a lot of it comes from really being self-aware and understanding. Where do we derive passion? And it's really interesting because probably toward the end of my first third of my career, I had a manager actually say to me that you bring too much passion to the table.
Speaker 3:Too much passion.
Speaker 2:Too much passion, and I've never really understood that to this day, because I think I know when to step back. So I'm not it's not that I don't bulldoze, I don't, you know, I'd like to think I'm an effective listener, but I think that when there are all things in all of our roles that we love doing and other things that we don't enjoy doing quite as much, so I think it's really that self-awareness and understanding what that is and, from a management perspective, recognizing that in people and being able to put them in situations where they have the opportunity to utilize those things that really give them the most joy and maybe that's the word is joy versus passion, not sure. And then, from a self-awareness standpoint, I think it's really understanding, reading, listening, learning, taking that environment around you and then doing something with it again that truly gives you joy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know you mentioned about a culture of learning in certain organizations, right. Can you talk a? You mentioned about a culture of learning in certain organizations, right. Can you talk a little bit about what that culture of learning means, because it sounds like we're kind of building towards that with people's desires and pointing them in the right direction at an organization, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. And so let's start back. I want to make sure that when I talk about continuous learning for myself as someone that's talking about it what I think about is it's actively seeking knowledge, it's developing new skills, refining your skills and then having competencies. So that's really, for me, the starting point. So when I think about a company that prioritizes those types of things with their employees, that's the starting point of a culture of learning. They provide opportunities for training, both formal and informal. They have mentoring, they have ERGs, those types of things where really I can take it and talk about inclusion, where people feel included, connected to their employer, and that also helps retention.
Speaker 2:Long-term Knowledge sharing, where there are cross-functional teams. There are some companies that actually move people to be either individual contributors or management people in different functional areas and from the outside looking in. You sometimes look in that and say why would that person go and be managing that type of function when they don't know anything about it? But it's that opportunity to expand and to grow. And there are certain skill sets. You may not have that specific technical knowledge, but you have other skill sets that absolutely are transferable. And then there are also the things that a company that is a culture of learning, is encouraging people to look for other opportunities within the company.
Speaker 2:When you have good employees, you don't want them having to leave that company. You really want to be able to keep them. So you do things like you have open internal application process, internal application process. You have it from a standpoint of we want you to talk to your manager so that your manager can help coach you and guide you as you're applying for another job in that organization, and it used to be very much that managers would take things very personally. I always was very excited about it and wanted to help people achieve their professional goals. So again, a company that does that drives the culture of continuous learning and then finally, providing reward and recognition. I think that is you support what you're saying. So all of those together, I think, is the starting point of a culture of learning at an organization.
Speaker 3:So very good guidance steps for someone who is at a company that might want to start creating a culture of learning. So let's put yourself in the place of an employee that might be listening right now and it's like, boy, that would be awesome, I'd love to work at a place like that. How does someone in that position start the spark to a culture of learning at a business?
Speaker 2:That's a great question because there are very few of us that ever are important to us, that we believe can help us flourish in our organization. So the odds are, if we believe that there are others that believe that culture of learning is part of what we want to bring into an organization, we start out by modeling those values and those behaviors. Ourselves Do those things that we personally believe and others will see. And along with that, listening is super important. Listening is so much more important than talking. Providing feedback and suggestions for things that can be done in the organization, share ideas, you know, in those cross-functional teams, utilize those opportunities or suggest those opportunities. There are very few things in a company that doesn't cross several functional areas and bringing cross-functional teams together to solve problems really gets to the best solution most of the time. Supporting others in the organization, cheering them on, developing relationships across your individual silo All of those things, I think, drive that culture of learning.
Speaker 3:And I think it elevates that person to potentially move into a leadership role. All those things you talked about are what good leaders do when they come into a company. You know creating those relationships and you know looking what other people are doing and try to try to understand their roles things like that as well. One of the things that you mentioned in your article is people seeking to actively expand their knowledge, skills and competencies Right, and you kind of touched on all those things in that past explanation and we were kind of chatting before we started recording. You know, like, the differences between, like, a knowledge, a skill and a competency, so can you talk a little bit about how you define those things?
Speaker 2:Sure. So the knowledge is the knowing and that's you know. That's the learnings that you get, both through education, through your experiences, your interactions with people. It's accumulating information. You then have the skills, which is really converting your knowledge into actions, and whether it's a physical skill or whether it's a skill in how you communicate or interact with people, it's a skill, and how you communicate or interact with people it's that. Critical thinking and using that knowledge in a way that it becomes actionable is the skill, and that competency, then, is actually applying it all together. So you know what to do the skills are, or you know what it is. Is the knowledge the skill is you know what to do, then the competency is doing it, utilizing both that knowledge and that skill together.
Speaker 3:So do you feel like you talk also in your piece about curiosity skills, and I think we talked a little bit. You explained a little bit about that when you explained about how an individual who wants to kind of grow within an organization and create that culture, but can you talk a little bit about the curiosity skills that you said kind of define a curious learner?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's really interesting. I have a two-year-old grandson and he's talking up a storm now and everything is pointing at something and saying what's that, what's that, what's that? Nonstop, and that's really, in the most basic sense, how I would define curiosity. I remember being a child and asking my parents, and especially my father, all the time well, tell me about this.
Speaker 2:What does that mean? And it's just, it's that desire to get more and more information and I don't know. I think there's something about. I think you can build that. I think some of us are born with that thirst for knowledge. It was shown to me as a child. My parents were avid readers. I became an avid reader. So I think when you're younger that's how you learn a lot from a formal standpoint. And it's interesting because even today, one of the things I do which is probably not healthy, especially in these days before I go to bed, I read the news I save up to the end of the day.
Speaker 3:Oh boy I read it online. And you sleep okay.
Speaker 2:And I sleep well.
Speaker 3:So what.
Speaker 2:I do is I read a publication that is known to be more left-wing and then I read another publication that's known to be more right-wing, because I want to find quote-unquote the truth somewhere in there, and I know that there are nuggets of things that will satisfy my knowledge for figuring out really what is going on with that how I have utilized that in the workplace is really interesting.
Speaker 2:And again, I don't know if it's just my nature, but for those that don't really recognize it, I think it's important to learn that this is something that can be learned. I started as a carrier in the claims legal role. I didn't know much about insurance, other than we had car insurance and my father had been very sick. So I knew there was disability insurance and I, you know I knew it was out there, but I didn't understand how it works. You know I knew what the purpose was, but so much I didn't know.
Speaker 2:And I came into a company that was a growing organization and I wanted to know and understand all of the functional areas of that insurance company. It happened to be a monoline auto carriers, so there wasn't as much complexity as some of the other carriers have. But I quickly started asking questions and observing, because so many things impact a claim, so many things impacted the legal area, that I had to learn it. But I also wanted to learn it, learn it, and suddenly I found myself getting asked questions about policy services and things like requirements around sending out cancellation notices to our insurers, and I had to learn. And it was a company that was very technologically advanced, so we had to talk through how do we convert things to be able to do it meeting our requirements, but through technology. So I learned about product management and it made me a more valuable employee and as I progressed I brought a lot of different perspectives and I think that really helps set my foundation as I move forward in my career.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's great that you had that background of that curiosity.
Speaker 3:I feel like sometimes and please disagree with me if you do that there's barriers put up to questioning things.
Speaker 3:I can you know, sometimes there's some fear because either you've been at a look at an employer for a certain amount of time and you feel like, well, I should know that already, so I'm not going to ask that question, or you're new to a place and you're the new person and you don't want to ask too many questions because you want to look like you know what the heck's going on, when quite honestly and I'll just be honest, and I would imagine 90 percent of us walking around this world really don't know what's going on as much as we look like we think we know what's going on right, whether it's work or home or whatever. I thought by 50 I'd have it all figured out, and I know less now than I knew when I was 20 years old. So are there ways to overcome those barriers? Do you just have to say you know what, I don't care what people think, I'm just going to ask, or are there strategies that you're aware of that can help people overcome kind of that resistance that you have to ask questions?
Speaker 2:It's an interesting question and I'll get very open and honest with you. I actually early in my career it was very much I don't care what people think.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Not such a good attitude to have to be successful and it took me a little while to understand that, frankly, because it is very important what people think. But you still should ask questions and I'm still. I will be the first person to admit I don't know something. I'll be the first person to admit I'm wrong, and that doesn't matter if I'm talking to a subordinate, a peer or a superior. I just I guess I have enough confidence that I know that not everyone knows everything and we all have questions and if I happen to be the person that speaks up asking the question, there's 10 other people in the room around me that also don't know the answer and they're happy that I'm the one that actually asks the question, so they don't have to.
Speaker 3:Yeah, a little bit of humility really goes a long way in this world, I think, for people to you know. Developing relationships and really personalizing yourself with other people Exactly what you said. I think you know other people are thinking the same thing and they're like, whew, good thing she had the guts to say it Right, that's awesome. So your profile was was recently featured in on workers compensation dot com as part of Women's History Month, so congratulations. I think Dr Claire wrote a very nice piece on you. Dr Claire is a guest of our show many times. She's wonderful. We're so glad to be close with her as well, and I read that piece. It was. It was fantastic, so congratulations on that. I'm so glad I came across that the other day that in this day and age and I know it wasn't that long ago that you were actually asked to not enter a company event through a certain entrance because you were a woman. Can you talk a little bit about that experience?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's interesting because I told this story on stage and the way I presented it. I wanted people to feel what I actually felt and I did not say it was me until afterwards. But let me tell you the story. So I worked at a law firm when I got up. Well, I actually started at this law firm in law school and stayed on as a lawyer when I got out and it was an insurance defense firm with 45 lawyers and I was the only female attorney. So that in itself was interesting A lot of learning there, that's for sure.
Speaker 2:And we were walking over to one of those old institutions that's downtown in a city that at some point in time was very restricted and it has one of those fancy names that you see them in a lot of different cities, but it's where the business elite would go and mingle with each other. And we were going over to a firm lunch and I was walking over with some of my peers Again, I'm the only woman over there and I remember and this was almost 40 years ago and I remember walking up to the front entrance. I had never been there, even though I lived in the city my whole life at that point in time and it was just this beautiful wood carved double doors. There was a doorman at the door and we walk up the steps, people in front of me are walking in. The doorman stops me and says I'm sorry, you can't go in this door.
Speaker 2:And I looked and like it did connect what was going on. Like, I beg your pardon, it's like if you go out to the left and go down the side of the building, there's another entrance and that's the door that you have to go in. And I don't remember what I said but knowing me, I made some kind of smart comment, walked back down the steps and walked around to the side and I do remember my peers were a little confused but no one really said anything. And it was just one of those things that if we spoke up it wasn't going to change anything. That was just how that place did it. So it was interesting and that feeling in the pit of my stomach of exclusion. I vowed I would never cause anyone to feel like that in the workplace or in my personal life.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we talked a little bit before we were recording also about the differences in book smarts and experience smarts, and they're both forms of learning right and although I'm sure at that moment there were a hundred different emotions going on in your mind and head, I'm sure you can. It sounds like you can come away with that obviously as a learning experience of how to treat other people. I'm sorry that you had to go through that, but on the outside or you know, at the end of it it looks like it's. It helped you in a certain in a certain way as well. You talk also about your pivot and push forward approach. Does this kind of, does that kind of, stem from this experience and others, or what does?
Speaker 2:that mean, I would say, and the others. I was very close with my father. He passed away very, very young after a lengthy illness, and I was young and you can't shrivel up and die when you have loss. I'm very much a glass-half-full person. I also judge others based on how I judge myself, which is I am so far from perfect. It's not funny, and what I always would say to people, and I still say when I become perfect, that's how I will judge others Right. So I think that, in addition to being someone that's very goal oriented, you just have to pivot and adapt. You just you move forward. You look at the learnings. It's interesting because even when I interview people, I always ask them about a very professional accomplishment that they're very proud of, and then I ask them about their biggest mistake and what learning they got from that, because to me that's almost more important.
Speaker 2:And people say so many different things, no-transcript.
Speaker 3:What kind of advice?
Speaker 2:would you give somebody starting in either the legal or insurance world today? All right, number one, be your authentic self. All of us brings different things to the table, and we should be very proud of what each of us bring. What I talked about before. Figure out what drives your passion, target positions where you think you'll be able to flex those things that you love doing. Relationships matter and, again, it took me a while to learn that relationships matter, that it is important to care what other people think. Yeah, have integrity, be kind which is the most important thing and have fun.
Speaker 3:That's awesome, Ronna. I hope you come back and talk to us again. This was such an enjoyable conversation. I wish we were able to have gotten this done like a month ago. We've both been you know you travel a lot, I've been traveling a lot as well, and we've finally been able to get together. It was truly a pleasure talking to you and thank you so much for your time. It was great.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me. I'd love to come back anytime.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to REA Audio. I hope we opened up your brain a bit and helped you be better at what you do. Please follow us on Spotify, apple Podcasts, stitcher, amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts. If you have input or suggestions, email Todd at reemployabilitycom. Be grateful and have a fantastic rest of your week.
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