Head of Sales at Proactivos · Nov 2022 to present
Juan Navia
Applying for Forward Deployed Go-to-Market · Handle · Mexico City
I built a 0-to-$1M+ commercial engine inside Colombian insurance, and when the manual work hit its ceiling, I automated it myself.
What I'd bring A GTM playbook built for insurance, nearly four years inside the back office Handle automates, and the technical range to run a pilot without waiting on engineering.
View my work
- 20xgrowth in recurring commissions
- 100+locations served across Colombia
- 7person sales team, built from zero
Origin · Nov 2022, Barranquilla
Where it started
In November 2022, Proactivos was a 3-person insurance agency built around a single purpose: managing the mandatory insurance policies for one hospital.
In a conversation with the owner, one number stood out: that hospital alone generated ~$50,000/year in recurring commissions, just from the insurance it was required to carry.
That was the insight: if one hospital produced that, what could a real commercial operation produce across many?
I was studying International Business at Universidad del Norte at the time. Shortly after that conversation, the owner brought me on as Proactivos' first sales hire. There was no playbook, no CRM, no team; just an opportunity and three people. I built the commercial function from zero.
Track record · 2022 to today
What I built, in numbers
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20x
Growth in recurring commissions
From ~$50K/year on one account to $1M+ across a diversified book
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$1M+
Annual recurring commissions
In insurance commissions managed today
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100+
Locations across Colombia
Hospitals and companies spanning multiple industries
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7
Direct sales hires
Recruited, trained, and led, built from a team of zero
Carrier side · where the trust lives
Insurance is a relationship business.
I run the relationships.
Growing Proactivos wasn't just about closing more accounts. It meant becoming a partner insurance carriers could operate through, not just sell alongside.
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Field force
The carriers put their own salespeople on our accounts
Close to 30 of them in a normal month, visiting clients across Colombia. None of them work for Proactivos: the insurers assign them, and I decide which accounts they visit and what they go there to sell. Getting people to run your playbook when they are not on your payroll is a different problem from managing a team.
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Reconciliation
Trusted with financial accuracy, not just origination
I personally led a full reconciliation audit cross-checking commission statements against Proactivos' internal payroll across three separate entities; the kind of work partners only hand to someone they trust with their numbers, not just their leads.
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Market intelligence
Built proprietary prospecting for insurance sales
A system that combines Colombia's national healthcare provider registry (REPS) with Supersalud financial data to score and prioritize which hospitals and clinics to pursue next, turning a relationship business into a data-informed one, without losing the relationship part.
74,748 REPS records scored and ranked
This is what "insurance experience" actually means day to day: commission reconciliation, coverage negotiations, and enough trust that a carrier puts its own salespeople on your accounts and lets you inside their numbers. It's not adjacent to my background; it is my background.
The case · why this hire
What I'd bring to Handle
I run the commercial side of an insurance agency: a book that has to be renewed every year, a back office held together by hand, and carriers that only talk through their own portals. Handle sells to people like me. This is the part I would not have to learn on the job.
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01GTM
A go-to-market motion built for insurance, not adapted to it
Mandatory coverage as the way in, multi-location accounts as the expansion path, renewals as the recurring line. I recruited, trained, and led 7 reps on that playbook while the book went from one hospital to 100+ locations, and I ran the pipeline myself before there was a team to run it.
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02Market
Colombia's insurance market, from the inside
I prospect from the sources the market actually runs on: the national healthcare provider registry (REPS) and Supersalud financial filings. I know which lines are compulsory, who is required to carry them, how carriers price them, and what a broker's back office looks like on a Tuesday.
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03Network
A network is the output, not the starting point
I did not inherit the relationships I have. I built them: one account at Proactivos, no playbook and no CRM, and nearly four years later that is direct commercial relationships with multiple carriers and 100+ accounts across Colombia. That is the part that travels. I know how carriers decide, how long trust takes to build, and what has to be true before anyone signs, and I am ready to move to Mexico City and run that play again with a product behind me.
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04Partner
Experience turning an agency into something carriers operate through
Not a channel that sells alongside them: close to 30 of their own salespeople working our accounts on my direction, commission reconciliation across three entities, coverage terms negotiated directly, and enough trust to be handed the numbers. Becoming that kind of operating partner is exactly what Handle has to do with every broker and carrier it deploys into.
Deployment · in production today
When the manual part hit its ceiling, I built the system that runs it.
What Carolina is
- A renewals agent for medical liability policies, live in production.
- It reaches clients on WhatsApp and by email, captures the reply, and follows up until the renewal closes.
- Companies hand it to their own employees to issue policies, ask coverage questions, and get quotes.
- The people who used to do this by hand are the ones working alongside it now. I onboarded them myself.
It is here for one reason: it is the same shape of work Handle automates. I designed it, built it, put it in front of clients, and got the team to actually use it.
Twenty turns of one renewal, end to end. Every step names the function that ran, the rule that bounds it and the file it lives in: where the model decides, where it hands off to a person on purpose, and where it stops at the carrier's own portal, the one I have been working by hand for years. The messages the client reads stay in Spanish, the language the system runs in.
01
Detect
A cron opens the renewal 60 days before the policy lapses.
date rule, nothing to interpret
02
Prioritize
The queue decides who gets written to in this run.
capped per run, fail-closed lock
03
Engage
The model reads the reply and picks the next move.
one forced tool call, six output checks
04
Quote
The premium comes out of the rate table.
the model may not write a number
05
Hand off
A person takes the case, and the system picks it back up once the policy is loaded.
the model flags it, the code routes it
The rule that made it safe to put in front of clients the LLM decides and interprets; the code controls and executes.
- 732physicians managed
- 729active policies
- 1,894automated tests
I negotiated the contract and I built the system that runs it. The hard part was never the model; it was getting people to trust it.
Fit · why Handle
Why I'm reaching out
I am not writing this from a place of safety. Proactivos works without me having to prove anything else, and in Barranquilla I know the carriers, the rules, and the people worth knowing. Leaving that to start over somewhere I have to earn all of it again is not the reasonable move.
I am doing it anyway because of what I think is about to happen to this market. Insurance in Latin America still runs on people holding it together by hand: reconciling statements, chasing carriers for a payment status, working portals that were never built to be automated. That is the work Handle is replacing with software, and the companies that get there first will not be the ones with the best model. They will be the ones who understand the operation they are replacing.
Everyone building Handle made some version of that trade before I did. Building something from zero, next to people who see the same thing coming, is the only kind of work that has ever felt like mine.
I am not asking to join Handle once it is obvious this works.
I am asking to help make it obvious.
Closing
Let's talk
I've spent nearly four years being the manual version of what Handle builds.
I'd like to help you replace me.