Gain the broad knowledge and industry insight you need for a successful career in the insurance industry

At its heart, insurance is very simple: risk is accepted in return for premium. Done properly, the customer gets the protection they want and the insurer makes a profit. Insurance may be perceived as being boring but the reality is that it is a dynamic, challenging and highly competitive industry: more so now than ever before.

This course is intentionally distinct from the more traditional “introduction to insurance” course aimed at new joiners at the start of a technical career. This is designed for managers and professionals who are new to the industry, perhaps in direct or indirect supporting roles. They need to understand the insurance industry, its structure and business models, its processes and language and – most importantly- the critical success factors, opportunities and challenges it faces today.

It is especially relevant to senior managers from across the financial services industry whose roles may be in other sectors but who might nevertheless come into contact with insurance.

You’ll gain all the technical, regulatory and market information you need to support your professional development.

The Course Agenda

The insurance business model

• Meeting customer needs and making a profit: the challenge of selling a product before you know the product costs.
• The main differences between life and general insurance
• A summary of the principles of insurance and how they embedded in the policy. And contract certainty!

Types of insurances companies

• General insurers
• Reinsurers
• Life offices
• Composities
• Monolines
• Mutuals
• MGAs
• Captives

Distribution dynamics

• Who sells
• Who buys
• The intermediaries and everything in between

The London subscription market

• Lloyds and the companies’ market

The insurance process

• Capital and capacity: risk-based capital management.
• Underwriting: “there is no such thing as a bad risk, just a bad price”
• The relationship between insurance and reinsurance: Managing risk and improving capital efficiency comes at a cost.
• Claims: “reserving: the key Profit and Loss driver
• Investment: is investment income a bonus or a requirement. “An investment trust with a rather expensive hobby”? Warren Buffet
• The key performance ratios: ROC, ROE, Combined Ratio

Industry risks and challenges

• Capital adequacy and governance (Solvency II)
• Business model disrupters and economic/social/ climate change
• How is the industry evolving to meet them?

An introduction to how insurance is regulated

• Achieving customer protection
• Maintaining industry confidence and mitigating financial risk