For the first time and starting this week, Ausure is holding Emerging Talent Days around the country. The firm, one of Australia’s largest AR networks, has staged professional development days for several years but the new initiative, said Adam Sloan (pictured above), targets Ausure’s younger employees and combines educational and networking opportunities.
Sloan, the firm’s Brisbane-based head of sales and blended broking, is attending all three events. The first is in his home city, followed by Newcastle and Melbourne. He expects about 50 people to attend.
“Something I’ve been really passionate about for a while now is investing in the future of the industry,” he said.
Sloan told Insurance Business that part of that passion is motivated by the fact that insurance is an aging industry.
“There’s not a lot of young talent floating around,” he said. “So we want to invest in the future leaders of the industry and particularly the future leaders in the Ausure group.”
However, he estimated that roughly half of Ausure’s ARs are under 35 but, unlike older peers, he said these younger professionals don’t get as much opportunity to network with insurers and other stakeholders. This is despite being on the “front line” of the business.
“A lot of the principals and directors of business that get out and about to network with the insurers – they tend to be in the older category,” said Sloan. “The ones that are younger that are actually on the phone, dealing with clients and insurers day in and day out, don’t get the opportunity to network very often.”
The events, he said, are a way to “shift the dial” and “do something different.”
Aged 34, Sloan would qualify for the Emerging Talent Days but he’s there to speak. Managing director Troy Brown, the firm’s broking manager, and the claims manager are also there to make presentations.
“I’ll be speaking at each one and we’ve got all of our key partners coming - so all the key partner insurers and our training and promotion program partners,” he said. “We’re going to talk about leadership, goal setting, mental health and career opportunities and career growth.”
Sloan said his presentation will emphasise goal setting.
“My focus is on goal setting and habits, talking around writing them down and having an actual plan but keep keeping it simple as well, so not overcomplicating it,” he said. “Obviously, habits and goal setting merge into one because you’ve got to build good habits to then achieve those goals but it’s really for some of the younger guys or gals that don’t make that part of their routine and trying to change their way of thinking a little.”
Sloan said he hopes attendees can make use of his advice for both career goals and day to day personal goal setting.
Each event runs from 9am to 4pm.
“That’s followed with a networking event at the tail end of the day where they’ll get to mingle with insurers and key partners,” he said.
Like Sloan, Gillian Davidson, a senior commercial insurance partner with Sparke Helmore Lawyers, is also concerned about nurturing the industry’s future talent.
Earlier this year on a trip to London, Davidson was able to observe the talent shortage at Lloyd’s firsthand. She was particularly struck by the aging workforce.
“I think it’s a reality across a lot of markets,” she said. Davidson said Caroline Wagstaff, CEO of the London Market Group (LMG), shared some telling statistics with her.
“What her statistics showed was that there were more people in the London market over the age of 50 than there were under the age of 30,” she said. “This was something that she and her organization are committed to trying to rebalance.”
One way Wagstaff’s organisation is trying to do this, said Davidson, is by presenting potential recruits with a good “story”.
“They’re recognising that they need to have a story, they need to have a narrative, around what participating in a career in the insurance industry means,” she said.
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