Busy man Peter Blanc (pictured), who is at the helm of a brokerage group that has already made two acquisitions in the first week of the year, has big plans as the new president of the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII).
“We need to reach consensus on what we, as a profession, want the CII to be during the next five years,” said the Aston Lark group chief executive, who succeeded Aon UK boss Julie Page as CII president on January 01.
“My aims as president will be to support the current and new CEO in any way I can while working to further the CII agenda in building public trust in the insurance and personal finance profession, and make sure we are effective in solving unmet needs and underlining the importance of advice in society.”
The new president plans to make good use of the feedback from CII’s recent consultation “Shaping the Future Together,” which allowed members to share their views on proposals for how the professional body will work. Insights from the consultation are slated to be published in February.
Blanc stressed: “The insurance and personal finance profession needs to work together to address the unmet needs that exist today – everything from climate change and flooding to cyber risk, scams, later-life care, and protection gaps.
“All the drivers in society today tend to be away from advice – they are aiming to cut out the middleman and get the quickest deal at the cheapest price, but I worry that is not the right answer for the majority of the public.”
Meanwhile CII chief executive Sian Fisher, who is stepping down at the end of March, pointed to the importance of continued evolution.
“Our Royal Charter requires us to work to secure and justify the confidence of the public in the financial planning and insurance professions,” she asserted. “Above all, we want to ensure that what we do – and how we do it – helps our members to support their clients in becoming more financially resilient and achieving their financial goals.
“As a key enabler of the 21st century economy, it is vital that our family of professions – together with their professional body – continue to evolve in step with the modern world, which is why we look forward to working with Peter in continuing his predecessor Julie Page’s presidential work on unmet needs as well as using the feedback we received from the consultation to help shape the future of our profession, the CII Group, and the societies and local institutes that exist within it.”
The CII consists of 125,000 members who maintain continuous professional development and abide by a code of ethics as part of their commitment to high professional standards.
