At the close of Q1 2022, the number of job vacancies in the UK hit a record high of 1,288,000 - an increase of 492,400 from the pre-COVID-19 level recorded in Q1 2020. It’s a statistic that is unlikely to raise many eyebrows among those hiring managers and HR personnel looking to fill job openings in an operating environment colloquially being referred to as “the great resignation”.
A recent report from the recruitment industry data analysts Vacancysoft revealed that UK insurers published an all-time high number of vacancies for risk specialists in Q1 2022. Insurers in England and Wales alone published almost 300 new jobs for risk specialists in the first three months of the year, up 44.3% quarter-on-quarter and 173.6% from Q1 2021.
Amid ongoing conversations about what it will take to convince the next generation of talent to dedicate their professional lives to insurance, experts are consistently underscoring the need for employers to invest in understanding the workforce of the future. To assume that the employees of tomorrow will have the same needs and expectations as the insurance professionals of today is a mistake employers simply cannot afford to make.
Significant research on what the future workforce and workplace might look like has already been carried out by a variety of organisations – and from these studies, several concurrent patterns emerge.
The incoming workforce has a very different idea about what an attractive work-life balance looks like than their predecessors, informed in no small part by the changes COVID-19 has wrought across work environments. Gen-Z is demanding flexibility from their workplace as standard and they’re unafraid to move jobs if this demand is not met – a fact thrown into sharp relief by the insight that most Gen-Zers are expected to work 18 jobs across their lifespan.
An ADP Research Institute report entitled “People at Work 2022: A Global Workforce View" surveyed over 32,000 employees worldwide and found that 71% of 18- to 24-year-olds said that "if my employer insisted on me returning to my workplace full-time, I would consider looking for another job” – as against 64% of the wider workforce.
Gen-Z is a generation that wants it all – a strong work-life balance, fair pay and value alignment – and they’re unafraid to keep looking until they find it. With this in mind, insurance businesses need to start making the preparations necessary to ready their workplaces not just for these demands as they stand, but also for how they are likely to continue to evolve.
Mental wellbeing is a significant consideration for the Gen-Z generation and they expect employers to be suitably cognizant of this. A 2022 survey from the workplace training company TalentLMs revealed that 82% of Gen-Zers want mental health days, while burnout was highlighted as a key reason why they would potentially quit a workplace.
Insurance employers must recognise that they are taking on a generation that has high expectations regarding what a good working environment looks like – and critical to those expectations is being able to access great mental health supports. In many ways this is good news for the insurance profession as it allows employers who prioritise employee mental health, and who create the right support structures, to stand out from the crowd.
A Workmonitor global study of over 35,000 workers by Randstad emphasised that almost half of those surveyed said they would not accept a job at an organisation that didn’t align with their views on social and environmental issues. The upcoming generation is looking for greater social and environmental responsibility from their employers, not as a ‘nice to have’ but rather a must-have.
New data from BUPA highlights that two in three Gen-Zers are anxious about environmental issues, while 63% are feeling the burden of climate change. Meanwhile, 64% say it’s important that employers act on environmental issues and one in three (31%) would turn down roles in companies with poor ESG credentials.
Despite the ever-growing talent gap and the array of demands and expectations that characterise the pipeline of talent exploring opportunities in insurance, the above statistics reveal plenty of good news for insurance employers - particularly considering that what links each of these structures is that insurance has the opportunity to lead real change.
Read next: Wiser Academy launches insurance boot camp
Whether it’s through pioneering flexible work environments, creating strong mental health programmes or taking the lead in rolling out ESG strategies – insurance businesses have a unique chance to make their mark. With these structures in place, the next and most critical step will be to advertise that piper’s call which is the link between insurance and a bright future in such a way that the upcoming workforce has no qualms in following in the dance.
