Workers look to distant roles that bring a glimmer of hope to what a balanced work life might look like; while underwriting leaders say remote positions and job opportunities are the most common requests made by new underwriting hires. (Credit: Alexander Limbach/Shutterstock.com)The insurance industry, known as one of the oldest and most traditional industries for a younger generation of workers, is under pressure to change. In the wake of the “massive layoffs,” insurance companies are facing even greater talent challenges than they experienced before the COVID-19 pandemic.
You see, this is reflected in the tug-of-war brewing between bosses and employees in the office work environment. In a post-pandemic environment, across insurance and many other industries, we continue to see workers moving away from traditional in-person jobs in hopes of securing work-from-home positions. leaning towards a more flexible work environment.
This tug-of-war is highlighted by the findings of the Insurance Talent and Tech Trends Survey recently commissioned by my company Convr. The survey examines a statistically significant sample of insurance underwriting leaders and reaffirms that there is a growing talent pool seeking remote work opportunities in today’s insurance labor market. The survey data also strongly suggests that if insurance providers improve their technology stack, they will attract more and better talent; and those workers have a greater ability to work successfully from home.
This is the undeniable future of the labor market in the insurance industry. This requires companies to increase flexibility and modernize their processes to offer more and more remote and hybrid job opportunities, because the appetite for these jobs will only grow from here. Workers look to distant roles that bring a glimmer of hope to what a balanced work life might look like; while underwriting leaders say remote positions and job opportunities are the most common requests made by new underwriting hires. Here’s what the current staffing situation looks like:
- 64% of underwriting leaders say their team is currently understaffed
- 63% of underwriting leaders aren’t sure they have the staff for growth
- 56% of underwriting leaders say more than 20% of their job openings remain unfilled for three months or longer.
Considering a typical day in the life of a commercial property and casualty (P&C) underwriter, it doesn’t take much imagination to understand, with better technological solutions, how many common tasks could be better performed. , if not fully automated – will satisfy employees to work at home while improving productivity.
In fact, 78% percent of underwriting teams say that better technology, internal or outsourced, can prevent employee attrition and keep people on the job longer, with nearly 90% certain that the better technology helps attract young talent. Job satisfaction can only improve with remote work options, as some commercial P&C insurance managers and above believe that remote underwriting workers are less likely to quit than those in the office.
Technology is clearly the direction of today’s underwriting teams, and nearly 85% of leaders already expect more underwriting work to be automated. A big driver may be that most underwriting leaders believe that manual data entry, which is central to an underwriter’s job, is tedious. On any given day, an underwriter typically analyzes information on insurance applications and other sources for sometimes several hours to collect the data needed to determine risk exposures, accurately premiums and coverage amounts.
However, many underwriting teams have a long list of open jobs. The quantitative skills required for underwriting are also in high demand in other industries such as tech and artificial intelligence (AI), so carriers continue to struggle to attract and hire a diverse core of young talent. Additionally, a younger talent pool expects a workplace with digital technology solutions and tools at their fingertips (something traditional brick-and-mortar insurers and reinsurer unknown).
As it turns out, the industry is not fully meeting the needs of the workers. Despite the numbers above, only 10% of insurance leaders say their team tries to attract underwriting talent by offering remote work opportunities. If insurance providers can’t meet workers’ expectations for jobs, they may fall further behind – draining talent and widening the gap between qualified candidates and vacant roles.
Worse, understaffing and unfilled positions increase losses. About 48% of underwriting leaders say staff shortages are negatively impacting their expense ratio. Nearly 44% of commercial P&C executives also indicated that with some frequency, staff shortages cause inaccurate information to inform their quotes. There’s not much optimism surrounding hiring for underwriting teams, however, with only 39% of underwriting leaders confident they’ll meet their hiring quotas by 2023 – a dire number that will continue for many nights this year. An incentive to keep young staff on the job – for a time, at least – by recalibrating the dynamics of how teams work and balance remote life.
To do that, they need to recognize that real change requires more than just new technology. Insurers, producers and reinsurers must begin to shift their organizational mindset and culture. This is the secret of true competitive advantage. If remote roles do not match your operation, another powerful option is to adopt new digital solutions.
By 2023, insurance companies must prepare to transform their underwriting operations and talent management efforts if they want to remain competitive. More and more underwriting tasks can be automated. Remote work remains a huge demand among new employees and future talent. Recent data highlights a critical gap that exists between operational realities and the expectations of effective talent around technology and automation. Thus, technology remains key to recruitment and retention.
John Stammen is the CEO of Convr, which is revolutionizing the commercial underwriting process using cutting-edge AI and decision science. As a company leader, Stammen brings strong critical thinking, vision and strategic planning, along with consistent value creation that creates repeated customer success.
