Next gen careers: How to attract new insurance professionals
Discover three practices the P&C industry can leverage to craft deep talent pools.
When I first entered the insurance industry as an underwriter four decades ago, I never imagined all the doors it would open for me. My father was a police officer. My brother and I were the first people in our family to graduate from college. I knew precious little about the business world, but I committed myself to learning as much as I could and I haven’t stopped. At age 66, I’m still taking tests, earning continuing education credits and expanding my knowledge base.
For people like me who love to learn, a career in insurance provides endless opportunities. In my view, attracting and retaining young professionals starts by helping them ignite their personal passion for learning.
In the business of insurance, it is key to prioritize the “four Ps” — price, product, process, and people. While all four drive business results, people are the most important. When you have the right people in the right environment and give them the right tools, you create an unstoppable team.
Building that winning team starts with investing in your people. For many in the industry, having a full-time staff responsible for career development is essential. Continuing education should not only be encouraged, it should also be required. At Pennsylvania Lumbermens Mutual Insurance Company (PLM), we require our employees to engage in continuing education. We’re constantly reaching out to students in both traditional and non-traditional ways, teaching them about our industry and showing them the potential rewards of a career in our specialty. These are practices our industry must embrace to move forward.
1. Adopt work-study programs for high school students
The earlier companies reach out to students and expose them to the potential benefits of a career in insurance, the better they’ll prepare those young people for future success. Fortunately, a number of employers across our industry have recognized the value of introducing insurance and risk management to high school and college-age individuals.
Offering these students hands-on work experience and mentorship opportunities can help foster a passion for working in the industry that will pay dividends.
For the past several years, we’ve done this effectively by partnering with Cristo Rey Philadelphia High School’s innovative work-study program.
Cristo Rey, a partnership of local educators, businesses, and universities, is a private Catholic high school for students of all faiths. Its work-study program allows driven and talented students from underprivileged communities to gain work experience one day a week, learn real-world skills and earn money they can put toward their college education.
At PLM, we introduce Cristo Rey student interns to insurance and the wood niche. We immerse them into our company culture. We further invest in their careers as they go into college and have even employed a graduate from the Cristo Rey program to be a full-time employee.
2. Strengthen your college internship programs
As college students explore and discover new possible career paths, a traditional internship is a great way to highlight the specialties within insurance and possible career trajectories, as well as offer a gateway into potential post-college job opportunities.
Internships should be more than just basic work experience where students can sometimes feel pigeon-holed and unchallenged. Time and time again, we hear about poorly planned internships where college students are limited to simple tasks like organizing files and handling the phones in just one department. These programs need to provide hands-on work experience across the company so students have the opportunity to envision a future for themselves within the industry or even at that company.
At PLM, we offer internships to college students at their sophomore year and follow up with a junior-year internship. If they complete their junior year internship, we usually offer them a position upon graduation. If the job offer is accepted, they receive $5,000 toward their senior year of college. We also pay 100% of any insurance or professional development courses they take during their internships, including Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU) courses.
Interns rotate through all our departments, meeting seasoned professionals and gaining experience in everything from underwriting, sales and legal to marketing, accounting, and customer service. Our interns also visit insureds and prospects with our loss control and business development representatives.
In 2020, four of our five interns received job offers. In 2021, all five of our interns received job offers.
3. Help your employees do more of what they love
To effectively attract young professionals and outsiders to insurance careers, companies must give their employees opportunities to do the things they want to do the most. Data today indicates that millennials and Gen Z employees want to feel as though they are making a difference with their work. Potential candidates to our industry need to recognize that helping people is at the root of everything we do, whether it’s through the coverage we provide in our policies, our claims service or through our many philanthropic initiatives.
At PLM, we encourage our employees to get involved in their communities through volunteering. For example, a few years ago our employees visited senior living communities throughout Philadelphia. They were there to wash windows, but they also used the opportunity to give bouquets of flowers to each resident. A simple gesture, yet one that embodied the spirit of giving and doing more. We plan several volunteer events like this during the year for employees to participate in. Our employees also love to support charities that make our region’s communities stronger. In fact, in 2021 — despite the pandemic — we had 100% participation in our annual United Way campaign, with more than 150 employees pledging over $80,000, for a total contribution from PLM of $205,411 to benefit programs and services in their local communities.
Aside from charitable giving and volunteering initiatives, we also seek to expose our employees to what they enjoy by introducing them to different aspects of the job and showing them the specialty we serve (the wood niche) in action. For example, we invite newer employees to attend any of the 100 broker shows we participate in nationwide each year. Back in the office, wooden ornaments crafted by our insureds adorn our walls. A wooden racing bike sits in our conference room.
I’ve spent more than 25 years combining the worlds of lumber, building products and insurance. Along the way, I’ve learned a basic lesson: you don’t start a fire with logs. You start it with a tinder that can make the logs warm enough to withhold the flame. In the same way, igniting a young person’s interest in an insurance career takes time and finesse. But once you invest the time and help them see and experience your specialty for themselves, you’ll spark a lifelong passion for learning and light their way toward an enriching career.
John Smith is president and chief executive officer at Pennsylvania Lumbermens Mutual Insurance Company. With more than 40 years in the insurance industry, he has been a part of PLM since 1998.
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