New effort to develop talent for captive insurance industry

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The Bermuda captive insurance industry is making a new push to attract young Bermudians to careers in the business.

For the first time ever, organisers of the Bermuda Captive Conference have selected a handful of Bermudian college students to attend and learn about the captive industry.

The conference, now in its eighth year, takes place from June 3-6 at the Fairmont Southampton resort. Peter Willitts, chairman of the Bermuda Captive Conference said the insurance industry as a whole is making a concerted effort to better attract young talent.

“The Bermuda Insurance Managers Association (BIMA) is very concerned about bringing young Bermudians in the insurance industry and especially into the captive industry,” Mr Willitts said. “So we reached out to the Bermuda College and asked if there were some student who wished to attend and we were very please with the result. We’re delighted they’re coming so they can see what the captive industry’s about.”

Conference organisers selected six of the top business students at Bermuda College to attend the event all of them interested in pursuing careers in the insurance industry. Selected to attend are Chaundre Burgess, Subira Dill, Andrew Furber, Kandia Hayward, Whitney Ming and Kishana Thomas Quallo.

Mr Willits said the conference, which had a record turnout of 550 attendees last year, provides a platform for the students and industry professionals alike to learn about the most pressing issues facing the captive industry today. He and conference organiser, David Gibbons, said they think the conference will help students see just how large the industry really is.

“A lot of people don’t understand all the opportunities that are out there for young Bermudians in the industry, the variety of jobs and how they all interconnect. So even though this is a captive conference, many captives come to Bermuda because of the large insurance and reinsurance industry here. And there are lots of opportunities there,” he said.

“So one of the things we hope the students get to see is the variety of different people that lie behind the captive industry in Bermuda, how important it is to Bermuda and how important it is for young people to continue to come through because there’s a lot of great talent in Bermuda and we want to make sure they understand where the opportunities lie.

“Developing talent is huge. And we’re committed to that, so we reached out to the college, we reached out to the Bermuda Foundation for Insurance Studies (BFIS),” Mr Willitts said. “We’re reaching out in many areas to try and encourage the people coming up to look at our industry and think hard about it.”

The new effort to involve students in the Bermuda Captive Conference comes on the heels of the first-of-its-kind Captive Education Summit which took place last week, hosted by BIMA and the Bermuda Insurance Institute (BII). It too, sought to bring attention to the captive industry and the opportunities it offers.

“You have a lot of people playing in the captive space and for a long time we were very separate and one of the things this pushes is bringing us together, so that we hit the market together, we talk about the industry together and we’re not seen as competitors but we’re seen as growing the Bermuda industry,” Mr Gibbons said.

Mr Willitts said that the key is attracting good talent to the industry is educating students about the opportunities early on in their studies.

“By the time the next generation comes through, they’re going to have made their decision probably by the second year of college. They’re going to have sort of decided where they’re going to go career-wise, so we’ve got to get to them younger and younger and show them what we’ve got.”

The students readily admit they don’t know much about the captive side of the insurance industry, but they seem eager to learn more.

“It seems like there’s isn’t enough talk about the captive market in Bermuda so I guess what I want to see is what role does that market play,” said Andrew Fubler who is not only studying business administration, but also works full time in the fund administration department of Bank of New York Mellon.

“I’m really interested in the management of risk. It seems like a lot of managers here really take an interest in you and they want to help you grow you and it’s not uncommon to see a CEO or chairman take interest in a kid to impart knowledge to them,” Mr Fubler said. “So I think that it’s an industry that you can grow in and a very rewarding one as well.”

Leslie Robinson, Assistant Director of licensing and authorisations for the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) started and had a long career in the captive insurance industry. She said while most students know a little bit about the insurance and reinsurance industry, they often don’t hear much about the captive side.

“We were here first,” Ms Robinson jokes. “And we’re still here the leading captive domicile. I guess it becomes difficult because you can see the big reinsurance companies. But because most of the captives are managed, you can’t see them, physically.”

But organisers of the conference say the students will have the opportunity to not only learn about the captive industry, but also to meet and network with other students looking to get into the insurance industry.

“It’s not just about Bermudian students. The captive industry is very global and one of the things that we’re doing is we’ve also invited students from Calgary University to come down so students get to see other students from other places that they could potentially be interacting with later,” Mr Gibbons said. “We’re supporting students here, obviously, but we’re also supporting students abroad and encouraging that kind of exposure.”

“I don’t really see this as a one-off opportunity,” he added. “I want to see an involvement with the college and the conference moving forward. And we hope to see the students in the future and continue to build the relationship that we’ve formed here.”

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