How to become a 'seller of risk' in 2020

Corporate insurance managers need to reposition themselves from buyers of insurance to sellers of risk, said participants of a recent roundtable held by StrategicRISK in partnership with Allied World.

Discussing the future of insurance management, risk managers were adamant that assimilating and reporting risk-based data to insurance partners is an increasingly important part of securing competitive pricing and coverage in today’s highly competitive soft market.

However, risk managers also stressed this is time-consuming and insurance managers are looking to their insurance partners for assistance with this.

Echoing an earlier theme from other StrategicRISK roundtable discussions, risk managers agreed corporates must better align their insurance strategy to their firm’s corporate strategy, risk appetite and tolerance framework and ERM programme, as one risk manager noted: “There is a solid case to integrate risk and insurance into one function or at least align reporting lines.”

Firms are increasingly exploring self-insurance for specific lines where price and coverage terms are not available, risk managers confirmed but also stressed that maintaining a tripartite relationship between client, broker and insurer is critical especially in a hardening market with continuously changing risk landscape.

Corporate insurance managers will benefit from building closer relationships with their lead underwriters and their following, supporting markets and helping them to understand their business and risk management process. 

Scenario testing policies is critical, particularly new policies in areas such as cyber risk and environmental liability.