Blog: Keeping on with the Broker Diversity Push

Cornell’s article pinpointed that only two of the Top 100 UK commercial lines brokers had women at the helm.

His wider assessment of the top 190 firms, including for instance personal lines players, brought the figure up but only to 3%.

As he rightly pointed out the industry had many questions to answer.

Insurance Age’s recent Freedom of Information request to the Financial Conduct Authority revealed that women hold just 8% of regulator-approved CEO positions.

Accepting the fact that care must be taken when comparing the two data sets, while there has been progress it remains far from a picture of health and balance.

Posts

The wider FOI figures detailed that only 15.7% of six key senior management function posts are held by women.

What is equally concerning is this comes against a backdrop of the FCA noting that across financial services, on both gender and ethnicity, firms actually tend to focus most on improving representation at senior leadership level.

Yet broking has moved from 3% to 8% at a CEO level and comes in at 15.7% overall?

Would moving from 8% to 13%, or even 21%, in the next six years really be enough CEO progress? Surely we can aim higher than that. And when will the overall hit 50%?

Concerns

The watchdog’s observation was issued as it raised concerns about diversity and inclusion strategies across its full remit of regulated businesses.

It noted that the focus on improving representation at senior leadership level came despite data showing that the biggest drop-off was from junior to middle management grades.

Indeed it said it had seen that the representation at senior levels was “only marginally lower than at middle levels”.

And warned: “Such focus [on senior leadership], in isolation, risks creating a culture where firms attempt to ‘poach’ diverse senior talent rather than develop their own pipelines. This is not a sustainable approach and is unlikely to bring meaningful, long-lasting change.”

Campaign

The eagle-eyed among you will have spotted that Insurance Age’s campaign comes with an overarching title and a strapline.

Over the course of the next year we aim to bring as much as possible under the umbrella of Broker Diversity Push at leadership and all levels of the market.

Boosting diversity and inclusion is undoubtedly crucial (see box).

In addition to its findings on gender and ethnicity the FCA also flagged the need to address social mobility, develop work around sexual orientation and give serious consideration to disability and neurodiversity.

It is pleasing that these issues are increasingly coming to the fore in the sector and the campaign will serve to help keep them front of mind. Parts of the scene may currently be stark but it is not one without hope.

Measure

We firmly believe what gets measured gets done.

To that end at the launch of the first section of our campaign we have called on trade bodies to investigate creating a broking industry benchmark and ways of working together to tackle the gender diversity leadership gap.

Biba, the MGAA and Liiba have backed the spirit of this part of the campaign but raised concerns on percentage-based targets and one-size-fits-all approaches.

The proposal was made in the belief that, even if it is not pursued, the call can still be a springboard to find better solutions to the current crisis. In a nutshell the campaign is about raising questions and finding collective answers.

Engage

In this first wave, former CII leader Sian Fisher has shared her views on the need for regular and rigorous measurement, Freedom’s Sam White has given her assessment and top tips while Ardonagh’s Diane Cougill has engaged with her insight on the progress being made at the consolidator.

We can provide a platform for the debate and be a means of best practice exchange. But we will need your help and engagement.

“Very few firms seemed to have understood diversity and inclusion as a fundamental culture issue,” the FCA reported of financial services.

The question is does yours, how can you help and be helped? Get in touch with us and share your thoughts.

Insurance Age looks forward to working together to bring out the best in broking in 2023 and beyond.

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