Broker CEO Forum: Industry must make talent development ‘strategic and intentional’

Many of the issues around developing and buttressing a talent pipeline for the insurance industry would be aided through making its development both “strategic and intentional” across the sector. 

That was according to Matthew Waters, founder and managing director at insurance recruitment agency Harrison Holgate, who spoke as part of a panel entitled Destination Insurance: Talent pipelines and progression at the recent Insurance Times Broker CEO Forum.

The exclusive event, hosted last week (13 November 2025) at Winchester’s Lainston House, brought together broker leadership from across the country to discuss issues such as regulation, broker performance, cyber penetration and talent pipelines. 

The talent panel, which looked forward to Insurance Times’ January 2026 Destination Insurance event, examined how the UK insurance industry could respond to an upcoming wave of senior retirements and the necessity for bringing new blood into the sector. 

Research published by the London Market Group (LMG) in May 2024, for example, showed that there were as many people aged over 50 working in the market as there were under 30, creating the threat of what Waters referred to as a “hollow middle” in the demographics of the sector workforce. 

Waters added: “What we’re facing now is a demographic for our talent that looks like a dumbbell – there are people at the top and there are people at the bottom, but there’s a gap in the middle. 

“That raises the question of how we intentionally transfer knowledge and talent from one end to the other.” 

Industry solutions

In terms of solutions to ensuring the sector has enough talented people to thrive, panellists suggested that a greater degree of intra-sector collaboration was a necessity alongside making talent development intentional. 

David Nichols, Zurich UK’s head of retail, also joined the panel. He explained: ”Some of the graduate scheme rotations we’ve been able to do, from broker to insurer and insurer to broker, are very fulfilling for the participants, because they provide a really diverse perspective on what a complete career can exist around insurance. 

“We need to become more comfortable in doing more of that because having better, more well rounded individuals that understand all facets of the market is a real investment in the industry of the future. Highlighting all the attractive components of this industry collaboratively across the sector would showcase that there are so many opportunities.”  

A broker chief executive who also joined the panel added: ”We can absolutely be doing more to collaborate on things like work experience, which would be a great way to highlight how much fun it is to work in our industry. 

”I wouldn’t say that we have a real problem attracting young people to the sector, but I would say that it’s hard to get through to them.”

A fun industry?

Getting through to people that may otherwise consider a career in insurance can be made more difficult by the reputational issues surrounding the sector. 

The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII), in its 2024 Talent Shortage Crisis report, described the insurance sector as “stale, pale and male” and as an industry that has long struggled to attract new entrants.

Consequences arising from this perception are also clear. The CII estimated that 25% of the insurance workforce is due to retire within the next decade, while only 4% of young people view insurance as an appealing career choice.

Isabelle Sellick, an 18-year-old apprentice at broker Clegg Gifford, spoke as part of the talent panel at the Broker CEO Forum. 

When asked what could be done to change this perception, she responded: ”People, especially the younger generation, need to be made aware that insurance is an extremely fun industry to work in. 

“There needs to be more marketing to show people that there are so many opportunities in the insurance world, which is so much more than just sitting and looking at a computer five days a week. 

”I couldn’t work somewhere I was bored but working in the insurance industry has given me so many opportunities for meeting people, learning and social events – I’ve never sat there thinking I’m bored.” 

This element of the insurance story is vital to efforts to supplement the insurance talent pipeline. 

As the broker chief executive explained: ”We really need our ambassadors and our promoters to be the young people in our industry more than anything, because I’m not sure that we promote how fun it is to work in insurance enough. 

“We really need to think more about how we can rely on the younger people in our industry to help us to promote ourselves.”