With a talent crisis looming, what can the insurance industry do to attract young professionals? Patricia Mascarenhas finds a loop hole to this dilemma
The insurance industry in India is on the cusp of a talent crisis as its economic growth over the past decade has been one of the most significant developments in the global economy. According to India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF), India's life insurance sector is the biggest in the world with 36 crore policies. The total market size of the insurance sector in India was US$ 66.4 billion in FY 13 and is projected to touch US$ 350-400 billion by 2020. Owing to our demographic dividend, the sector is growing at a much faster rate, creating a huge requirement for trained manpower. According to ASSOCHAM, this requirement is estimated at 3 million trained insurance professionals by 2030.
To bridge this gap between the supply and demand of qualified insurance professionals in the country, NIIT Institute of Finance, Banking and Insurance Training Ltd. (IFBI) has launched a certificate programme in insurance. This six-month certificate course is designed for SBI General Insurance, a joint venture between State Bank of India and Insurance Australia Group (IAG). It is an “Earn and Learn” programme where students get an opportunity to work under experienced mentors and understand the business dynamics, while pursuing the certification.
The primary objective of the programme is to create professionals who have in-depth knowledge of the sector as well as exposure to actual workings and culture of the corporate world via two-day classroom sessions along with a 4-day On-the-Job Training (OJT) with SBI General Insurance. “Since every student will be placed under an experienced mentor, they get to learn intricacies of the insurance sector and how a corporate operates,” says Bimal Jain, president, NIIT IFBI adding that this OJT will also enable students to earn during the six-month learning period, as per the terms and conditions specified by SBI General. Ravi Khanna, vice president- HR and learning, SBI General Insurance also agrees, “Our association with NIIT IFBI is to bring forth the best in terms of curriculum and faculty,” he says.
The programme is designed to build competencies in the areas of domain specific technical knowledge, application orientation, technology orientation, selling skills and customer service skills. “Topics such as principles of insurance, practice of life insurance, practice of general insurance, professional skills, selling skills and techniques and customer services are covered as a part of the programme,” informs Jain. Skilled professionals, graduates and students who have successfully completed Grade XII in regular mode and are in the 21-40 year-old age group can apply for this course.
Speaking about how the Earn and Learn degree benefits students, student Shivkumar Sarkar says, “This course gives us a gist of both the industry as well as academia. It allows us to gain theoretical and practical knowledge and helps us become familiar with the realities of working,” he adds.
Candidates successfully completing the programme by meeting the performance criteria set by SBI General Insurance during the six-month training period at IFBI, will be absorbed by SBI General Insurance as executives or assistant executives. “They can get into direct sales where they will be responsible for tapping the existing database of customers and prospects and converting potential customers to actual customers,” says Jain adding that they also have an option to become a part of the channels managing insurance agents or bank assurance - where they would be accountable for generating business, leads and interest in a range of SBI General Retail/SME products like long term home insurance, health insurance, motor insurance, fire insurance etc.
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