Luke Brannigan recently joined Crawford as People Development Director for the major and complex team, to help sharpen our focus on developing our own colleagues and to grow our pipeline of next-generation loss adjusters. Luke has more than 20 years鈥� insurance industry experience and is passionate about people development in the loss adjusting space, helping colleagues to bring their careers to life and attracting new talent to the profession
Luke says, 鈥渄espite the UK insurance industry鈥檚 significant contribution to the economy, it鈥檚 still perceived to be a poor environment for career growth, and that鈥檚 an area we need to be looking at if we want to be attracting new talent.鈥�
The core issue is that many senior and highly experienced loss adjusters are leaving the profession as they reach retirement. In addition, the next generation of talent is seeking careers with companies that are led by a clear sense of purpose, will help make a real difference to real people and offer acceptable work/life balance. The key is to bridge the gap.
While Luke feels it鈥檚 well worth investing in external candidates for a few highly specialised roles, he sees his real mission as developing expertise from within.
Beyond occasional, highly selective external recruitment, Luke believes the mid- to long-term answer is to shift focus to existing internal resource and to think differently about recruiting fresh talent externally.
鈥淲e鈥檒l provide support and training for internal colleagues 鈥� including those currently in entry-level roles 鈥� who want to develop and aim for loss adjusting in general, but major and complex loss is a growth area in particular for us.鈥�
As for external recruitment, Luke believes that a career in loss adjusting is the best kept secret in the insurance sector 鈥揳nd can genuinely make a difference to people鈥檚 lives. 鈥淭here鈥檚 still a misconception that loss adjusters pay the least we can get away on claims. The truth is that they are our client鈥檚 first point of contact with customers in those moments when lives have been seriously disrupted and when what鈥檚 needed most is a calm, experienced head offering real added value, help, guidance and advice for customers and clients alike.鈥�
Luke sees this as the key to attracting new talent, especially amongst graduates. 鈥淔or somebody looking for a career where they can make a positive impact on the lives of others while acquiring very real technical skills, it doesn鈥檛 get much better than this.鈥�
Luke is already engaged in a mix of new and existing initiatives to further develop careers at graduate level, as well as working to develop outreach programs to get this highly attractive and rewarding career path onto as many candidate wish lists as possible.
Luke says, 鈥渋n 1941, Churchill famously invited the USA to 鈥榞ive us the tools and we will finish the job鈥�. Well, in 2023 and beyond we鈥檙e not only offering candidates the tools, but Crawford will also deliver all the training and mentoring needed to have a fantastic career as a loss adjuster.鈥�
This first appeared in Modern Insurance Magazine.
