Airmic to partner universities; warns of looming talent gap

Airmic today announced plans to partner UK universities in an initiative designed to inject young talent into the risk management profession, develop the broader business skills of its membership and form academic liaisons. The association warned that the profession must do more to retain relevance in a changing world, or experience a talent gap.

The initiative, Growing the Profession, will see Airmic work with six universities which offer undergraduate and Master’s degrees in risk, insurance and affiliated subjects. The universities are: University of Southampton Business School, City Business School, Cranfield School of Management, University of Nottingham Business School, Glasgow School for Business and Society and University of Exeter Business School.

Airmic will introduce students to the professional world of risk management, offering places at Airmic events such as the annual conference and the Enterprise Risk Management and FastTrack Forums. Students will be given access to the association’s technical output and thought leadership, and offered mentoring opportunities and the chance to meet students and young professionals in the same field.

Clive Clarke, Airmic’s chairman, put the youth agenda under the spotlight when he took over as chair in June last year. According to Clarke, risk management and insurance are wrongly in the shadow of other industries as a graduate career choice.

“To put it simply, the continued relevance and success of our profession will suffer if we don’t act soon to inject young talent. The business world is changing fast – faster than ever – and risk management is changing with it,” Clarke commented.

He added: “The type of skills required of a risk manager in ten years’ time will therefore be quite different to the skillset of the 40 and 50 somethings running the industry today. We need to adapt as a profession and open the door to graduates or we will be facing a huge gap in knowledge and experience.”

Under the same initiative, Airmic has launched a 12-month professional development programme with City Business School, entitled Tomorrow’s Risk Leaders, for current members who aspire to have strategic roles within their organisations. In recognition that risk managers are increasingly required to have broader business skills and to participate in board-level conversations, the programme will equip them with the business knowledge and communication skills to take their careers to a new level. It will include a series of lectures, networking events, soft skills development and personal mentoring.

Julia Graham, Airmic’s deputy CEO, who is driving the programme, said: “We are incredibly excited about Growing the Profession. At the heart of this project is the professional development of our members, our future members and the risk management community as a whole. The response from universities has been overwhelmingly positive and we’re delighted to have 24 students at the conference today.”

For further information, please contact Jessica Titherington, Titherington PR, +44(0)7733 261445, jessica.titherington@airmic.com

Note to editors:

Airmic is the UK association for risk managers and insurance buyers. Its annual conference, Things To Come: Risk in Transformation, takes place at the ICC, Birmingham June 12-14.

For more information on Growing the Profession, Airmic has published a covering note, The Professional Journey, and four brochures covering: membership, university partnerships, fastTrack and Tomorrow’s Risk Leaders. Please contact Jessica Titherington for more information or to receive copies.