Engaging and Retaining Top Performers

To build the talent required in today's marketplace, insurance and risk management businesses must understand and develop strategies that attract, retain and engage key staff.      

After decades of being an industry of choice for actuaries and other knowledge workers, financial services already faces a scarcity of the very employees it needs the most. The pinch is felt particularly in developing insurance markets like China and India, but even in developed markets, it's getting harder to find the skills needed.

As the demands for technical analysis increase — with the broader industry focus on enterprise risk management, catastrophe modeling and management, competitive market analysis, complex life insurance guarantees and other sophisticated management techniques — the need for financial, actuarial and technology experts will only intensify.

The number of math- and computer-based jobs is predicted to rise across all industries over the next several years. Yet, between 2001 and 2006, enrollment in U.S. college computer science programs declined approximately 40%, a figure that hasn't been made up by increases in other countries. In the U.S. alone, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) predicts a 24% rise in the number of actuarial jobs over the next five years and a decline of available actuaries. Similarly, the BLS predicts an increase of 34% in financial analyst positions and 28% in computer software engineer positions.

How will financial services companies find employees to fill these positions — and convince them to stay? The success of financial services companies depends heavily on having the right people making the right decisions. These people are highly educated, highly compensated and increasingly in demand by other industries.

The need to attract, retain and ultimately engage employees for enhanced performance is driving more and more organizations to turn to their workforce itself for insights on this issue. The sophisticated analytic techniques available today in employee research can help companies better understand what it takes to find and keep the kinds of people they need and, even more importantly, what kind of environment, culture and leadership approach will drive the level of engagement that our research shows improves performance and results.