Showcasing the risk profession: an interview with Helen-Clare Pope

Just weeks into her term as Airmic chair, Helen-Clare Pope talks to Airmic News about her year ahead, her desire to transform the image of risk management and why insurers need to respond faster to members’ needs.

"I'm not a believer in having policies for the sake of it," says Helen-Clare Pope, Airmic's new chair. Airmic has many fantastic initiatives that it is pushing through, and continuity at the top can be more effective than radical change for ensuring they are successful, she believes. "Airmic has a long-term plan and I'm not going to change that. It's not healthy to have lots of peaks and troughs".

But this does not mean that Pope is a woman without a vision. Far from it. Pope is passionate about transforming the risk management profession from one which people so often fall into by accident, to a career that is perceived as dynamic and that young people actively seek to be involved in.

“We at Airmic can present a genuine alternative”

Part of this is about changing the perception. "A lot of school leavers and graduates won't have heard of risk management, or if they have they won't realise how much it has to offer, how varied and interesting it is. So it's partly about raising its profile and changing its image - it's about selling it."

Since the financial crisis in 2008, graduates have not been flocking to banking in quite such numbers. This opens up an opportunity, she believes. "We at Airmic can present a genuine alternative," she says.  In keeping with a broader Airmic view that the risk manager of tomorrow needs to be more than just a technician, Pope doesn't just want to target people with risk degrees. "It should appeal to a broad range of backgrounds, including law or engineering, for example."

Pope plans to target school and university leavers to get the risk management profession on their radars. She will be using Airmic’s fastTrack scheme – which is going from strength-to-strength – to showcase the potential it offers to ambitious graduates.

“I want to hear from people. To understand what’s holding them back”

Part of the same mission is achieving diversity. Getting women more involved in the industry is one of her priorities. “It is still too dominated by white middle-aged men,” she says. "As a woman I feel that I have been privileged and lucky - combined with hard work - to get to where I am today and I want the young women coming up through the ranks to have the same opportunities."

Pope is seeking practical solutions. "I don't think that lack of ambition is a problem for women, but I do think that they are more likely to be the carer in the house so a work life balance is more important to them. Therefore we need to be aware, for example, that an Airmic academy meeting scheduled at eight in the morning may not be practical."

But it's not just about female participation. Pope wants to achieve diversity in its broadest sense - including gender, age and geography.  "The typical person at any industry event looks very similar," she says. "And they are usually based in London too". Pope would like to see more events hosted outside London – and importantly, to see them well-attended. “In the past there hasn’t been strong take up, but why is this?” she asks. “I'd like to set up training and networking events around the country and to get Airmic partners involved to tap into their networks to get people active.”

If anything will characterise Pope's year in the chair it will be her desire to hear from Airmic's membership - to understand why some groups are less engaged in the industry than others. "I want to hear from people, to understand what's holding them back. I want to know what I can do to make life easier."

“Insurers are providing solutions for yesterday’s problems”

Turning to the relationship between the risk management and insurance industries, Pope would like to encourage a culture shift: she wants insurers to put Airmic members at the centre of what they do. "In the industry I'm in - and most consumer industries - the customer is at the very heart of what the business does. The insurance industry has got better but they're not there yet."

By way of example she notes that, despite some progress, insurers are still providing solutions for yesterday's problems. In the retail world, she says, a business that doesn't keep apace with the needs of the customer will simply not survive. In insurance, however, there is still complacency, "but actually those that offer products we really want will have a competitive advantage."

Improving this relationship is not going to happen overnight, or indeed in Pope's year as Airmic chair. But she hopes that increasing dialogue between risk managers, insurers and brokers will encourage a greater mutual understanding. “We need to increase the pressure on insurers to respond to our needs.”

In her spare time, Pope is an active member of Girlguiding UK – an institution that she believes is instrumental to developing and inspiring girls. Having joined the Brownies as a 9 year old, she’s now been a leader for over 30 years. It seems fitting then, given Pope’s desire to promote women in risk management, that she has chosen Girlguiding UK as her charity for her year as Airmic chair. “It’s all about helping young women achieve their full potential,” she says. 

Helen-Clare Pope