Insurance ProfitAbility - The Insurance Simulation

The Programme

Insurance ProfitAbility is a board-based simulation of the insurance industry. It simulates the insurance business with customers in 3 market segments - ie. individual, SMEs and Corporates as well in 3 geographies. This engaging and challenging simulation is for managers and staff at all levels of the insurance sector. It creates a greater understanding of how gross underwriting margin is computed against insurance premiums and claims as well as the level of expenses incurred in ensuring a lean back-end operation.

Who Should Attend

This programme is designed for professionals at all levels within in the insurance industry looking to develop a broader and strategic understanding of the business.

The Objectives

The programme was originally developed for Bupa in the UK and is designed to give a global overview of how the insurance business works and to make the learning of strategic planning, marketing and financial concepts as easy and enjoyable as possible. It is a fast-paced and highly challenging programme that focuses on the following goals

1. Financial Understanding
a. Understanding impact on key insurance ratios eg. Solvency Ratio, Net Loss Ratio, Net Operating Expense Ratio based on decisions made
b. Understanding the P&L and the Balance Sheet.
c. Importance of cash, allocation of resources, difference between cash and profit.
d. Creating value and the financial impact of operational decisions

2. Analysis
a. To make the realisation on how the participant’s role and actions impacts the business objectives of their organisation. Includes analysis of Market trends – external, environmental scans and situational audits

3. Business Planning
a. To make the connection between business strategies employed and eventual financial performance of the company

The Insurance Simulation

Each participant is part of a management team managing an insurance company, in competition with five other teams. Each team will decide on which geographical markets to enter (Home, Europe or Asia) and on which customer segments to compete in (Individual, SME or Corporate), make capital and operational investments, take out loans, research the competition and make decisions based on their position in the marketplace. Each customer segment (Individual, SME or Corporate), has different criteria for customer retention and new business.

The goal is to outperform the competitors by creating more profit and value than them, while maintaining cash flow. In between each competitive round, participants receive teaching inputs to enhance the learning. The ‘Insurance ProfitAbility’ programme will simulate up to 4 - 6 financial years over a period of 2 days.

Each ‘year’, and after making strategic initiatives to retain or win new contracts and make the necessary investment in infrastructure, customer facing and back-office technology, participants would need to prepare a financial analysis of their respective team’s performance. The facilitator in turn facilitates a debriefing session on key learning points.