Recent Projects

Training

Financial Planning Training The brief here was from a major Indian Bancassurer to develop an on-line financial planning training course for all of its HNWI relationship managers. The purpose of the course was to train them on the principles and practices of Financial Planning in order to equip them to have a better conversation with their 'Priviledge Banking' customers. And of course the ultimate goal was to increase the sale of insurance and wealth management products , which was achieved. For this project, we prepared the curriculum, produced all the content, white labelled our Learning Management System for them and loaded all of the content on to it. The Course consisted of 12 video lessons, a quizz at the end of each lesson as well as a chance to enter their reflection on what they just learned and how it could be used in the business. Content included: *Basic Principles of Financial Planning *Understanding Insurance *Having the 'right' investment conversation *Preparing the Financial Plan *Key skills that every relationship manager must have. We also introduced gamification into the program, which proved to be a great way of keeping the students engaged. A series of Financial Planning models, such as: Rupee Cost Averaging, The Cost of Waiting, Insurance Needs Fact-Finder were also produced and avialable for download from the course. The students hailed the course as a great learning experience and ultimately over 640 people enrolled into the course.

Bancassurance Masterclass We have been running an annual Bancassurance Masterclass for one of Africa's largest financial services companies for the past 5 years. Previously, we would travel to a number of countries across the continent and present a 3 day Bancassurance Masterclass to invited business partners and staff, it was always well attended and was a highlight of the annual marketing program. Due to the pandemic, the decision was taken to move Masterclass on-line. We produce all the content and then train their staff on how present and record it. This gives them the opportunity to showcase selected staff as Bancassurance subject matter experts. We load the content onto our Learning Management System that has been white labelled for them. The masterclass lasts for a period of one month to enable students time to complete the on-line learning modules. The first week of the Masterclass period also includes a series of live webinars where our client presents their outlook and strategy for the coming year. For this year's Masterclass we took all of the content from previous years, refreshed it, added new content for this year and organised it all into 5 individual courses that students could select from: *Bancassurance Strategy *Bancassurance Sales Training *Digital Bancassurance *High Net Worth Bancassurance *Bancassurance Product This year there were over 500 enrolments from across the continent into one or more of the courses. As we had, in effect, developed a comprehensive on-line Bancassurance Training Academy, the decision was taken that, as a resource, it was too valuable to take down at the end of the Masterclass period and the site is now permanently available for business partners and their staff.

Bancassurance Consulting

Asia-Pac Best Practice Bancassurance Project For this project we were engaged to assist with a major benchmarking exercise for one of Asia Pac's largest Banks and their Insurance Partner. The purpose of the exercise was to benchmark best practice across the various Bancassurance channels (Branch, Digital, Direct etc) in 5 major markets in support of a number of a number of key planned regional and local initiatives. We were asked to benchmark competitor activity with aim of developing an understanding of what industry/best practice looks like in each country. This was done in order to help inform their decision making process around those key regional initiatives, e.g., were they competitive against competitor propositions? We were asked to gather and report on benchmarking data around matters such as : *Best practice in lead generation. *Best practice in activity management. *Best practice in customer segmentation and targeting (for insurance). *Best practice in digitised sales processes. *And a number of other Bancassurance best practices. In order to undertak the assignment, we developed a series of benchmarks and subsequently sourced data from a wide variety of sources in order to provide the required information. We also prepared a branch mystery shopper exercise for each of the markets where we co-ordinated a mystery shop of the client's branches as well as key competitors. It was quite a revealing exercise and confirmed that the Bancassurance market across Asia-Pac, particularly in the more developed economies, is sophisticated and competitive. Where we continue to see major gaps are : Branch culture, training, sales training in particular, product design and referral processes.

Launch of Bancassurance for a Major African Bank We were enaged by a major African Bank that had just established a wholly owned Insurance subsidiary with a composite licence. This really was a 'first principles' assignment as it was the first Bancassurance operation ever permitted by the regulator. In order to proceed, we first set up an appropriate project management framework by establishing a series of committees including a steering committee of senior executives, a cross functional operations committee composed of the executives charged with implementation and a cross functional Product and Marketing committee. We also prepared charters for each committee in order to clearly eastablish agreed outcomes and responsibilities, along with a comprehensive gantt chart based project plan and process. Areas covered in the project included: *Development and documentation of key operational areas. *Development of an effective referral/lead management process. *Development and documentation of in-branch insurance procedures. *Development and documentation of accounting and audit procedures and standards. *Development and delivery of required training. *Development and documentation of necessary compliance/ regulatory policies and procedures. *Preparation of the Marketing plan. *Development and documentation of the recognition and reward philosophy and policy. *Development of the Product roadmap for the channel. *Development of a series of bundled product solutions for key retail and commercial market segments. *Development of a Sales and revenue forecasting model. *Development of the In-branch sales model. *Development of the HNW channel sales model. This was a highly detailed project, neccesitated at least in part due to the unchartered waters and the likely intense scrutiny on its success, or otherwise, both by the regulator and the broader market. The channel was successfully launched in full confidence that the necessary infrastructure for a fully functioning Bancassurance channel in place from day one.

Investment Governance

Investment Governance Project for a Major Charity We were approched by a major charity who were looking to improve the return from their corpus, which at that time was invested solely in term deposits. The decision to invest in a portfolio of income and growth assets is not one to be taken lightly, particularly when the corpus is largely comprised of donated money. The Board was acutely conscious of its governance responsibilities as stewards of that capital. We took them through a detailed process that is designed to give comfort to The Board that, regardless of the outcome, they could proceed in confidence, knowing that they had discharged their Board responsibities in a competent and effective manner. That process was: 1- Initial Board meeting to discuss what they were trying to achieve, unpick the difference between their risk appetite and risk tolerance and discuss if there were any governance or legal restrictions that we needed to be aware of. We then presented that discussion back to them as a Board paper to confirm we were all on the same page with regards to the 'rules of the road'. 2- The next step was to prepare a properly structured risk register with them, based solely around the decision to invest in a portfolio of income and growth assets. This is now a key Board governance document and is refereshed annually. 3 -Once the risk register was approved, we were able to prepare a comprehensive Investement Policy Statement, which is the governing document setting out all the paramaters governing the investment of their corpus, including: *Key risk and return metrics *Appointment and removal of investment advisors. *Board delegations (to the investment commitee). *Investmeny grade benchmarks. *Permitted assets. *Excluded asset. This was adopted as a Board policy and is reviewed annually. 4- Following adoption of the Investment Policy we developed an Expression for the Provision of Investment Services and invited 3 suitably qualified firms to submit a response. As a part of the process, they all participated in a 'beauty parade' where they presented their proposals to the Board Investment Committee. Ultimately, a reccomendation was put to The Board, which was accepted, and the corpus was invested as proposed and in accordance with the approved investment policy. 5- We remained engaged to assist with any transition issues - AML/CTF in particular and continue to have an on-going engagement where we produce a bespoke quarterly report that provides the information The Board believes it needs to discharge its duties, over see the activities of the appointed investment advisor and respond to any ad-hoc queries or issues that may arise. The Board expressed their satisfaction with the process and the outcome and were confident to proceed knowing that they could clearly demonstrate good process and good governance around the decision to seek increased return through increased risk.

Whatsapp Insurance

Pay-as you-go On-Demand insurance For this WhatsApp project we assisted in the development of an innovative on-demand, pay-as-you go local travel accident insurance policy, sold through WhatsApp for one of Africa's largest insurance companies. The policy is designed for individuals travelling on regional inter-city buses. The cover lasts as long as the trip and because we have links with Google maps the system estimates the time of the trip. Upon confirmation of an accident and injury, the claim is immediately paid. We positioned the product as 'first responder insurance'. Customers apply either via a telephone number of QR Code, both of which are prominently displayed at the bus terminal. Upon enquiry, they customer is greeted by an intelligent chatbot that takes through the entire process from initial enquiry through to sale, payment and fulfilment and onto claim if necessary. To enable this functionality, the system contains a comprehensive administration 'back-end' where, in addition to sale, payment and fulfilment, customers can update their details, lodge claims and make enquiries. The system is also linked to a call centre where client activity is monitored and an operative can intervene if necessary, e.g.' if a purchase process is abandoned. The system can be either stand-alone, which makes for a very rapid implementation schedule, or linked to the in-house insurance systems via API. Clients often choose to begin in stand alone mode , in order to facilitate rapid deployment, with a plan to subsequently integrate. What was clear as we progressed the project was that the Turnkey nature of system required very little in the way of I.T resources from our client, rather it was primarily a product design and marketing project. From signing of contract, though to launch, took 3 months, a remarkably quick turn around time for a project that introduced a number of ground breaking innovations for our client, including a new to market style of insurance contract along with a sophisticated end-to-end solution for selling insurance through WhatsApp,