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Insurance Companies & Agencies · Corporate brokers
HR for Corporate Brokers: Relationship Managers, Placing Teams and Client Servicing
A corporate insurance broker is a small, expert business that lives on client relationships. A few senior people hold the accounts, and their move to a rival can take a large part of the book with them.
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Share your requirementsA corporate insurance broker advises businesses on their insurance needs, places the cover with insurers and services it through the year. Staff include relationship managers who hold client accounts, placing and technical specialists who negotiate with insurers, claims servicing teams who help clients through a loss, and an operations team that issues documents. The firm is usually small, with a few senior partners or directors whose personal relationships bring in the largest accounts. Staff are well educated and move easily. Clients stay with people more than with firms, so the way the firm treats its key people affects its income. The wider BFSI hub covers what financial employers share.
- Plan
- Hire
- Onboard
- Manage
- Develop
- Perform
- Engage
- Retain
- Exit
- Improve
When HR is weak in corporate brokers, you may see
- Clients follow people, not the firm
- Specialists are hard to hire and harder to replace
- Claims servicing carries clients' worst days
- Juniors learn by sitting near seniors
- Pay is negotiated person by person
- Technical experts are promoted into management
These are the places the people side of this kind of business tends to give way. The rest of this page works through them.
Who does the work in corporate brokers
HR here has to work for each of these groups, not only the office. The set-up below is written with all of them in mind.
- Relationship managers
- Account executives
- Placing and technical specialists
- Claims servicing executives
- Client servicing and renewal coordinators
- Employee benefits advisers
- Operations and documentation staff
- Business development managers
- Directors and partners
Where HR strains in corporate brokers
Clients follow people, not the firm
A senior relationship manager who leaves can take accounts with them, so the firm's income rests on a few people's goodwill.
Specialists are hard to hire and harder to replace
A good placing specialist with a feel for insurers is scarce, and the firm cannot cover for them when they are away.
Claims servicing carries clients' worst days
The team helps clients through losses, in tight timelines, and is rarely credited when a claim goes well.
Juniors learn by sitting near seniors
Account executives pick up skill from whoever they work for, and the best seniors may be too busy to teach.
Pay is negotiated person by person
Directors strike deals with key staff one at a time, so colleagues in similar roles find they earn different amounts.
Technical experts are promoted into management
A strong account handler becomes a team head with no training in managing people, and the team suffers for it.
HR topics for corporate brokers
Start with the topics that matter most here: Career and Succession Management; Organisation Design; Compensation, Payroll and Benefits. Then work through the rest. Each topic is written for banking, financial services and insurance, not in general.
Career and Succession Management
Named backups for the roles that cannot be vacant.
Organisation Design
Structure, reporting lines and who is allowed to decide what.
Compensation, Payroll and Benefits
Salary structure, payroll inputs and a month that closes on time.
HR Strategy and Workforce Planning
How many people, in which roles, by when — and what they will cost.
Recruitment and Talent Acquisition
Requisition to joining, the same way every time.
Onboarding and Probation
A first day that is the same for the fifth joiner as the first.
Employee Administration
Records, attendance, leave and the day-to-day HR that must simply work.
Performance Management
Goals, reviews and ratings that hold up in a conversation.
Learning and Development
Training planned from need rather than from the calendar.
Employee Engagement and Experience
Communication, recognition and the conditions people actually work in.
Employee Relations
Two routes — one for complaints, one for conduct — kept separate.
Policies, Compliance and Governance
Policies a manager can apply, and obligations with owners and dates.
Health, Safety and Wellbeing
Induction, records, incident reporting and follow-through.
Retention and Attrition Management
Who leaves, when, why — and which of them mattered.
Exit and Alumni Management
Resignation to relieving letter, in a defined order.
HR Technology and Automation
Records that survive people, and approvals that do not queue.
HR Analytics and Management Reporting
A short monthly pack management actually reads.
HR Operations and Governance
An HR function that runs the same way every month.
What a working HR set-up looks like
The pieces a corporate brokers business puts in place, in an order that makes each easier. Open any card for the detail.
Spread the relationship across more than one person
Every large client has a lead and a second contact who both know the account, and meetings include both.
What this coversHide
Spread the relationship across more than one person
Every large client has a lead and a second contact who both know the account, and meetings include both.
What this coversHideEvery large client has a lead and a second contact who both know the account, and meetings include both. See succession planning.
Map specialist skills and cover
A table of who can place which class and who is the back-up, with training time for the back-up.
What this coversHide
Map specialist skills and cover
A table of who can place which class and who is the back-up, with training time for the back-up.
What this coversHideA table of who can place which class and who is the back-up, with training time for the back-up. The competency management work builds it.
Support the claims desk
Case review, a limit on open claims per person and recognition when a client says thanks.
What this coversHide
Support the claims desk
Case review, a limit on open claims per person and recognition when a client says thanks.
What this coversHideCase review, a limit on open claims per person and recognition when a client says thanks.
Train managers before they manage
A short programme for newly promoted team heads on delegation, feedback and one-to-ones.
What this coversHide
Train managers before they manage
A short programme for newly promoted team heads on delegation, feedback and one-to-ones.
What this coversHideA short programme for newly promoted team heads on delegation, feedback and one-to-ones. See the manager development programme.
Set pay bands for each role
Bands for executive, manager and specialist levels, set against comparable firms.
What this coversHide
Set pay bands for each role
Bands for executive, manager and specialist levels, set against comparable firms.
What this coversHideBands for executive, manager and specialist levels, set against comparable firms. The compensation benchmarking work gives the reference.
Start by checking where you stand
Before changing anything, find out what is true today. These checks take an afternoon and tell you which of the topics above to start with.
Share your requirements- List your ten largest clients and who holds the relationship for each.
- Ask which specialists have no trained back-up.
- Ask the claims team how many open claims each person carries.
- Check what training was given to the last newly promoted team head.
- Compare pay across three people in similar roles.
- Confirm with a qualified professional the rules on broker appointments, client money, conduct, record keeping and employment that apply to a broking firm like yours.
Confirm with a qualified professional. What applies to you depends on your business, your state and your arrangements, and it changes. This page describes practice. It does not state a legal position.
How GullyHR helps
The services below fit this kind of business best. Each starts by recording where you stand, and every later report compares against that. We do not promise outcomes.
- Succession planning
Cover and succession for the people who hold large client relationships and rare placing skills.
- Competency and talent management
A map of specialist skills and back-ups, with a growth path for account executives.
- Manager development programme
Training for newly promoted team heads who have never managed people.
- Compensation benchmarking
Pay bands for executive, manager and specialist roles set against comparable firms.
Start with a free conversation, or see the paid HR Diagnostic.
Our HR transformation approach
- 1
Assess
Understand the business, its workforce, current processes and HR challenges.
- 2
Identify gaps
Find the missing, weak, inconsistent or person-dependent processes.
- 3
Design
Create the structure, processes, policies, SOPs, dashboards and systems needed.
- 4
Implement
Help HR and department managers actually adopt the new system.
- 5
Automate
Digitise repetitive and approval-based workflows where it is worth doing.
- 6
Measure
Track hiring, attendance, employee cost, performance, training and attrition.
- 7
Improve
Strengthen the people-management system continuously, not once.
Blogs worth reading first
From the GullyHR blog: one on HR in banking, financial services and insurance, and one on each of the topics this page points to.
HR Management
"What if this person resigned tomorrow?" A succession exercise for small companies
A two-hour exercise that names the roles you could not fill quickly, who could cover them, and what readiness would actually require.
7 min readRead article
HR Management
Everyone reports to the founder: when and how to redesign the structure
A flat structure works until the founder becomes the only route to a decision. How to tell when you have passed that point, and how to redesign without a reorganisation.
8 min readRead article
Industries
Incentives that reward quality, not just output, in industrial component makers
How to design incentives for operators, setters and inspectors in fastener, gear, spring and valve units so that accepted lots, not piece counts, earn the bonus.
7 min readRead articleMore on the GullyHR blog.
Questions owners ask
Make sure at least two people know each large account, share meetings and files, and give the key person a stake in the firm's success. No arrangement is perfect, but spread reduces the risk.
Pair each junior with a senior, give them parts of live accounts, hold a weekly case discussion and set a list of skills to master. Time to teach must be planned or it disappears.
Use bands by role level, with room for individual skill and results. A shared structure removes surprise comparisons while keeping flexibility for scarce specialists.
They were promoted for technical skill and have no training in people work. A short programme on delegation, feedback and one-to-ones, with a mentor, helps them find their feet.
Cap open claims per person, review cases together, rotate heavy claims and recognise good outcomes. A manager who listens to the team after a hard case is worth more than a generic wellness event.
We would list your largest clients with their relationship holders, ask where specialist skills are single-point and look at how pay is set. A first job is often a relationship cover plan with pay bands. Scope is written for your approval.
More on HR for banking, financial services and insurance
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See all HR topics for banking, financial services and insurance, or another industry.