"I always felt that I was pretty progressive when it came to female talent in the industry. Then I started the podcast, and I realised how biased I was, because there’s so much more female talent out there than I ever imagined."
- Sandra Lewin, Founder of 100 Women in Insurance
In September 2023, Sandra Lewin launched the 100 Women in Insurance podcast, which has become a platform for women in the industry to share their careers, struggles, and achievements.
Sandra begins each episode with her mission statement: “Making insurance a career choice, not a chance.” She believes the insurance profession is changing, so “it couldn’t be a better time to showcase the fantastic women in the sector.”
“The idea was to interview women working in what would traditionally be considered male-dominated roles and just see how they do it, show people that they can do it too, and promote the variety of roles out there,” she explained.
“When you're starting something, everyone always says find a niche and stick to it. So, I thought, let's start talking about insurance and showcasing the variety of roles that are available in the market.”
Initially, 100 Women in Insurance focused primarily on female recruitment in the insurance industry, encouraging more people to choose insurance instead of “falling into it.”
As she started searching for women to interview, Sandra thought to herself, 'hang on a second, I'm well connected in the insurance market’ […] “And yet insurance has this stigma around not having enough female talent to progress to senior roles.”
She said: “I think until we move to the phase where we’re attending career fairs and exhibitions, where we’re more visible on social media, where role models are changing, we’ll continue to struggle in terms of people choosing insurance.”
“Everyone on the podcast who said they chose insurance did so because a family member, friend, or someone else had already explained it to them.”
A key topic discussed on the podcast is retention: “It became apparent that even though we do get people in the market, they hit that managerial level around the same time that women typically become a parent or caregiver.
“The structure and culture of an organisation is not necessarily designed to cater for this period of time, which means we either lose that talent completely (as in they leave the corporate world), or we lose it in the sense that these women don’t progress.”
“I was very surprised to find out that often women don’t want to progress because they know that the company isn’t set up to cater for their needs, or there’s an assumption made that they shouldn’t progress,” she added.
Sandra explained that several women she’s spoken to have returned to work, colleagues gained promotions or new opportunities, and whenever they spoke to their managers, they were told, ‘Oh, I didn’t think you wanted this because I thought you wanted to focus on home.’
The 100 Women in Insurance podcast has also helped Sandra become more aware of female role models in the sector, individuals who are becoming increasingly visible via social media platforms such as LinkedIn.
“I always felt that I was pretty progressive when it came to female talent in the industry. Then I started the podcast, and I realised how biased I was, because there’s so much more female talent out there than I ever imagined,” she said.
“Depending on what generation you’re in, and depending on how you’ve been raised, success is often defined by whether you make it to the C-Suite. But in reality, there are so many ways to succeed, and it’s about defining what success means to you.”
Sandra noted that ‘squiggly careers’ are something that many of her interviewees have followed when progressing with their own career goals.
“Squiggly careers have made a lot of women very successful. They’ll be going up and up, and then suddenly they’ll go to the side, try something different, learn something new, go up again, and then maybe take a step back.
“If you experience other aspects of business - learn about risk, then maybe you work in compliance, then explore underwriting - that can make you a better leader,” she explained.
Another trend is the importance of “the honesty and transparency of their desires.” Sandra explained that some interviewees, when onboarding, have said, ‘I want to join your company, but for the next year, I’m going to need every other Friday off and over summer I’m going to work significantly less hours, but in September and October, you’re going to pretty much have me 24/7. I need that kind of flexibility.’
“The reason why they’ve been able to negotiate this is because the focus wasn’t ‘what’s in it for me?’ It was about how it would help the business.”
“It’s about recognising what’s right for you right now, and that even if you make certain choices, it doesn’t determine your future,” she added.
Since launching the podcast, Sandra has gone on to set up the Women in Insurance Collective, which she describes as a “space that women can access for networking, but also coaching, and mentoring programmes for anyone, whether you are part of a big corporation or not.
“After the podcast launched, I started to get inquiries for coffees and meet-ups. I heard that women were listening to the podcast and then connecting over it at conferences. It became a conversation starter for many, and they started to naturally create this community.”
At the time, Sandra felt there was a lack of “feminine networking opportunities and events” in the insurance industry; “A lot of companies get tickets to golf and football clubs, but why don’t we get tickets to Fashion Week, for example?”
The first event organised for the Women in Insurance Collective was Barbie-themed, with the room decked out in pink with balloons, candy, and Barbie boxes. 157 people came through the door; “I was expecting about 40, so it shows you that there is a need.”
“The Collective serves as a global community, offering online networking opportunities, in-person social meetings, and webinars on various topics with the aim of retaining female talent in the sector.”
Sandra noted this intersectional approach is “breaking those barriers and creating a safe space to empower, share stories, and connect on a personal level in your own way.”
“We all live different lives and have experienced different things. When you have a diverse team, you start thinking outside of the box. If we’re all the same, then we’ll all use the same products, whereas if we’ve experienced different things, we can think of different products.
“I think that diversity comes from awareness – when recruiting, we shouldn’t recruit diverse talent just for the sake of bringing in diverse talent, because that in itself creates a very difficult position for both parties,” she concluded.
At the Women’s Recognition Awards (WRAs), we aim to recognise the firms and individuals pushing to make the mortgage, protection and specialist lending markets a better place to work for women and all underrepresented groups.
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