Apprenticeship - Becoming an underwriter

The core competence of the Lloyd's Market is underwriting and the role of the underwriter is to exercise the right sound professional judgement, based on deep knowledge and profound understanding of the subject area and its context.  

There is a strong belief within Lloyd's that competitive advantage in the market is almost totally reliant on the strength and depth of its intellectual capital, i.e. the collective knowledge and capability of its professionals, particularly the teams of underwriters at their "underwriting boxes" in the "Underwriting Room".

The technical knowledge an underwriter has to acquire consists of two parts:-

1. (Increasingly) deep understanding of the specific risk area (technical knowledge).

2. Broad tacit knowledge of e.g. Lloyd's customs and practices; historical background and market precedents, current affairs, the economy, market gossip, who's who in the market etc.

Success as an underwriter comes from developing the necessary depth and range of knowledge and then applying it effectively. 

The acquisition and application of professional knowledge takes time and is best gained through the process of some form of apprenticeship. The individual gradually builds specialist and tacit know-how; gains technical skills and develops business relationships; applying them in increasingly complex and important scenarios, under the guidance of a senior colleague or mentor. 

The early career training and development of underwriting personnel is the best known and documented of the careers at Lloyd's and has evolved over a period of 300 plus years. Such training tends to adopt the following pattern:- 

• Young people are recruited with no previous underwriting experience.
• Individuals then spend the majority of their apprenticeship sitting next to an underwriter in the Underwriting Room at Lloyd's.
• The trainee is also expected to carry out a number of day-to-day tasks such as data entry.
• Underwriters learn the "tricks of the trade" and "market gossip" through debriefings, socialising, actively sharing technical knowledge and market information through technical seminars and team briefings. Such processes will vary from managing agent to managing agent.

The Apprenticeship Phase

Development roles

The development phase
a. Recruit or Market Entrant
b. Apprentice / Examination Student
c. Junior Underwriter i.e. Newly Qualified Staff (ACII or equivalent)

The Apprenticeship Phase will be the pre-requisite to the following more experienced career roles:

The professional phase
d. Class Underwriters

The leadership phase
e. Lead or Syndicate Active Underwriters or Deputies

This guide identifies and codifies the knowledge, skills and competencies required to be a professional underwriter at Lloyd's by concentrating on the following career stages:-

This guide supports professional examination qualifications that underpin such attributes, but acknowledges that:-

• some competencies can be taught and examined
• some can be encouraged and developed through a beneficial corporate culture, including apprenticeships
• some are simply innate

Those in this final category, if they cannot be "trained", need to be identified and recognised during recruitment interviews or early employment selection procedures. This guide is aimed at developing professional staff who will be in a variety of roles and at different stages of their career and will, therefore, have different job requirements in terms of knowledge, skills and competencies.  Similarly, individuals will each have their own profile of capability. 

Training and development activities should be used selectively to address clearly defined development needs in order to help an individual to meet the requirements of a particular job or group of jobs. This guide has been prepared to assist in selecting appropriate activities to meet individual development needs.