Lack of diversity not surprising, but sobering:Lloyd's

Fixing the culture at Lloyd's is going to be "a long haul" said Lloyd's chairman Bruce Carnegie-Brown at a media roundtable in Monte Carlo today on the sidelines of Les Rendez-Vous de Septembre.

To coincide with the start of the Dive-In Festival Lloyd’s will be publishing the results of a major survey it sent out to 40,000 market participants to solicit inputs for the future of Lloyd’s. “The results were not surprising, but they were sobering,” Mr Carnegie-Brown said.

Remedial steps to be implemented by Lloyd’s to address issues as diverse as gender imbalance and wellbeing in the workplace. “It’s disappointing that we haven’t made more progress to date,” he said. But he warned that, “We may go backwards before we go forwards,” alluding to the fact that once a culture of openness takes hold within the marketplace, it is possible that more evidence of lack of diversity will emerge – and it will also have to be addressed.

Mr Carnegie-Brown’s commitment to improvement seemed beyond doubt as he said, “As a regulator of the market, we have the power needed to sort it out.” In addition to the issue of culture, the other areas of focus for Lloyd’s in the immediate future are performance and the future of Lloyd’s.

With regards to performance Mr Carnegie-Brown said, “Lloyd’s has never really been as robust as it should have been. We are in the process of trying to force out $4bn worth of bad business and replace it with $7bn of opportunity.” In terms of the future of Lloyd’s Mr Carnegie-Brown was equally bullish. “We’ve seen encouraging feedback from the market – including the media,” he said. “Moving from dreams to action will be much harder. We’ve got to do it in stages. You can’t do it all at once.”

He also said, “On 30 September you can expect to see some more ideas of ‘Blueprint 1’ that will turn from proof of concept to execution – and we will continue to interact with the market.” Lloyd’s CEO John Neal said, “If we don’t take measurable, tangible action, it’s not going to work.” Addressing the issue of market performance he said, “We must simplify the process and reduce the cost of doing business with Lloyd’s,” and this “represents a huge opportunity for the wholesale fraternity.”

Source: Asia Insurance Review