Insurance companies may be ignoring one of their greatest assets--the claims staff.
It wasn’t always so. In the 1970s and early 1980s, when the majority of today’s experienced claims professionals began their careers in insurance, the industry offered a challenging career with a high degree of security. There was a general feeling of satisfaction, both with the company and the profession, with salary increases of 10 percent yearly not uncommon.
Now, however, the industry finds its claims operations struggling with a dearth of new talent, a severe training deficit and a badly fractured career ladder.
Problems for the claims units began in the early 1990s when, in response to a number of industry problems (real estate and record catastrophes, among others), companies often delayed salary increases and limited them to 2 or 3 percent.
