New network aims to empower women into leadership roles in insurance sector

The Women’s Insurance Network (WIN), which was created in a move to address gender inequality in the insurance sector, held its inaugural event on Wednesday morning at the Queen’s Picturehouse in Casemates.

The breakfast event marked the official formation of a steering group composed of women working in the industry, aimed at empowering and elevating women to assume more senior roles.

The event saw a significant turnout of companies, sponsors, and industry associations, including the Gibraltar Insurance Institute and the Association for British Insurers.

Their presence was seen as crucial for WIN because broad engagement and collaboration across the sector is vital to the network’s objectives.

“The Gibraltar Insurance Market forms a significant and core part of Gibraltar's Financial Services sector. In 2022 the market's collective premium income for Gibraltar reached around £7 billion,” said Lorraine Povedano, the branch Manager for Chubb Insurance Gibraltar and former President of the Gibraltar Insurance Institute (GII), in her opening speech at the event.

“Employing near 500 individuals and with around 45 licenced firms, Gibraltar is a key player in the UK motor insurance market with a 30% market share and growing exponentially year on year.”

“Gibraltar has the infrastructure, the people, the skills base and the regulatory framework to thrive in a vibrant insurance sector.”

“Women in insurance make up over half of the workforce and although underrepresented in insurance company leadership positions, we can guarantee that the support and interest received over the last few weeks has been the driving force in successfully elevating the Women's Insurance Network.”

“The traction we have gained has certainly given this the launch to collaborate with women in the industry in building what will be a strong and lasting symposium.”

Co-founder of WIN, Erika Pozo, a director at Kroll Global Advisory with 18 years of experience and hailed as a “strong advocate for networking and elevating women working in financial services”, also addressed the women present.

She said that the need for the initiative became apparent during Gibraltar Day in London last year, where a keynote speaker pointed out the lack of female representation in the insurance event and said to her that this needed to “be called out”.

“Even though I had this idea for quite some time, it wasn't until that time and at that point that I was ignited, to come back into Gibraltar and finally set this up,” Ms Pozo told the Chronicle.

“I managed to rope in a few colleagues of mine and a few members from the Gibraltar insurance industry who immediately put their names forward to get involved.”

WIN aims to host quarterly events where it will be engaging with the industry.

“We're hoping to engage and collaborate with the industry on various hot topics surrounding gender inequalities. And basically our main aim is to elevate women to take on more senior roles in the industry,” said Ms Pozo.

“The World Economic Forum says it will take around 100 years to get to gender equality. Those global objectives cannot be met without having national objectives. And national objectives will not be met without having institutions involved and working towards the main goal.”

“I felt that there was definitely a need for a forum to be set up within our industry so that our industry could take a part in the role in trying to enhance diversity and inclusion in the industry.”

Looking towards the rest of 2023, WIN will be at ‘Breaking Barriers’, a Startup Grind event next Wednesday, May 24, at the Sunborn, where both Ms Povedano and Ms Pozo will be representing WIN and will feature as panellists spreading their message to a wider audience.

WIN is also set to take part in a networking workshop in September hosted at Hassans.

“This will be a workshop focused on networking within our industry ran by professionals who are experienced and work in our industry,” said Ms Pozo.