Mr Lee’s career thus far seems to have followed a fairly predictable pattern – he gets approached to take on a new role and he accepts the challenge since, he himself admitted, he “just can’t say no”.
He confessed this on the morning that we spoke, three weeks into his new role as director of underwriting and claims at PruProtect – the latest company to poach Mr Lee, this time from his previous role as deputy chief underwriter for Canada Life.
But, he explained, the decision to make the transition to PruProtect was not taken lightly – especially given that Mr Lee formed part of a succession plan for the top spot of chief underwriter at Canada Life.
“PruProtect is known for its ongoing innovation and product development,” he said. “But I really had to be convinced and enthusiastic about the prospects and the commitments of the company. I was and that is why I am here.”
Going back more than 20 years, how Mr Lee found himself on the underwriting side of his first employer, General Portfolio, was not necessarily a traditional route.
Mr Lee said: “I got into financial services as a trainee with a local employer, General Portfolio, after doing my A-levels. The truth of the matter is that I met my current wife at the company and she was my boss in a non-underwriting function. A job came up in underwriting and I thought it would be a good idea not to work for my future wife.”
He continued: “It was a very fast-paced company and that was a good grounding for me. I moved to Canada Life, which was focusing on the IFA market – as opposed to General Portfolio, which was direct sales – something that was all the rage at the time. The role gave me exposure to the IFA market and particularly large cases, and high sum-insured risks.”
It was from here that Mr Lee was first approached to take on a new role, at the time by Swiss Re, to join its underwriting team.
Mr Lee added: “I spent about five years there. Being at a reinsurer gives you a much wider perspective of the industry on a global basis and I carved out a niche again on the larger risks. After five years I was approached by Reinsurance Group of America who was very new to the UK at the time. That was a real contrast to Swiss Re – the way of working was completely different to a reinsurer, so that was an exciting couple of years. Then I joined the life market at Lloyd’s, which was a completely different world compared to the company market.”
It was then that Mr Lee took all his cumulative experience and turned his hand to consulting for three years.
He explained: “The timing seemed right for me at the time. I was lucky to be able to do it off the back of a year’s contract to get me going with Partnership, which then led into another year, so that gave me the confidence to do it.
“I gained all the things you do when running your own business: having to think on your feet, being innovative and learning to be self-sufficient. That was running pretty well until the whole economic crash in 2008/2009, which made it a bit tricky to be honest with you. So when I was offered an employed position again with Canada Life, it seemed quite a sensible thing to do being a family man with a mortgage. That was all going quite nicely until PruProtect approached me and here I am.”
So, three weeks in, how has it all been going?
Mr Lee admitted that it is a “learning curve”, but he is confident that he is working with a product that is “best in breed”.
He added: “I am going to be building on the underwriting processes and excellence that we have got in place, focusing on innovation and seeing how we can carry on supporting the fact that the product is, I believe, best in breed. As we expand the product range, I want to make sure that the underwriting proposition we have is also recognised as being best in breed alongside the product – that is my main focus.”
The main challenge, according to Mr Lee, is simply going to be maintaining the high quality of service that the company is known for.
Mr Lee said: “We are launching at some point into the wealth management space so that will potentially be a slightly different breed of adviser and we have recruited extensively to make sure we have got a proposition that is going to lead the market there. So that is one of my first challenges: to make sure that we have got everything in place on the underwriting side to support that wealth management proposition.”
He concluded: “PruProtect is always trying to make sure that underwriters are accessible to the advisers and that is not always something that you can get at other companies. So obviously as we are scaling up and writing more business we need to make sure we have got the right people in place that are accessible and of the right calibre to deliver that. It is worth noting that it is potentially a slightly different adviser that we have been dealing with as they are moving into the protection space often driven by the RDR so we need to make sure that we can support them appropriately.”
The only question now is whether Mr Lee will be able to say “no” to the next company that approaches him.
Amy Ellis is senior features writer of Financial Adviser
CV: Darren Lee
2013 PruProtect: Director of underwriting and claims
2009 Canada Life: Deputy chief underwriter, Develop and implement Canada Life’s underwriting philosophy across the UK business units
2006 Big Picture Underwriting: Underwriting Consultant Director of own company
2003 R.J. Kiln & Co. Limited, Lloyd’s: Lloyd’s Underwriter, Responsible for growing and profitably underwriting a niche book of specialised Term Life risks
2001 Reinsurance Group of America: UK chief underwriter, Joined as deputy chief underwriter and promoted within one year
1996 M&G/Swiss Re: Senior Underwriter, Introduced the “field underwriting” concept to the UK market whereby the underwriter provides onsite underwriting services
1994 Canada Life: Senior Underwriter, Underwriting life, critical illness and income protection risks
1989 General Portfolio: Underwriter, Underwriting life, critical illness and income protection risks sold by the company’s direct sales force
