HR Corner Creating a global platform by Ada Poon Comprehensive training equips young graduates with local and global expertise Developing competent leaders is important in a people-oriented industry like insurance. To achieve this one key industry player offers diversified training programmes to young graduates, helping them prepare for long-term developments in the highly competitive business environment. Talent management is a key initiative of Zurich Insurance Group (Hong Kong) in grooming insurance professionals and enhancing the company's services. In 2006 it started a 44-week global associate programme (GAP) on top of its two-year management trainee (MT) programme, which aims to recruit and develop local graduates. Focused on training in different specialties, GAP recruits and trains potential graduates to become senior technical experts and leaders in the insurance industry. It combines both classroom and on-the-job training in the participant's home country, with an international assignment and global classroom training in a foreign country. Department heads from various functions and classroom trainers assess the performance of individual trainees. The company's HR department, in turn, completes the overall appraisal for trainees' permanent placements in a specific business segment at the end of the training. Last year, 60 global associates from 10 countries were recruited for GAP and four of these future leaders were from the Greater China region. Kenneth Lai and Florence Cheng were the lucky two who were selected in Hong Kong after a seven-stage screening process. A graduate in earth science, Mr Lai is happy that he can apply his academic knowledge to his daily work. "During the global training we studied catastrophe risk management as it is an important part of insurance. My knowledge of natural disasters such as typhoons and earthquakes enables me to better assess the risk level and calculate the pricing range," he says. The global training in South Africa and assignment in Australia left the pair with great memories. "The global job rotation was a good learning experience which helped us build overseas networks and understand work practice and style in different cultures," notes Ms Cheng. Future leaders While GAP focuses on training in specialised streams, the MT programme is designed to prepare management trainees for the range of duties they will have as managers in the company. It covers both insurance training and management competency development through on-the-job training, mentorship and professional examinations. Trainees are given four half-year placements in different departments to provide them with practical skills and knowledge necessary for working in the insurance industry. Individual performance is rated by department heads and mentors and in accordance with professional examination results. Upon completion of the programme, newly graduated trainees are assigned a role in a specific business segment according to their interests and strengths. Current management trainees Emily Fu and Andrew Tang agree that the training is useful in helping them prepare for a long-term career. "The programme helps me realise that the insurance industry is much bigger than I once thought," Ms Fu says. "Financial planning is more appropriate to describe what we do today and I see tremendous potential in it. The job rotation allows us to have different experience and acquire comprehensive knowledge across departments. It certainly helps in our future career development in the insurance industry." Mr Tang says the training has broadened his horizons and exposed him to the wide variety of insurance services. He adds that people are more receptive to insurance which has become a necessity for most nowadays. Carmen Chiu, manager of Zurich's recruitment centre, graduated from the MT programme a few years ago. She believes it taught her many new things and sharpened her skills in project management and people interaction. All-round skills As the two programmes have different training focuses, their entry requirements vary slightly. "For the MT programme, we are looking for outstanding university graduates from any disciplines," Mandy Wong, the company's head of human resources for Greater China says. "For GAP, we target those who are in the top tier of their graduating classes and have multilingual ability. Nonetheless, in both programmes we look for candidates who are creative, eager to learn and to take challenges, and who possess leadership and communication skills." To impress the panel of interviewers, Ms Wong advises, it is more important for a candidate to demonstrate a positive attitude, common sense, confidence and passion, than extensive technical knowledge. Of course, presentation, problem-solving and analytical skills are indispensable. Both the past and current programme participants believe that continuous learning is important to enhance professionalism and to help them reach the managerial level. As Ms Wong concludes, "We are building our future leaders and senior technical experts to support the company's growth in the long run. These programmes provide many opportunities to graduates and strengthen both their technical and soft skills, which in turn become career-long assets to them individually." Salient points Recruit and develop local graduates via global associate programme and management trainee programme Great exposure through home-country classroom and on-the-job training, international assignment and global classroom training abroad Department heads from various functions and classroom trainers assess performance HR department completes overall appraisal for permanent placement in specific business segments Taken from Career Times 27 July 2007, p. A24 Your comments are welcome at [email protected]