David Harney was appointed CEO of Irish Life Group in April this year
David takes over the leadership of Irish Life at a very interesting time and Ciaran Phelan, CEO, IBA met him to get his views
David, you took up the role of CEO of Irish Life Group on July 1st, how have you found the transition to the new role?
I was honoured and delighted to be selected for the job having worked with Irish Life Group my entire career. Prior to being appointed CEO I headed up the Group’s corporate business and I was a member of the senior leadership team and before that I worked across sales, marketing, finance and actuarial services. This breadth of experience has provided me with a tremendous overview of the operations of the business. Clearly, stepping into the CEO role brings with it new responsibilities, opportunities and challenges and this is what makes the role so exciting. It’s also a really exciting time for our business as we look towards developments, investments and the recent acquisition of our Irish Life Health business. Since taking up the position, I have been getting around the businesses to meet management and staff and I have been engaging with other key stakeholders around our priorities for the business. This has been a very rewarding process and I look forward to working with the leadership team and our wider colleagues around the entire business to deliver on our ambitious plans. You’ve mentioned the recent addition of Irish Life Health to your portfolio of services, what was the thinking behind that?
We are in the business of health protection and wealth creation so the expansion into health insurance was a logical move. Through the acquisition of GloHealth and Aviva Health we brought together two very strong existing businesses which, when supported by the market knowledge and financial strength of Irish Life Group, has created a significant and innovative force in the Irish health insurance market. It is our intention that Irish Life Health will become the quality and value benchmark for health insurance in Ireland. What do you see as Irish Life’s key strengths? We are financially strong and committed to Ireland. We are a member of the Great-West Lifeco group which has over $1.2 trillion in assets under administration and our owners have ambitious plans for our continued growth and development in Ireland. Our size, scale and financial strength coupled with our leadership position in pensions, investment and life insurance in Ireland enables us to invest in the business to deliver better outcomes for all of our clients. We are focussed on delivering strong outcomes for all of our customers – whether they are individuals, small businesses, or major employers and affinity groups. Our clients are a significant proportion of the Irish population and we are committed to meeting their needs. One example of this is our investment capability. With over €60 billion in assets under management, Irish Life Investment Managers is a leading fund manager in Ireland. We are using this scale to deliver innovative solutions such as MAPS to ensure clients get investment solutions that best fit their needs.
“Customers are at the centre of every broker’s universe and every broker wants to ensure that she or he is delivering the best service and providing the optimal advice to their customers. We are working with experts to develop programmes to enhance brokers’ ability to advise, as well as constantly improving our strong customer proposition to meet the ‘best advice’ hurdle”
“My ambition is to further enhance Irish Life’s position as the most trusted, respected and innovative provider of wealth creation and health protection products to a growing base of customers in Ireland. In order to achieve this, we will have to ensure that we continue to create a rewarding and exciting workplace for our employees and enhance our position as brokers’ number one supporter”
Another example is in the area of advice. We believe totally in the value of advice to ensure that people in Ireland have access to expertise that will give them a better financial future. To achieve this we are focussed on partnership with advisers and we want to be at the forefront of helping them do what they do best – advising clients in making optimal decisions. Numerous studies show that clients who work with a financial advisor out-perform those who don’t by as much as 3% per annum – and the key difference is the adviser’s ability to manage client behaviour. We are working with world renowned experts to develop products and programmes to ensure that advisors are as skilled at managing human behaviour and emotion as they are at managing their clients’ investment portfolios. What are your immediate priorities? The needs of all of our customers continue to come first. We will work to provide best in class solutions and empower customers to make more informed decisions by providing accessible and transparent information, ensuring they have access to expert advice and guidance and a more personalised approach. Technological innovation will be critical to our future success in terms of all of our interactions with our customers, and we will continue to generate new ideas that will sustain and enhance our competitive edge. We have very strong core competencies in the areas of product development, technical knowledge, risk management, investment management and sales and distribution. It will be important that we maintain and enhance our best-in-class position across these areas. Finally, we will work with the wider industry, policy-makers and Government to support the cause of both our customers and our industry in terms of how policy or other legislative changes impact pensions, investments and health. Ireland has some unique demographics, how relevant are they to Irish Life’s business? We have a unique set of demographics in this country. The baby boom that took place in most western countries after the Second World War did not materialise in Ireland until the 1970s and 1980s which means that Ireland’s baby boomers are still working while their EU equivalents are now retiring.
This presents a huge opportunity for both our business and brokers’ businesses. As these people transition towards middle age and retirement, their requirements in terms of future financial planning, income protection and wealth creation significantly increase. As a result of the recent economic crash, many Irish investors are still risk adverse and not setting aside enough for retirement. We see it as part of our responsibility and commitment to both clients and advisers to educate people on the impact of their behaviour on their future financial security and help them make good financial decisions in an informed way. We are uniquely positioned in the marketplace to support brokers and deliver for our customers across these areas. There has been a lot of debate around the adequacy of pension provisions. What’s your view on this issue? Only 29% of Irish people know how much they need to live on in retirement and only 50% of people working in the private sector have a pension plan at all. Many of those are underfunded because people don’t know what they have or need, or they can’t afford to fund them. The creation of adequate pension provisions for retirement is a growing issue and concern. We have been at the forefront of the debate about how to solve this issue. There seems to be consensus now that a soft mandatory (or opt out) model is the best solution. We feel strongly that this needs to be offered in an environment that builds on the current pension structures, such as PRSAs and occupational schemes, and also that any solution is structured in a way that allows people access to advice. As stated earlier, our research shows that advised customers fare better and it is important that we do not lose sight of that. Irish Life works closely with independent brokers throughout the country. How do you see this relationship evolving in the future? The broker network is very important to Irish Life and it’s a critical channel for our business. We continue to work closely with our broker partners to deliver the best possible service
“We are a member of the Great-West Lifeco group which has over $1.2 trillion in assets under administration and our owners have ambitious plans for our continued growth
and development in Ireland. Our size, scale and fi nancial strength coupled with our leadership position in pensions, investment and life insurance in Ireland enables us to invest in the business to deliver better outcomes for all of our clients”
“We have very strong core competencies in the areas of product development, technical knowledge, risk management, investment management and sales and distribution. It will be important that we maintain and enhance our best-in-class position across these areas”
David Harney, CEO, Irish Life Group.
to them and ultimately their customers. Customers are at the centre of every broker’s universe and every broker wants to ensure that she or he is delivering the best service and providing the optimal advice to their customers. We are working with experts to develop programmes to enhance brokers’ abilities to advise, as well as constantly improving our strong customer proposition to meet the “best advice” hurdle. The challenge we all face is that technology is empowering consumers and we need to continue to invest in innovation to ensure that we remain relevant, meet the needs of our customers and create operational efficiencies for brokers to make things easier for them, reduce cost or develop their business. What’s your ambition for the business? My ambition is to further enhance Irish Life’s position as the most trusted, respected and innovative provider of wealth creation and health protection products to a growing base of customers in Ireland. In order to achieve this, we will have to ensure that we continue to create a rewarding and exciting workplace for our employees and enhance our position as brokers’ number one supporter. We’ve been honoured to win the IBA award for best life company for the last six years and will continue to strive to improve the way we interact with brokers to make things easier. While we know there will be challenges to overcome, the fundamentals underpinning the industry are very sound and by working together, we will seize the tremendous opportunities that lie ahead.
