Organizational Development in Microinsurance (Microinsurance in Focus No. 5)

Publication Date: Dec 2007
Published by: CGAP Working Group on Microinsurance
Document Type: Other (PDF)

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This paper suggests solutions to the problems of organizational development in microinsurance.

This brief examines the problems that organizational development faces in microinsurance and recommends solutions. These include:

• Organizational structure: Organizations that have microinsurance as just a small part of their activities, could:
  
  • Have a small microinsurance department at the head office to respond to queries from field staff and clients;
  • Have a spokesperson for microinsurance within the senior management and on the board;
  • Integrate insurance into the activities of the frontline staff;
  • Hire an insurance specialist at branch level.
• Recruitment: The frontline staff is selected based on their main responsibilities and are lacking in microinsurance experience. This problem can be solved by:
  
  • Considering insurance responsibilities when recruiting people;
  • Recruiting intelligent people with development experience for back office positions;
  • Recruiting insurance specialists and helping them understand the low-income market.
• Training: Organizations should provide training to front-office and back-office staff as well as senior managers, upgrade staff skills and create career paths to ensure retention;
• Compensation: For controlling compensation and high staff turnover, microinsurance organizations should offer incentives that motivate sales and reward client retention.
• Institutional culture: Can be built through encouraging relationship building with the client, after-sales service, easierclaims processing and minimizing claims rejection.