The next member of WCL we want to introduce you to in our ‘People behind the tech’ series is Nathan Holloway who joined WCL in 2021 as an Account Manager to support WCL’s ongoing growth. Nathan joined the insurance market 18 years ago as a broker and moved to working in the insurtech space over five years ago.
Name: Nathan Holloway
Job title: Account Manager
1. Can you tell us about your career journey so far?
Like a lot of people, I landed in an insurance job pretty much by accident. It’s a long way from my childhood dream of flying jets in the RAF. But I’ve been in the market now for 18 years and have no regrets. After a few years learning the ropes as a retail broker I moved to my first B2B role selling to brokers. This proved to be the best decision I could have made, as I found my calling. I enjoy selling to insurance professionals as they understand their clients and their businesses, which often makes for interesting and rewarding conversations. Having found my way into the world of insurtech, I feel I have found a winning combination. I get to work with all the amazing people in the insurance market but also using my love of technology to help these businesses realise their goals.
2. What is an average day in the life of an Accounts Manager?
The Account Manager role within a business like WCL will always play a key role in supporting our customers achieve their operational goals– we don’t just sell our products; we support p businesses in their transformation objectives. WCL has a great mix of clients from both inside and outside the London market and my role is to ensure that they get the most value from us, and that are fully aware of the depth of offerings we have. My job is to articulate the understand the bigger picture and what benefits can be realised when WCL’s products are used in conjunction with one another.
WCL has a great mix of clients from the London market and beyond and my role is to ensure that they get the most value from us, and that are fully aware of the depth of offerings we have. My job is to articulate the understand the bigger picture and what benefits can be realised when WCL’s products are used in conjunction with one another
3. What do you enjoy most about your job and why?
I love meeting new people and so an enjoyable part of my job is getting in front of clients and prospects and listening to their stories. I have always found people enjoy telling you about their businesses, good or bad, and this often leads to opportunities to come up with solutions to help them and to work on interesting projects. It also helps build long-term relationships. I’m a good listener and during a conversation I try to let the other person do the talking.
4. Which areas for developing technology do you see as the most important for your business and industry?
I think the market is engaging in the “data” question. Many businesses have spent a lot of time and money to ensure they get access to their data in a way that allows them to use it strategically and always have access to it right across their value chain. Managing data correctly allows for easy automation and interconnectivity across the whole business. It’s something the market has been grappling with for more than 30 years, but there’s a huge amount of available data – all the transactions available for people buying, selling, and making claims – and nobody, apart from a few innovators, has grasped how to use that data across the whole business. There are so many silos, with teams not speaking to each other enough. The market is defining a single data record but using that data comes down to either saving money or making money. If we get access to that data, how can it make us more efficient, and how can it save us money. Can we use it to make better underwriting and claims decisions?
5. What is your proudest moment in work or your greatest achievement in your career and why?
I was lead account manager on a Claims product and built it up from a relatively small, forgotten product to one of the company’s bestsellers, with a 50% increase in revenue. It was satisfying to help the business grow by spotting the value of the product, relaying that value to the clients, and thereby increasing the revenue. I worked with the right people to make it successful.
6. Following the acquisition by Zywave what are you most excited about / opportunities to explore.
Having Joined WCL after the Zywave acquisition, it was the new ownership that was one of the main reasons I decided to join WCL. I see the globalisation of WCL within the Zywave umbrella as an exciting opportunity for all involved – it’s given WCL a global profile, view and remit, taking the company’s message outside London. In turn, Zywave now has a UK vehicle. WCL is the UK and European hub for Zywave and . I see my future as running a centralised management function.