J’ai été engagé comme conseiller saisonnier en avantages sociaux. Le conseiller est un agent qui détient une licence lui permettant de vendre des régimes d’assurance santé Medicare à des retraités faisant partie des associations de clients de Willis Towers Watson. Les conseillers en avantages sociaux accompagnent des participants de tout le pays dans leur transition d’une assurance groupée à une assurance individuelle du marché des assurances santé Medicare. J’ai ensuite occupé un poste saisonnier de représentant au service à la clientèle. J’agissais comme personne-ressource pour les clients inscrits à notre marché des assurances individuelles. J’aidais les participants dans le règlement de réclamations, dans la présentation de recours, ainsi que dans d’autres services de comptes. Ceci m’a mené à de nouvelles fonctions de superviseur des opérations, où j’étais à la tête d’une équipe de 15 conseillers en avantages sociaux qui vendaient des régimes d’assurance santé Medicare à des retraités faisant partie de nos associations. Je suis ensuite devenu superviseur des opérations de 10 à 12 équipes de conseillers. Maintenant, en tant que gestionnaire des opérations, je m’occupe de la transition des nouveaux clients et je dirige plusieurs gestionnaires des opérations d’inscription et leurs équipes. En parallèle, j’assume le rôle de responsable de secteur. Je m’occupe des activités des nos centres d’appels de Tempe, en Arizona.

En tant que gestionnaire principal des opérations d’inscription, je m’occupe de la transition de nouveaux clients employeurs qui passent d’une assurance de groupe à une assurance personnelle pour leurs retraités. Je dois atteindre les objectifs de transition de tous les clients admissibles à Medicare. Je m’occupe également de communiquer quotidiennement avec mes équipes d’inscription du segment Retraite et de veiller à ce que les inscriptions se fassent avec succès. Je produis des rapports hebdomadaires pour les directeurs de division, indiquant le progrès des inscriptions et l’état de la gestion du rendement des équipes et des agents.

En tant que responsable de secteur, je supervise les activités relatives à la gestion du rendement et à la participation des employés. J’organise également des visites du centre pour nos clients actuels et potentiels. Je chapeaute les événements caritatifs, les séances sur la sécurité et les sessions d’accueil de nouveaux employés, entre autres.

Le plus grand défi que je dois relever dans le cadre de mon poste est le roulement des employés chaque année. Un pourcentage important du personnel est saisonnier et travaille lorsqu’il y a un grand afflux de demandes pendant la période des inscriptions. Ceci signifie qu’il faut former les employés chaque année si nous voulons offrir une expérience de qualité. Nous faisons de notre mieux pour gérer cette problématique en utilisant des processus simplifiés et en nous concentrant sur le développement professionnel. L’objectif est d’aider mes collègues saisonniers à développer leurs aptitudes assez rapidement pour pouvoir accéder à d’autres postes dans l’organisation avant que leur contrat saisonnier ne prenne fin.

J’ai eu plusieurs occasions d’avancement chez Willis Towers Watson. J’ai été responsable de la création d’un système qui servirait à gérer tous les postes opérationnels des avantages sociaux pour retraités dans le marché des assurances individuelles. Cet outil est utilisé par les superviseurs des opérations et par les gestionnaires pour faire un suivi quotidien, hebdomadaire et mensuel des objectifs des collègues. Au cours des deux dernières années, j’ai chapeauté la mise en œuvre semestrielle de l’évaluation du rendement des employés saisonniers car ils n’étaient pas évalués par notre système global interne. En plus d’avoir droit à une évaluation qui résume la qualité de leur travail par rapport aux valeurs de Willis Towers Watson, les employés ont accès à des commentaires critiques en temps réel et à du mentorat.

Ce qui me rend le plus fier est le rôle que j’ai joué dans l’ouverture de nos nouvelles installations de service à la clientèle à Tempe, en Arizona. J’ai participé à la planification architecturale, aux effort de recrutement, à l’hébergement pour les formations extérieures, ainsi qu’à la création de la culture organisationnelle d’un tout nouveau personnel. Le site de Tempe est unique en son genre. Plusieurs secteurs d’activités sont installés dans le même bâtiment. Ceci a exigé, et exige toujours, beaucoup de travail d’intégration. Les installations sont fonctionnelles depuis trois ans et 500 employés, incluant les saisonniers, y travaillent.
Récemment, j’ai fait partie des 100 employés qui se sont vu remettre un prix CEO Circle. Pour me qualifier, je devais être nommé par au moins deux collègues. Les juges évaluent si les nominés respectent et encouragent les valeurs de Willis Towers Watson, soit la priorisation du client, le travail d’équipe, l’intégrité, le respect et l’excellence. Les juges essaient également d’estimer la valeur que le participant ajoute à l’organisation grâce à la complétion de projets. Mon travail acharné au quotidien a été reconnu. C’est une leçon d’humilité et ça me motive.

La culture d’entreprise met le client au cœur des décisions. Les gens de tous les rangs s’efforcent toujours à rendre les services aux clients meilleurs. Par exemple, les nouveaux agents parlent quotidiennement avec les retraités inscrits à notre marché des assurances individuelles. Ils les rassurent, répondent à leurs questions, et leur font savoir qu’ils peuvent toujours communiquer avec nous s’ils ont besoin d’aide.

J’aime beaucoup rencontrer des clients potentiels et leur parler de ce que nous pouvons offrir à leurs retraités qui passent d’une assurance groupée à une assurance personnelle dans notre marché des assurances individuelles. Nous mettons de l’avant le choix du client; nous proposons plusieurs options aux participants afin que ceux-ci trouvent ce qui convient le mieux à leurs besoins. Nous demeurons objectifs lorsqu’il s’agit d’aider les gens à s’inscrire aux régimes. Nous voulons surtout nous assurer que chaque personne trouve son compte lors d’une entente.

Je suis fier de faire partie d’une organisation qui priorise l’expérience des clients et des retraités plutôt que ses revenus. L’entreprise veut bien faire pour le client et croit qu’une telle approche aura une incidence positive sur les revenus et la croissance à long terme.

J’aimerais être plus impliqué dans les stratégies de vente. Je pense que ma connaissance de la division dans laquelle je travaille pourrait servir à innover et à faire progresser l’entreprise, à percer sur de nouveaux marchés et à élargir notre offre de produits.

C’est une entreprise dans laquelle vous pouvez faire avancer votre carrière. Maîtrisez vos tâches rapidement afin de progresser et obtenir un nouveau poste. Transférez vos compétences d’un poste à l’autre pour avoir encore plus d’influence dans vos nouvelles fonctions. Et plus d’influence vous aurez sur nos clients, plus vous vous sentirez valorisé et comblé par votre emploi.

I joined Willis Towers Watson as an analyst in pensions valuations in May 2018. It’s been almost three years since I joined the company and I must say that my journey to becoming a subject matter expert in this area has been enriching and fulfilling.

I had a background in insurance and with adequate assistance and training, I soon acquired the knowledge and expertise required for my role. The continuous support and excellent training provided by my senior colleagues have helped me channel my strengths and skills.

My role as an analyst involves the management of pension schemes for multiple clients. I ensure that new and existing members’ pensions are accurately maintained and serviced. I also juggle between calculating pensions and forecasts, and preparing quotations, in addition to processing pension contributions while maintaining service level agreements.

Initially, understanding the finer details of pensions in the U.K. market was a challenge, given that my past professional experience was primarily in the U.K. insurance domain. I vividly remember the difficulties I faced when I worked on the transition of a new client account. Since I was new to the team, I was aware that this assignment would be particularly challenging. However, my senior colleagues and team gave me opportunities to learn, expand my knowledge on the subject and gradually become an expert. This equipped me with the skills and confidence I needed to take up the project again in April 2020. I worked closely with the team to ensure that the transition was smooth, despite working remotely. The client was extremely happy with how the requirements were met, which would not have been possible without the support of my team.

The recent shift to work from home due to the global pandemic has been almost overwhelming being a mother of a young child. My team has always been helpful and especially flexible with my work hours, allowing me to accommodate my daughter’s online school routine and daily activities. This has helped me establish a healthy work-life balance.

I have been able to achieve several milestones during my time at Willis Towers Watson but there is one that I will always cherish. It was when our team received the ‘Best Team Award’, for our efforts on a key account of the company. Apart from this, I have also received three awards for outstanding work that I am grateful for.

The culture of a company can be inspiring, and this is something I have experienced since day one at Willis Towers Watson. The inclusive work environment has empowered me to focus on my career goals and grow professionally.
I value the transparency within the company, along with the flexible work environment that allows me to seamlessly balance work and personal life.

I’ve had the opportunity to work with talented, smart colleagues that are always respectful and go out of their way to support each other. The core values like teamwork, integrity and excellence are upheld by all of the colleagues and across every level of the company.

Yes, the thing that surprised me the most was the empathy that was shown by the senior colleagues during challenging times. Their actions confirm that the company’s values are not just on paper but are put into practice every single day. They make it a point to lead by example and inspire the team by making them feel heard, supported, and valued.

I want to ensure that I can learn and expand my knowledge and expertise to achieve quality results. In the future, I would like to develop my skills further to help my professional growth within the company.

Working at Willis Towers Watson provides opportunities that will encourage you to strive for excellence and step closer to achieving your career goals. You will get the chance to grow both personally and professionally while truly living the shared values of integrity and teamwork. The organization and its colleagues are very supportive, and they encourage you to focus on your physical and mental wellbeing, which will help you stay motivated.

I joined Willis Towers Watson in 2013 on the Consultant graduate scheme at the London office. Early on, I spent a lot of time attending training sessions, studying for my exams, getting to grips with the world of defined benefit pensions and climbing the steep learning curve. I qualified as a Fellow of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries in 2017 and around the same time I began taking on more responsibilities at work. My role shifted to focus on advice specifically for corporate sponsors of pension schemes, and I also took on some additional roles including being a committee member for the UK LGBT+ colleague Inclusion Network. I now support Scheme Actuaries and Lead Consultants to provide advice, ranging from funding to de-risking for a range of pension schemes that vary in size from tens of millions to several billions, including multi-million pound projects which span a number of years.

Truly no two days are the same. Given the unique challenges that face each of my clients, the work we carry out and advice we provide is never the same between project to project which keeps us on our toes! A typical day for me will involve responding to emails and phone calls from colleagues, other advisers or clients, attending meetings either in person (before COVID-19) or over the phone, and reviewing or drafting advice, usually with a calculator in one hand and a red pen in the other.

I’ve had a number of opportunities including managing interns and developing the graduate training programme, but my most recent has been leading the events arm of the UK LGBT+ Inclusion Network. The network has gone from strength to strength: we now have over 750 members and run several events a month, ranging from networking events to fund raising and movie nights. I also love being involved in organising coffee breaks for my team and hosting virtual quizzes to provide a much needed break during the day.

The two biggest challenges I most commonly face are time management and stamina. While many of our projects have long-term timescales, there can be unexpected hurdles which mean you need to be flexible and manage your time well in order to successfully meet your client commitments. Stamina is also critical as you can quite often have busy days, weeks or months, whether it’s speaking to several clients a day or tackling multiple complex mathematical problems, so you need the endurance to keep going. Personally I find being diligent at taking regular breaks to be the main starting point for avoiding burnout and maintaining stamina.

The graduate training programme for Retirement graduates is second to none. Coming from a teaching background, even I was blown away at how developed the programme was. It has since been further developed but for me, it was incredibly expansive, including a series of training modules that took place over a number of days, with a combination of written exercises, role-plays, practical and soft skill training and more.

However, possibly the most valuable training is what I received on the job. Learning and development are instilled in our culture, and colleagues constantly provide guidance and training as part of the way we work together. In my experience, this is particularly true of our Senior Consultants who are always willing to impart their wise knowledge and offer development opportunities to junior colleagues.

In 2018 I was working on a project winding up a pension scheme by securing members’ benefits within the insurance market. This is a typical endgame for pension schemes although not many are quite at that stage, but I observed that this scheme was getting close. I ran some projections looking at the feasibility of a future wind up on the lead up to a client meeting and shared them with the Senior Consultant who suggested I raise the topic at the meeting. This culminated in the sponsor and trustees of the pension scheme conducting a formal feasibility project, which then led to the scheme eventually winding up. This became one of the very first deals of its kind in the market due to the scheme’s hybrid benefit structure of a defined contribution and defined benefit pension scheme, and the deal tackled the inequalities of pension entitlements between males and females.

My proudest achievement is qualifying as a Fellow and passing all of my written exams first time. I put this down to a combination of hard work and the support I received from Willis Towers Watson. Between the generous study package, allowing me to pick and choose the materials that worked for me, and the proactive visible support of colleagues encouraging me to take the time I needed to study, the company made sure I had all the tools and time I needed to give each exam my best.

Professionally speaking, we have some of the greatest minds in the field who are very open and collaborative, which makes for an incredible place to work, learn and grow. However, this doesn’t detract from the fact we are all human and can have fun – even some of the most seasoned actuaries in the office can be caught at the Christmas party busting some moves on the dancefloor!

I really value being part of such an inclusive and diverse team. I had a preconceived notion that all large companies in the financial services industry would be very ‘corporate’ and that I wouldn’t be able to relate to this new type of environment. However, my colleagues are so open, welcoming and represent such diverse backgrounds and each bring something different to the table. I also appreciate the support the company has given me to move from the London office to the Reigate office in Surrey, particularly around retaining my desired client allocations but helping to identify new opportunities in Reigate. Since my move, I’ve found what I believe to be ‘the best of both worlds’ – I have the large clients and complex projects that comes from working at a leading consultancy, with the benefits of a quicker commute and more green space (which is perfect for taking my dogs on a walk during my lunch break).

I previously completed my teacher training programme and expected that it would be looked down upon as irrelevant. However, it has been a huge benefit and was noted favourably in my recruitment process. Given that my job as an adviser centers around guiding and explaining technical concepts to a less technical audience, my teacher training was an invaluable transferrable skill.

I was also surprised to find people with such varied interests – whether that’s baking TV shows, sports or roleplaying games, you’re bound to find someone who has common interests with you here.

My hope is to continue climbing the career ladder and be supported by the amazing colleagues and leaders at the company, as well as to help my clients solve their problems and deliver positive outcomes for pension scheme members.

You must! Take the time to find more out about the company and the role on the Willis Towers Watson website and reach out to the recruitment team to get your questions answered.

I was hired after university as part of a graduate intake. I have worked with a large variety of clients and taken on various different roles during my time at Willis Towers Watson. Currently the majority of my work involves acting as a consultant, advising trustees of a wide range of defined benefit pension schemes. I also do a small amount of corporate work and I have also taken on a managerial role in the team.

In my role as a people manager, I need to keep in touch with my direct reports daily, allocate work to the appropriate colleagues within my team and help with wider long-term resourcing of projects. Being a manager provides unique challenges different from my consulting role, and no two days are the same.

For my consulting role, I need to make sure I work collaboratively with my client teams in order to complete work efficiently and in line with the required timescales. This can vary between simply providing a quick response to a client with some ad-hoc advice, to delivering a large project that takes place over a number of months.

Having lots of things on the go at once can be difficult, but this role has taught me the importance of being organised and prioritising or delegating my work when needed.

I worked as a Project Manager on a major project for one of our largest Reigate clients. This involved over 30 people and months of work. My role was to co-ordinate the different sub-teams and keep everything on track. Sending out the final reports to the client after months of effort by the entire team was probably one of the most satisfying and exciting moments of my career. Knowing that the team has produced something that will impact so many people can be daunting, but the level of care taken with deliverables in Willis Towers Watson can give you confidence and pride in the end product.

The project described in the previous question was probably my proudest achievement and earned me a Circle Award from our CEO. However, I personally feel that the best sense of pride comes from how we work as a team and help each other. For me, the sense of “team victory” is always when I feel proudest of being a part of Willis Towers Watson.

I completed the graduate training programme during my first two years at the company which was invaluable. This programme provides the vital base of knowledge which underlies the work that we do. More informally, a huge amount of training and development comes from working on the job day-to-day and, in particular, from working closely with senior colleagues and learning from their experience. Being in such a large company enables me to work with a wide variety of people and therefore learn new things from each of them. I am still learning new things each day.

Like the rest of the world, 2020 has been an odd year for us. I think that the collaborative culture at Willis Towers Watson was highlighted during that period. People are so supportive, take time to check on their colleagues and always have time for each other.
Unlike many other companies, to shine here you just need to complete work to a high quality and people will notice and appreciate it. The culture lends itself to this way of working.

Willis Towers Watson provides so many opportunities and a wide variety of clients and projects to work on. But for me personally, the people are the best part about working here without a doubt. I’ve learnt so much from the people around me and will continue to do so. I can’t remember a day where someone didn’t teach me something, or a day where I didn’t laugh working here. I’ve made lifelong friends at Willis Towers Watson and for that I am very grateful – my graduate year intake still all go away together every year!

For such a large company, there is still a small team feel where everyone knows everyone. We have so many people who are experts in their field, and you will inevitably end up working with many of them at some stage in your career.

I am looking forward to exploring the various opportunities that are available to me at Willis Towers Watson and hope that in the future I will have a breadth of knowledge and experience in a wide range of work. I hope that in years to come I am still learning and doing new things.

Do it!