As the insurance industry grapples with an aging workforce and accelerating change, HUB International’s Matthew Studley (pictured) believes the sector has been too slow to tell its own story - and is now paying the price in talent.
Studley, president of HUB International’s Ontario and Atlantic regions, says the talent challenge in his markets looks much the same as it does across Canada and other developed economies.
“I don’t think it’s materially different in Ontario and Atlantic Canada than it is elsewhere in Canada and, frankly, elsewhere in North America or many parts of the developed world,” he said. “We have an industry that has disproportionately relied on a generation which is coming towards retirement.”
With many baby boomers eyeing the exit, the concern isn’t just about headcount. It’s about expertise that took decades to build and can’t easily be replicated.
“You can’t possibly learn 30 years of experience in three, no matter how well we teach you, or how smart you are, because there are things that are only going to happen once every 10 years, or even every 20 years,” Studley noted.
For Studley, one root cause is the way insurance is perceived outside the industry.
“As an industry, we’ve done a terrible job doing PR for how many benefits there are to work in the insurance industry and what society gets out of the insurance industry,” he said.
Most people’s interactions with insurers happen at stressful moments – usually when something has gone wrong.
“I’m a huge believer that the vast majority of interactions people have with the insurance industry are negative – and there’s a reason for that, because most of those folks who see value in their premiums are dealing with claims and, even when claims are paid in full, it surrounds a traumatic event,” Studley said. “Insurance is the punchline of a lot of jokes, whether it’s social media, movies, TV shows, and as a result, that’s an association a lot of people grow up with.”
That image problem, he argues, is a big reason why young graduates often overlook insurance, even though the work can be both resilient and meaningful.
“I think there’s a huge opportunity drawing a distinction with people, especially new grads, around what the breadth of insurance has to offer to an individual in terms of their career,” he said. He points to the industry’s “reverse cyclicality” – the fact that it tends to hold up even when the broader economy slows – and to the impact frontline advisors can have.
Within HUB, Studley says the response has been to accelerate investment in structured development for newer entrants.
“We want to develop systems for the new talent coming into the industry so that HUB offers industry divisions, specialties and products to choose from, and is an employer of choice,” he said.
At the same time, HUB is focused on keeping seasoned talent in the fold – and finding ways to capture and share what they know.
He sees the challenge as a three‑part equation: “It’s retaining the top end [of the workforce], it’s building bottom‑up in terms of new talent and getting more people in the door, and then having something like artificial intelligence bridge the gap between the two, as well as anybody who falls in between those two groups.”
AI, in his view, can help newer staff access institutional knowledge faster, while also supporting experienced professionals with better data and tools – but it can’t replace foundational training or human judgment.
Even with those efforts, the numbers are daunting.
“Nothing is going to solve the entirety of this problem,” Studley cautioned.
“When you start talking about some of the statistics – 40% or 50% of people are going to retire on a fairly short timeline – that’s a very difficult pill to swallow, and I would have loved to push the solutions ever further than we did 10 years ago, but we’ve got to start pushing much further and faster today.”
While the demographic challenge is broadly similar across regions, Studley says HUB’s approach in Ontario and Atlantic Canada is shaped by a specific strategic philosophy: combining local relationships with broader resources.
“The spot that HUB disproportionately wants to deliver on is balancing local autonomy and local relationships with global resources and industry and product expertise that you can leverage into those local businesses based on what that local community needs,” he said. “We are mindful to strike the right balance between those two, and I do think that that is something which distinguishes HUB versus many of our competitors.”
