Business Development Manager

What will you do?

Santam Specialist Solutions has a career opportunity for a Business Development Manager (BDM) in the business area which will be based in KZN, Durban.

The position will report to the Business Head: SA Market Business Development

The primary purpose of this position is To build, maintain, and solidify relationships with Key Brokers, representing all lines of business within Santam Specialist Solutions (SSS). This strategic role is focused on leading & driving key business development objectives to achieve the Strategic Goals and delivering on primary KPIs through a holistic and collaborative approach across the organization.

What will make you successful?

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

1. Engagement: Building and Solidifying Relationships:

• Communicate the SSS message to our intermediary market, including team & people updates, product updates, and risk appetite.
• Actively listen to our intermediaries to gather feedback on expectations, problems, service, and market intelligence (changes, competitor analysis, rate changes, and opportunities).
• Creating Broker profiles with a comprehensive analysis to understand the broker holistically:

• • Strategic Objectives: Understand the broker's own business goals, target markets, and growth ambitions.
  • Financial & Operational Metrics: Analyze their GWP, client portfolio size, areas of specialty, and operational strengths.
  • Current Relationship Mapping: Assess the volume of business placed with us, the specific clusters/products used, and our overall share of their wallet.
  • Key Personnel & Structure: Identify decision-makers, influencers, and day-to-day operatives within the broker firm.
  • Competitor Landscape: Determine which other insurers they use, the competitor's share, and the perceived strengths/weaknesses of those relationships.
  • Perception & Feedback: Gauge their view of our service, underwriting appetite, competitiveness, and overall value proposition.

2. Business Development: Transactional Focus

• New Business: Identify and validate true cross-sell opportunities through a review of the Top renewals per business unit/cluster.
• Retention: Work with Business Unit Heads to promote business retention and packaging of SSS offerings within appetite, ensuring clarity on strategic accounts and timeous access to renewal lists.
• Lost Business: Analyze lost business data to understand market positioning and inform strategies to re-obtain submissions.
• Build, manage, and optimize a pipeline of prospects, tracking progress and forecasting accurately.
• Drive business development visits to establish new relationships and maintain the existing broker network.
• Implement structured engagements with agendas, action items, and tracking, maintaining records in shared folders/systems.

3. Business Intelligence and Data: Reporting Focus

• Conduct monthly, quarterly, half-year, and full-year analysis, concluding data and present agreed reports to management.
• Deliver Monthly, Quarterly, Half-year & Full Year feedback to Head of Business Development SA, including:
• GWP Data (New Business, Lost Business, Retention Ratios).
• Competitor Feedback (new entrants, exits, key personnel changes, products/capacity).
• Cross-sell opportunities.
• Work with Data Warehouse and Finance to ensure data accuracy, integrity, and that reporting rules are understood and aligned (e.g., for Broker Dashboards).
• Provide market intelligence relating to people movement, product competitiveness, coverage, and other pertinent aspects.
• Ensure provided data aligns with what each internal team reports on.

Qualifications and Experience

• Insurance-related qualification or relevant degree.
• FAIS Compliant
• Regulatory exam compliance.
• 5 to 10 years' experience in Business Development in a Strategic role involving Specialist and/or Niche classes of insurance.
• Experienced in maintaining and growing a profitable portfolio of Corporate/Commercial Insurance.

Skills and Competencies

• Core ability to think and act on a strategic level.
• Technical ability across various specialist insurance product lines.
• Excellent interpersonal skills to develop and maintain understanding and working relationships with key selected brokers at all levels.
• Ability to identify new business and target cross-sell opportunities with a focused strategy.
• Proficiency in leveraging data and analytics tools to update dashboards and derive insights.
• Strong analytical skills for pipeline management, data analysis, and reporting.
• Ability to co-ordinate monthly and quarterly internal/cross-cluster meetings to ensure strategic alignment.
• Maintain a working knowledge of targeted industry groups and underwriting appetites.
• Assist in formulating, implementing, and coordinating a business development strategy as agreed with Clusters.
• Proactively lead all engagements specific to business development.
• Co-ordinate collaboration between respective Clusters to lead the pipeline management process.
• Work hand-in-hand with the Business Head to refine strategy, prioritize targets, and ensure alignment with company goals.
• Assist in preparing a budget for the relevant business/cluster area that aligns with the overall SSS strategy for growth and financial sustainability.
• Adhere to the approved budget through the generation of income and control of expenses, complying with internal expense policies.