Dona Treesa Chacko
- MSc course: Insurance and Risk Management
- Graduation year: 2022
Why did you choose to study MSc Insurance and Risk Management at Bayes Business School?
I am from India but was brought up in Dubai. I completed my undergraduate studies in Finance at Pune University, India. Upon completing my undergraduate degree, I made a major career choice to switch to insurance and thus pursued my master’s degree at Bayes Business School which is a renowned institution in the industry for their sector specific programme offered. I am also happy to share that I recently got my first foot in the industry and was placed at United Insurance Brokers within their treaty division.
What did you enjoy about course?
With London being the leading insurance hub, there exists plenty of opportunities in the domain for people with specialised knowledge and expertise which is offered by the MSc Insurance and Risk Management programme at Bayes. The faculty members and visiting lecturers are professionals accomplished in both industry and academic science. Bayes also has a long-established association with the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII) and the programme is structured to cover significant modules from and credits towards the industry standard qualification (ACII).
During your studies you attended the ‘Women in Insurance’ event, can you tell us a bit about this?
The event was an in-person and virtual that was held at Bayes and aimed to attract young women into the insurance profession by highlighting and celebrating a variety of career stories from a wide range of roles, levels of seniority, and backgrounds. The half-day event gathered speakers who are female professionals and leaders within the insurance industry who took part in panel discussions sharing their insightful experiences and gave an opportunity to the attendees to raise questions or seek advice. There were also representatives from various global companies like Aon, Allianz, Marsh, etc. and the prestigious Lloyds who had their exhibition stalls installed to provide information and guide the participants about early career opportunities within their respective companies.
It was fascinating to hear about the journey of these incredible women in the industry and it was inspiring with a bit of amusement to learn that many of them landed in insurance without any prior plans for it. With my interests to establish a career in the broking side of insurance, a key takeaway for me was a piece of advice one of the broking professionals gave where she said that selling insurance also means selling your personal brand as it is a people’s business and therefore, it is important to develop a culture of excellence right from the time you start your career and build on it throughout the journey.
What advice would you have for students considering MSc Insurance and Risk Management?
Insurance influences everything around us in the dynamic business world that’s full of uncertainty and risks. Insurance is for inquisitive people with an ability to innovate with what one can offer as a business solution. Insurance minds are innovative, enquiring, and active in everything from risk event prediction to in-depth client company research, if you have these characteristics this is the programme for you.