We recently caught up with our Head of Marketing, Annie Wakeman. Marketing forms part of our platform, which you can find out more about here.
In this spotlight, Annie shares how she we nt from a Marketing Assistant to a Marketing Manager in the space of a year, why she chose to pursue a career in marketing and what she is looking forward to for the Group in 2024.
When did you join Specialist Risk Group (SRG) and what was your position at the time?
I joined what was just Miles Smith in July 2016 as a Marketing Assistant whilst on my placement year as part of a Business Studies degree. At the time, Miles Smith was a combination of UK wholesale and UK retail broking, and the marketing was quite events focussed. Although I had experience working for a software company, this was my first exposure to the world of insurance and working and living in London.
How has your role developed over the last seven years?
When I joined, I was learning the ropes of insurance and business, and I was putting a lot of what I had learnt during my degree into practice in a corporate environment. It was interesting to see how you can go from reading a textbook and taking exams, to learning what is actually helpful for a business from a commercial perspective.
I have always been drawn towards the strategic planning side of marketing, opposed to the creative side of it. I am more interested in learning about the business, the products offered and working out the best way to communicate and distribute them.
After completing my placement year, I went back to Bournemouth University for my final year but I continued working part time for Miles Smith so I would come up to London a couple of times a month. It was challenging juggling both, but it meant after I finished my degree, I was able to come back to work full time.
It seems funny looking back at it, but I went straight into a Marketing Manager role at Miles Smith. I was given greater responsibility and learnt line management, which was a huge step up. I didn’t know much at the time, but I had no fear, I was just so focused on working hard, getting the job done and doing the right thing for my manager and the company.
In 2018, a private equity company, Pollen Street Capital, acquired a majority stake in Miles Smith, and things moved pretty rapidly from then. I quickly became very focused on putting processes in place, many that are still in place today, so that marketing could support the business through a rapid stage of growth.
In January 2020, SRG was launched to our insurer partners at The Gherkin and each year things have developed more. Since then, lots of colleagues have joined, there has been more difficult decisions to make and more brands to manage and integrate within SRG. I get to speak with so many specialist business leaders and colleagues and I enjoy finding out more about them and how we can help them to hit their business objectives through marketing.
In 2020 through to 2021, I was part of the first HiPo cohort which I really enjoyed because it got me stepping outside of my role. Day to day, everything I see is through a marketing lens and therefore, being part of HiPo and spending time with people in different areas of the business was a great opportunity to reflect and build my network in the Group.
In the last couple of years, my team has grown, and I now have greater line management responsibilities. Management was always one of those things I knew I wanted, but you can’t appreciate how hard it is until you do it. It’s been a huge learning curve for me.
The past seven years have been really positive because my career and role has expanded so significantly and I have not had to move business to do that, which is a real privilege in my opinion.
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