What an extraordinary year 2020 has been! Unlike 2019 when the pandemic outbreak first started, 2020 was a year of highs and lows, of reimagining the road ahead, recharting our course and putting in motion plans to prepare for that future. We accelerated the pace of our transformation and overall performed better while facing a virus that has brought entire nations and their economies down to its knees.
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The global pandemic has had a considerable impact on society and the economy, and businesses like MII. We grappled with a steep decline in activities as lockdowns depressed sales and business activities. However, we responded quickly and took several countermeasures to stabilize the business, minimise the impact and transition to new models.
To this day, the future remains radically uncertain but as we continue to prepare for the long haul, it is encouraging to see businesses taking proactive measures towards sustainability through workforce upskilling and reskilling initiatives while repositioning to seize opportunities and avoid emerging risks. Even in times of crisis, education and training remains centre stage.
Health and Safety Is Our Top Priority
Our top priority was and still is, the health and safety of the people that count on us. In 2020, the MII team showed tremendous resilience, responsibility and resolve to support one another, our customers, our students and our members.
We implemented comprehensive hygiene standards across all our locations in Malaysia and provided our employees with clear guidance on the preventive measures they should take. Till today, more than 80% of our employees are working from home to help prevent the spread of the virus. We also successfully safeguarded jobs throughout the entire year and rewarded our employees for their extraordinary commitment to deliver better results in 2020 despite the headwinds.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank our Board of Directors for their trust and guidance and the MII team for their tireless commitment, agility and resilience.
Opportunity Amidst Chaos
2020 was a difficult year for many but it was also a year that accelerated MII’s transformation. While chaos causes some to retreat, chaos can also uncover opportunities.
MII made real progress in terms of enhancing its infrastructure, customer experience, support, reach and product portfolio. Our focus for the year was in four areas, ensure the well-being, health and safety of the MII team, steer the Institute successfully through the crisis and continue to push forward with our transformation, and set the course for redefining our future.
In the chaos that was unfolding around us, we seized the opportunity to rechart our course. These efforts helped us to minimise the impact of the crisis in 2020, largely due to a strong fourth quarter and pivot to digital learning and virtual operations. Overall, we successfully steered MII through difficult waters.
2020 Financial Results
Despite the economic challenges, we used 2020 to make MII a better Institute. Through industry collaborations and accelerating digitalization initiatives, we connected with more consumers than ever before and expanded our reach.
Nonetheless, despite the rigorous efforts to stabilize the business and transform digitally, our topline was impacted by the pandemic due to the lockdown in the first half of the year that brought the business to almost a standstill. However, quick measures to resume critical business were put in place to meet demands such as pivot to virtual examinations and webinars in April, virtual trainings in June and virtual conference in September 2020. Our shift to virtual operations in March 2020, automation, centralization of processes, outsourcing of non-core activities and migration to cloud led to greater cost efficiencies. These cost savings were passed on to industry through lower fees for trainings, professional programmes and complimentary access to webinars.
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Focusing on the Fundamentals: Customer at the Core
It was critical for us to keep a real-time pulse on changing customer preferences especially when customer behaviours, consumption and expectations were altered due to the pandemic.
We provided greater flexibility and options to clients in terms of mode of learning and programmes and qualifications that were customizable to the company’s business focus. Almost 90% of programmes were offered virtually in 2020 and now all are available virtually.
Students have the option of e-learning, class based, blended learning, tutorial support add-on and social learning to connect with peers and lecturers. Students may select the product and mode of learning and examinations based on preference, convenience and affordability.
Since June 2020, the social learning platform, Teamie, has been utilized for disseminating lecture slides, e-books, assignments, quizzes, monitoring students’ progress, sharing information and conducting examinations.
To keep pace with the needs of the industry, we also enhanced our programme suite with over 450 programmes offered on life and general insurance, broking, loss adjusting, governance, risk & compliance, leadership, Board & C-suite, digital skills, data analytics, personal developments, business management and essential skills. This is in line with MII’s aim to be the integrated training & development service provider for the insurance industry.
The Silent Revolution of a Digital Shift
The digital world is thriving, and with many staying at home, digital technologies have created a semblance of normality. In keeping with that, the lockdown saw the launch of our most successful digital campaign ever - #LearningNeverStops.
This campaign was launched industry-wide and saw the participation of local and international experts, industry players and the insurance fraternity at large to share the latest developments, trends and research findings in four key areas namely insurance technical knowledge, leadership, digital transformation/future skills and essential skills. This campaign that was initially set out to ensure continuous and risk-free learning for MII Members garnered the interest of those beyond our industry. From April to December 2020, we had 115 webinars under the #LearningNeverStops series for the benefit of our members.
Other virtual offerings as part of our digital pivot followed suit and were equally successful, namely #VirtualLearning for our Virtual Instructor-Led Trainings (VILT) and Virtual Examinations, Virtual Conference and #Empoweredlearning for our e-learning products and services.
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Supporting Industry Transformation and Innovation
The greater reliance on technologies means that employees must be trained to operate them correctly and work alongside them efficiently. To support the industry’s digital transformation, Future Skills programmes were added to the MII programme suite. 31 programmes are offered by MII in collaboration with partner organizations. 29 webinars on digital transformation, data analytics and insurtech were also made available and continues to be our focus. MII was also the Community Partner for the Singapore Fintech Festival 2020 to promote innovation in the industry.
Developing Strong Community Of Practice
The Community of Practice (CoPs) was launched in February 2020 to connect people with common goals and interests to share knowledge, resources, innovations, support and co-create solutions. The first CoP launched was the Compliance CoP that was held on 12 February 2020 with 34 compliance professionals from the industry in attendance that heard from local and international key opinion leaders on trends and latest developments.
The Risk & Engineering CoP was launched in June 2020. Various webinars on risk and engineering were organized through community expertise. The community also led the development of the Fire Risks Assessors (FRA) Course in collaboration with our strategic partners. The FRA is the first of its kind accreditation course in the region aimed at elevating the skills and competency of risk engineers in the industry in line with internationally recognized standards. FRA participants may also apply for accreditation with the UK Engineering Council.
Other CoPs that are in the pipeline are Human Resources, Claims and Underwriting.
Supporting Human Capital Development
As the education institution set up by the industry for the industry, we recognised the need to support member companies through the pandemic with complimentary access to webinars and Short Course e-learning products, providing greater flexibility in learning and discounted programme fees.
We also launched the Training Credit Scheme in April 2020 to promote lifelong learning culture and boost capacity building investments by industry players. Companies may redeem funds contributed to the scheme to offset against fees for programmes, conferences and examinations. Participating companies were incentivized for investing in talent and skill development through utilization bonus paid yearly based on training & development spend for the year.
Adapting Customer Experience
In 2020, we set out to enhance customer service channels and service levels for greater access and to build better connections with our customers. Among the initiatives introduced included Chatbot, SMS communication channel, social media channels, extended Customer Support hours to include after hours and weekend support and process improvements to enhance turnaround time for certificates and refunds. The customer service team handled over 80,000 calls, emails and requests in 2020.
2021 Outlook
We hope that 2021 will be the year of hope and empathy with a resolve to be kind to our planet, our communities, our loved ones, our team members and ourselves. As an Institute, we look forward with renewed hope of new opportunities as we strengthen our offerings to play an integral role to prepare the industry and industry professionals for the future. We firmly believe that through education, we have the power to change lives and we are committed to the cause.
In 2021, we aim to exceed our forecasted performance and complete more than half of our transformation plan. This will be achievable through diversification of our products and services, enhancing our professional qualifications and certifications to empower our students with future skills such as technology awareness and leveraging data, enhancing our membership proposition and increasing collaborations with partners globally.
We also look forward to creating new milestones when we shift to our new office at the AICB Building (Centre of Excellence) in Kuala Lumpur. Working alongside other Institutes in the industry, we believe that together, we can make a difference.
Our Way Forward Together
As challenging as 2020 was, it has shown us a glimmer of inspiration – how we remain resilient by working together. The only way to get through such a year is by working together as a team and MII is committed to continue to evolve, enhance and improve. With that, on behalf of MII, I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to you - our members, customers, students, partners - for the trust you have placed in us. Our deepest appreciation also goes out to MII Committee and Council members, industry players, industry Associations, Bank Negara Malaysia, and all others who have supported us in 2020. To our MII Board Members, I am eternally grateful for your wisdom and guidance.
We are wholly focused on how MII can best play its role. We will continue to do our part to support the industry’s growth and development and we will look for new opportunities and innovative ways to accomplish that.
Please take care and I know we will get through this, together.
Shalini Pavithran
Chief Executive Officer
The Malaysian Insurance Institute
