Muang Thai moves to accommodate Gen Y execs

Sara Lamsam, president and chief executive officer of MTL, said yesterday that as an Asean company, MTL has to prepare well in all areas, especially its human resources who are members of Gen Y. 

Excluding sales staff, some 70 per cent of its workforce are Gen Y employees, who by nature are looking for new challenges with a certain direction. 

The company will have to restructure its management structure to be flatter and also provide a forum for Gen Y employees to offer ideas and how to execute them.

The changing environment, especially the digital trend, is weighing on growth. Gen Y people will play a greater role not only in driving premiums but also in developing products and services.

The company is giving more importance to digital design. Products and services must be made simple to comply with consumer preferences in the digital era.

MTL is seeking a platform for doing business in Asean, in countries such as Indonesia and the Philippines. The penetration into Asean markets will be through joint ventures rather than other vehicles because even though the company has experience in developing life insurance products, to succeed on the regional stage, it must have a strong network and understand local regulations.

“We might set up a joint venture with a local company or use the existing joint venture of local partners. The pattern is not finalised yet but we will definitely go if the markets that we will go to have clear regulations,” he said.

In Asean, MTL has a representative office in Myanmar, which cannot do any business.

“Thailand has a geographical advantage in serving neighbouring people in terms of medical treatment, so protection is one kind of life insurance policy that should be offered,” he said.

The company has confidence in branching out in Asean. It was recently named the Life Insurance Company of the Year at the Asia Insurance Industry Awards in Taipei.

Sara, who is also president of the Thai Life Assurance Association, said the trend of maturing insurance policies might influence the gross premiums of the life insurance industry.

There has been an increase in the number of policies maturing in the past three years and that is the result of more active selling of policies by many life insurers before the 1997 economic crisis. In the past decade, several insurers promoted short-term policies to attract buyers. 

However, the persistency rate is 86 per cent, regarded as a high level. Insurers have also developed niche products, so new premium income is higher than on matured policies.

Gross premiums in the life insurance industry in the first nine months of this year grew by 15 per cent, declining from 16 per cent in the first eight months, as many policies had reached maturity.

The industry this year expects to expand by 12-14 per cent, which is much high than the gross domestic product growth, he added.