Training in Paris- Part 2

So, as promised, here is the second part of my blog series about Paris and Training and Training in Paris.

The Training part was fantastic. For those of you who’ve forgotten what I’m actually doing here as I write about pasta, I work in the Financial Lines division of a major multinational insurance company. This means that we write Directors and Officers Insurance, Employers Practices Liability Insurance, Professional Liability and Crime/Fidelity Insurance, which are all coverages that indemnify for financial losses brought on by errors where a higher level of care is expected (like, legal malpractice, failure to supervise for D&O, discrimination for EPLI, etc.)

It was two weeks of solid information, but unlike a lot of basic training courses, this was an in depth and up to date training- because as you can imagine with Subprime, D&O insurance has become much riskier- and therefore more sought after (its what we refer to as Adverse Selection- the notion that those most likely to have claims are those most likely to purchase insurance).

But I won’t bore you any more with the details of Financial Lines Insurance. The most wonderful part of the training for me, is that there were representatives from almost all of our major European offices. I was one of two underwriters sent from Milan, but there was also a nice girl from Athens, about a dozen from the various UK offices, Madrid, Zurich, Hamburg and Frankfurt (so a Hamburger and a Frankfurter- hehehehehe), and even Johannesburg, South Africa.

This was so much more than the opportunity to learn the ins and outs of our underwriting lines- it was also the opportunity to learn about other cultures and what the market is like in other countries- which is one of the reasons I left NY for Milan in the first place. Additionally, we got some good “face time” with some of the major heads of the EU offices.

So the advice I pass on to you- NEVER say no to training!