How Insurance TA Can Connect Talent Decisions to Business Performance

Many insurance TA leaders are finding that established hiring metrics do not always tell the full story. TA may report on time-to-fill, cost-per-hire and offer acceptance rates, while business leaders are monitoring combined ratios, claims capacity, actuarial output and regulatory readiness. The difference is more than a reporting gap. In a sector where specialist roles can have direct commercial and regulatory consequences, connecting talent activity to these wider measures can make TA’s contribution more visible in leadership discussions.

Connecting TA Measures With Insurance Priorities

Familiar TA metrics remain useful for understanding how efficiently recruitment is operating. On their own, however, they may provide less insight into what happens after a vacancy is filled, or the business effect when a critical role remains open.

In insurance, the business is asking different questions. 

• What is the actuarial headcount needed to support the next product launch cycle? 
• What does a high attrition rate in the claims team mean for Consumer Duty compliance obligations? 
• How does underwriter tenure and experience connect to loss ratios in specialist lines? 

These are questions that TA can help the business explore. In some organisations, the answers are not yet easy to produce because the relevant data sits across different functions or systems, while reporting remains centred on recruitment delivery. Bringing those sources together can help leaders develop a clearer view of how talent decisions affect business performance. 
 
As Andy Mountney, a global TA leader, observed in Robert Walters' TA Evolution 2026 guide: "My concern is whether TA can focus on what actually drives business outcomes, not just what TA teams think they should do." 

In insurance, many of these outcomes can be traced to workforce capacity. Actuarial capability can influence product development timelines. Claims-handling capacity can affect customer outcomes and regulatory performance. Compliance staffing can contribute to audit readiness. TA teams that make these connections more visible may be better placed to participate in wider conversations about risk, growth and operational planning.

What Meaningful Measurement Can Look Like in Insurance

Sarah Hanson, Head of Talent Acquisition International at QBE Insurance, identified the capability the function needs in Robert Walters' TA Evolution 2026 guide: "You need to be somebody who is data savvy and really good at storytelling." 

The storytelling she describes is not about replacing existing TA measures. It is about placing them in a business context. A vacancy rate in a specialist team may also indicate capacity risk. Time-to-fill may become more commercially relevant when it is considered alongside the time a new employee needs to contribute fully in a role where delays carry a measurable cost. 
 
Jennifer Turner, Vice President of Talent Acquisition at Aspen Insurance Group, points to what the structural response looks like: "We are building out role profiles and we are focused on developing an agile workforce which will help us get to where we need to be in the future." 

Mapping roles against future business requirements and developing pipelines around them can give TA a clearer basis for workforce conversations with finance, risk and operational leaders. It also helps the organisation distinguish between roles that need immediate recruitment support and capabilities that may need to be developed over a longer period. 
 
Research from McKinsey, cited in the TA Evolution 2026 guide, found that organisations integrating workforce planning into business planning are 66% more likely to exceed financial targets. For insurance TA leaders, one useful starting point may be to identify the roles where a capability gap has a clear operational or commercial effect. These could include senior actuaries, compliance specialists, claims managers and data scientists supporting pricing models.

Where Insurance TA Leaders Can Start

For each priority role, TA and business leaders could consider three questions: what does the role enable, what is the likely effect if it remains vacant or is filled unsuccessfully, and which existing business measure could provide evidence of that impact?

Answering those questions may not require an immediate investment in new technology. It often begins with agreement between TA, HR, finance, risk and business stakeholders on which outcomes matter and how they can be measured consistently. Existing process measures can then be presented alongside information on retention, productivity and workforce capacity.

An RPO partner with insurance sector experience can support this work by adding analytical capacity, external benchmarks and insight into specialist talent markets. Depending on the organisation’s needs, that support might include reviewing talent pipelines, developing time-to-productivity measures or helping teams connect recruitment reporting with the risk and commercial indicators already used by leadership.

Ready to connect talent strategy with business performance?

Robert Walters works with insurance carriers, Lloyd’s market participants and insurance groups to shape talent acquisition models around their workforce and business priorities. For organisations exploring how recruitment reporting could provide a clearer view of risk, capacity and performance, our insurance talent specialists can help identify a practical starting point.

As the insurance sector changes, hiring speed will remain important, but it is only part of the picture. Connecting talent decisions with the measures the business already values can give leaders a clearer view of where TA is making a difference.