Up the ladder

Paul Dickson runs Watford-based Dickson Insurance Brokers, a broker and independent financial adviser, established in 1986, covering personal and commercial clients.

Dickson numbers UK listed companies in the technology, telecoms, manufacturing and online grocery sectors among his clients. These include: software and services group Anite; one of the UK’s largest toy distributors, Character Group; the business class airline Silverjet; and the internet and communications group Pipex.

The firm has a gross written premium of about £8m and employs 17 staff. It specialises in technology, telecoms, leisure and sports parks.

How did you make it to where you are today?

I started in record shop management at 16, when vinyl mattered. I then had a stint at CIN Properties – the Coal Board’s pension fund management arm – followed by the best part of 10 years at Lloyd’s broker Towry Law. My route from retail to finance is perhaps not entirely linear, but had something to do with my parents feeling that I should contribute a little more to the household budget and possibly my own career path.

Certainly the rigours of working for a highly ambitious mid-sized firm in my early 20s reshaped my entire outlook on work. I doubt this path could be easily followed today. It’s probably better to have a degree these days.

What are the key challenges ahead?

Retention and differentiation. Mix in the likely deferral of any immediate upturn in rates and the uncertain impact of the credit crunch and the outlook becomes decidedly interesting.

Client retention is key. Keeping top quality staff on board is becoming more costly. Recently we’ve seen examples of high profile individuals and specialist teams switching firms for a greater share of the action. Very capable individuals have begun to realise that the customer is where the value exists and they’re increasingly trading these assets. This is a real threat to the corporate broker model, which, in contrast, has tended to exploit the aggregated value of account placings, rather than loving the customer.

What has changed the most since you started in insurance?

It’s a much faster moving business. It is more entrepreneurial, fiercely competitive and more efficient. Brokers know the value of niche. They invest in marketing at a level unheard of 10 years ago. Regulation has changed too, but this has stimulated these other changes, almost as an unintended consequence, by separating the professional brokers from the rest and defining market opportunities for consolidators and network operators.

What advice would you offer someone just starting out?

Choose your employer with care. Take the CII exams. I studied via a correspondence course with Metropolitan College, London. All costs were paid by my employer. We do the same at Dicksons, and we certainly recommend the CII qualifications to everyone in the business, including the accounts staff and secretaries. Become an expert in a given subject, but gain a working knowledge of the market as a whole. Most importantly, enjoy what you do.

“Regrets -
Ive had a few.
I tend to be
a bit of a
control freak.
Is that bad?

What is the biggest mistake you have ever made?

Regrets – I’ve had a few. I tend to be a bit of a control freak. Is that bad?

What was your biggest success?

Starting my own business in the mid 1980s.

What is your unique selling point?

Forging grown-up relationships with clients on the back of solid service delivery. Reliability at the forefront. Projecting a culture of old fashioned customer-facing service but overlaid with intelligence. And humour.

Talk about some of your contemporaries and friends in the insurance market?

I take my hat off to the modern breed of insurance brokers. The likes of Stuart Reid, Chris Giles, Andy Homer, Peter Cullum, Phillip Hodson, the Bollington guys. They’ve re-engineered things and made themselves stupendously wealthy. Envious? Me?

When you are not working what do you do to relax?

I own a Princess 42 yacht, still begrudgingly berthed in the UK and not in the Mediterranean as I would wish, due to work pressures. I am a huge music fan so a regular concert-goer. Travel, guitar playing, golf, a bottle of Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc. Working on our 16th century house near Windsor.

What is your favourite book/film/football team?

Book: The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. Film: Perhaps A Fistful of Dollars. Music: Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here. Favourite football team: Arsenal. To say anything else would cause a mutiny in the office.