Business Development Manager

Santam; Durban; On-site; ZAR 600 000 - 800 000; Full time

Job summary

A leading insurance provider in Durban is seeking a Business Development Manager to build and maintain key relationships with brokers. The successful candidate will focus on strategic objectives, business development, and data analysis while ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements. Ideal applicants should have extensive experience in corporate insurance and demonstrated success in managing profitable portfolios.

Qualifications

• 5 to 10 years' experience in Business Development in a Strategic role.
• Experienced in maintaining and growing a profitable portfolio of Corporate/Commercial Insurance.

Responsibilities

• Build and solidify relationships with Key Brokers.
• Identify and validate cross-sell opportunities.
• Conduct monthly and quarterly data analysis and reporting.

Skills

Strategic thinking

Interpersonal skills

Analytical skills

Business development

Data analysis

Education

Insurance-related qualification or relevant degree

FAIS Compliant

Regulatory exam compliance

Job description

What will you do?

To build, maintain, and solidify relationships with Key Brokers, representing all lines of business within Santam Specialist Solutions (SSS). This strategic role is focused on leading & driving key business development objectives to achieve the Strategic Goals and delivering on primary KPIs through a holistic and collaborative approach across the organization.

What will make you successful in this role?

This role will be measured against three core pillars.

1. Engagement : Building and Solidifying Relationships (35%)

• Communicate the SSS message to our intermediary market, including team & people updates, product updates, and risk appetite.
• Actively listen to our intermediaries to gather feedback on expectations, problems, service, and market intelligence (changes, competitor analysis, rate changes, and opportunities).
• Creating Broker profiles with a comprehensive analysis to understand the broker holistically:
  • Strategic Objectives: Understand the broker's own business goals, target markets, and growth ambitions.
  • Financial & Operational Metrics: Analyze their GWP, client portfolio size, areas of specialty, and operational strengths.
  • Current Relationship Mapping: Assess the volume of business placed with us, the specific clusters / products used, and our overall share of their wallet.
  • Key Personnel & Structure: Identify decision-makers, influencers, and day-to-day operatives within the broker firm.
  • Competitor Landscape: Determine which other insurers they use, the competitor's share, and the perceived strengths / weaknesses of those relationships.
  • Perception & Feedback: Gauge their view of our service, underwriting appetite, competitiveness, and overall value proposition.
• Facilitate key engagement sessions (office visits, breakfasts, lunches, dinners) with top‑tier global and national / independent intermediaries.
• Set up meetings for internal teams / leaders and provide pre‑meeting statistics and insights.
• Ensure all entertainment expenditure aligns with company policy and is declared on the conflict‑of‑interest register.

2. Business Development : Transactional Focus (45%)

• New Business: Identify and validate true cross‑sell opportunities through a review of the Top renewals per business unit / cluster.
• Retention: Work with Business Unit Heads to promote business retention and packaging of SSS offerings within appetite, ensuring clarity on strategic accounts and timely access to renewal lists.
• Lost Business: Analyze lost business data to understand market positioning and inform strategies to re‑obtain submissions.
• Build, manage, and optimize a pipeline of prospects, tracking progress and forecasting accurately.
• Drive business development visits to establish new relationships and maintain the existing broker network.
• Implement structured engagements with agendas, action items, and tracking, maintaining records in shared folders / systems.

3. Business Intelligence and Data : Reporting Focus (20%)

• Conduct monthly, quarterly, half‑year, and full‑year analysis, concluding data and present agreed reports to management.
• Deliver Monthly, Quarterly, Half‑year & Full Year feedback to Head of Business Development SA, including:
  • GWP Data (New Business, Lost Business, Retention Ratios).
  • Competitor Feedback (new entrants, exits, key personnel changes, products / capacity).
  • Cross‑sell opportunities.
• Work with Data Warehouse and Finance to ensure data accuracy, integrity, and that reporting rules are understood and aligned (for Broker Dashboards).
• Provide market intelligence relating to people movement, product competitiveness, coverage, and other pertinent aspects.
• Ensure provided data aligns with what each internal team reports on.

Qualifications & Experience

• Insurance‑related qualification or relevant degree.
• FAIS Compliant.
• Regulatory exam compliance.
• 5 to 10 years' experience in Business Development in a Strategic role involving Specialist and / or Niche classes of insurance.
• Experienced in maintaining and growing a profitable portfolio of Corporate / Commercial Insurance.

Knowledge & Skills

• Core ability to think and act on a strategic level.
• Technical ability across various specialist insurance product lines.
• Excellent interpersonal skills to develop and maintain understanding and working relationships with key selected brokers at all levels.
• Ability to identify new business and target cross‑sell opportunities with a focused strategy.
• Proficiency in leveraging data and analytics tools to update dashboards and derive insights.
• Strong analytical skills for pipeline management, data analysis, and reporting.
• Ability to co‑ordinate monthly and quarterly internal / cross‑cluster meetings to ensure strategic alignment.
• Maintain a working knowledge of targeted industry groups and underwriting appetites.