Profile: Rob Worrell, CEO insurance broking at the Ardonagh Group

Back for good: Rob Worrell thought he was done with insurance after “falling out of love” with the sector. He tells Insurance Age how he was tempted back by the CEO insurance broking role at Ardonagh

"I’m just a big-nosed lad from Hull trying to do his best,” Rob Worrell sums himself up with a smile. 

He also describes himself as a sporty family-man who likes to keep fit and enjoys people’s company.

These traits have served him well throughout his insurance career, a career that last year he thought had run its course. 

When Worrell left his previous job leading Jelf’s general insurance division in March 2017 he had no intention of ever returning to the industry. Indeed he occupied himself with a number of non-insurance business interests.

“I thought I had fallen out of love with insurance and that was me retired,” he remembers. “But within a fortnight I missed it.” 

Fast-forward to December last year and Worrell stepped into his post as CEO insurance broking at the Ardonagh Group. 

Worrell’s job is to look after the bits of Ardonagh still under the Towergate name – Towergate Advisory and Towergate Healthcare – as well as Chase Templeton. He took over the reins from Janice Deakin, who in turn became deputy CEO of Ardonagh.

In the beginning

But, going back to the beginning, Worrell came into insurance in 1987 when he took a job as a trainee at Provincial in Hull after completing his A-levels. Not long after that he moved over to the broking side, first at ACS Insurance Consultants, followed by Minet Insurance Brokers. 

In 1993, at the age of 24, he founded The Insurance Partnership (TIP) together with Ian Hakes, Les Reveley and Malcolm Douglas. “I resigned from Minet on the Friday and got married on the Saturday and then I went on my honeymoon,” he recalls. “We set up the business when I came back, poor as a church mouse. We didn’t get paid for months.”

His reasons for wanting to set up a new business were that Minet was in the middle of closing offices and making “poor choices for clients and colleagues” that he did not want to be part of. 

“The two things that define my career the most are being a champion of clients and a champion of colleagues,” he explains. He even has a name for it – Rob’s CAC strategy. 

“If you get those things right you get an incredible insurance broking business.”

Worrell remembers setting up the business as a lovely experience, but highlights that a lot of hard work went into growing it organically. In his own words the four co-founders were “terrible businessmen, but really good insurance brokers”. They grew the organisation through word of mouth and recommendations from clients. 

“Success is repeating good behaviours and day after day we put the clients first,” he continues.

“Real heroes”

Worrell is not interested in taking credit for the success of TIP and states that the other three partners were “the real heroes of the story”, because they were all in their forties and took on a 24-year-old equal partner.

“They had the gift of experience and the gift of backing and everything else, but I had drive and enthusiasm. They took a chance on me, but I don’t think it was a massive gamble. The outcome was assured.”

Looking back, Worrell notes he faced some hard lessons during his time at TIP – for example a non-executive director brought in to assess the business criticised Worrell’s lack of strategic thinking and forward-planning. From that he learned the importance of having a clear strategy for the business including its values and where it was heading.

Speaking to people in the market about Worrell, many describe him as a charismatic leader with loyal staff who will follow him anywhere. So how did he go about building that up? 

“There’s a huge responsibility when people give you their trust and I treat that like the most precious gift,” he begins.

Human touch

Worrell outlines his belief that this type of loyalty can’t be manufactured and can only come from people believing he has their best interests at heart. He also states it is about humanity and being the best person he is capable of being. “If there’s a fight I’ll be at the frontline, if there’s trouble I want to fix it and if there’s praise I’m quite happy not to get it.”

But he adds that this should not be confused with softness. “I like to treat people how I want to be treated myself, but I also believe in an eye for an eye. I don’t like to cause anybody a problem, but they better not cause me one.” 

In 2013 TIP was sold to Jelf Group for £15.5m and Worrell gives one reason for this decision – Alex Alway, who was Jelf CEO at the time. He upholds that TIP was not sold for money but because the partners felt they had “a powerful message and couldn’t find a big enough stage for it to be heard on”. He also liked Jelf’s infrastructure and the people there, including current CEO Phil Barton.

Worrell proudly points out that several staff members moving over from TIP were offered senior roles in Jelf after the deal and maintains that Jelf was the right home for the broker. 

“If I had been a little bit shorter I would have liked to inject the ‘elf’ in Jelf, because that’s how much love I had for it,” he jokes.

Over and out

But nearly five years later, about a year after Jelf was bought by Marsh in December 2015, Worrell decided he had had enough and exited the business. He declined to go into detail but said, essentially, he had “lost the love” for his job.

His friendship with Janice Deakin, who he credits with giving him his first big break outside of Yorkshire while he was still at TIP, led him to his current role at Towergate Advisory. However, he notes he has had to “eat a fair bit of humble pie” when walking around the Ardonagh offices, admitting he has previously criticised Towergate from afar.

“There was much to admire about the people of Towergate, there was far less to admire about some of the previous Towergate leadership decisions,” he argues.

However, he saw an opportunity to help and is realistic about how the market thinks about Towergate following its well-publicised difficulties. 

“I’m not clever enough to be the point of change in Towergate’s perception in the market, but I can contribute,” he says. 

He also wishes to boost the staff and give them credit. “We can restore the trust and we can give the people the self-confidence that they absolutely deserve for showing just how wonderfully they behaved over the years in front of clients when their leadership were making some horrible decisions.”

Why Towergate?

He chose to join Towergate because he believes in the management team, including Deakin and CEO David Ross. But another reason is that he was given a wide mandate to drive long-term value through culture and client focus.

“Janice was very gutsy to say we’re going to have somebody who’s not overly corporate. I will never think of the shareholders first and I will come in with the dreaded CAC strategy,” he observes.

Worrell inherited his role from Deakin and says she has been true to her word and allowed him to crack on with his job without interfering. “Giving your family jewels away is tough to do. 

“But I wake up in the morning knowing she’ll be doing something great for Ardonagh somewhere and she knows I’ll be doing my best for Towergate Advisory somewhere else.”

His strategy is to continue to evolve as an insurance broker to meet the need of evolving clients. And, despite being the CEO of such a large business, he still goes out to win new clients and chase after renewals. “I like winning new clients not because they [current clients] feel compelled to recommend us to others through fear of reprisal, but because they’re genuine ambassadors,” he concludes.