Prudential restructures, marketing remains untouched

Prudential is undergoing organisational changes as it aims to bring the agency and bancassurance businesses under a single distribution division. This comes following the departure of chief agency officer, Roy Lim, who had helmed the role for a year.Driving the distribution division will be Odd Haavik, who will take on the newly created role of a chief distribution officer. Prudential also added that head of partnerships distribution, Stephanie Simonnet, who overlooked bancassurance, will be taking on a different role within the Prudential Group. In the interim, Haavik with 30 years of experience, will manage the two distribution channels and leverage the strengths each offer to better position the business for growth.The marketing team in Prudential will not be impacted by this organisational restructure. Most recently, Prudential brought on-board former OCBC’s chief marketing officer Goh Theng Kiat as chief customer officer. He replaced Angela Hunter to champion customer centricity across the organisation as he oversees customer segments, brand and marketing, data analytics, products and events. Goh will be reporting to Wilf Blackburn, Prudential Singapore CEO.Wilf Blackburn, CEO, Prudential Singapore, in a statement to Marketing said that these changes were announced approximately two weeks ago to further drive the business."We made a strategic decision to have both our agency and bancassurance businesses come under a single Distribution Division. This combines the strengths of our distribution channels to offer stronger support to our more than 4,800 Financial Consultants and partners, setting the foundation for even closer collaboration. As our distribution business expands, it makes sense to consolidate for greater synergy and efficiency, which will ultimately benefit our customers," he said.Prudential has also made clear to Marketing that the organisational restructure is not related to the digital transformation the company took in July. Several of its agents expressed concerns over the surge of digital transformations in the company and according to an article on The Straits Times, approximately 350 out of 600 agency executives sent a petition  to Prudential’s headquarters in Hong Kong and London. This was in a bid to express the “unhappiness” towards the selling of popular products and savings plans online, which might go against their own earnings as agents of the company.Read also: Prudential faces unhappy agents as it pushes digital transformation agenda Prudential CEO makes video apology amidst stir over incorrect deductions