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Rising Importance of Industry Specialization

In recent years, macro events like the Covid-19 pandemic have increased the pace of innovation, development cycles and industry consolidation amongst sectors.

In recent years, macro events like the Covid-19 pandemic have increased the pace of innovation, development cycles and industry consolidation amongst sectors. Increasingly, the changes catalyzed by macro events can become opportunities for well-positioned businesses and disasters for those that are underprepared. The evidence of this is all around us: businesses that have taken decisive action to avail themselves of growth opportunities in adjacent industries while winding down other less desirable part of their business have survived if not thrived. The stakes have never been higher and there is now even more to gain (and lose) as we are currently experiencing several seismic shifts at once: digital transformation, shifts in globalism versus national protectionism, climate change, and the Covid-19 pandemic, all of which are creating new industries while shuttering others at a rapid rate.

In such an environment, businesses must strategically assume risk to succeed, and are being asked to do so with greater pace than ever before, to meet stakeholder demands. Established and emerging risks are shifting rapidly; brokers and risk advisers must become experts in their clients’ industries and businesses to offer the specialized advice and solutions required to stay ahead.

Brokers and risk advisors play a key role to help clients connect the dots on what is happening in their strategic, operating and competitive environment and the associated risks by:

  • Understanding the impact of macro-events;
  • Pre-empting the risks related to their business cycles, and most importantly;
  • Innovating with pace, the relevant risk solutions to meet their evolving needs.

To deliver all these requirements, the broker must have intimate knowledge of their client’s industry. This is why Marsh takes an industry-focused approach to risk advisory and client-service so we can provide clients with an uninterrupted holistic view of risk issues on the horizon. Further, specialization places our experts further along the steep learning curve of intimately understanding your business, so that they can swiftly get to tailoring solutions for you.

A thriving business is a business that adapts, and every attempt to adapt will come with risks, challenges, opportunities and rewards. A specialized broker is crucial for a deep understanding of the risk landscape of your industry and business, and can function as a critical support to your future success.

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