Navigating a pandemic

Leading the response: IAG’s Suzanne Storrie

IAG Crisis Director Suzanne Storrie says adaptability will be key as the virus lingers

By Wendy Pugh

Leading a coronavirus outbreak response became such an immersive experience for IAG’s Suzanne Storrie that it led to a personal rethink on achieving work-life balance in a pandemic.

Ms Storrie was already well set up for home working and made a relatively seamless transition when the coronavirus outbreak escalated, but like many people she found in the new circumstances the day didn’t have a clear end, and it was possible to become too focused.

“I was living and breathing and dreaming COVID and I had to stop doing that,” she told Insurance News. “I had to, for myself, say it is OK and it is important to go for a walk, and [to] not just listen to COVID podcasts, listen to something else.”

Ms Storrie quickly established a better routine and says company team leaders also recognise the importance of beneficial breaks taken during the day, whether it’s lunch hours or other time out.

“We are now in this for the long haul; we don’t know what the end date is, and we have to set up sustainable behaviours,” she says.

Ms Storrie was named Crisis Director, leading IAG’s COVID-19 Response Team, in March in an appointment that required her to quickly assess the requirements and come up with solutions at a rapid pace.

Chief Financial Officer (now Chief Executive) Nick Hawkins flagged to her on a Wednesday that a new role focusing on IAG’s response was needed. By the Friday she had been appointed to the position and from there, through the weekend and afterward it was a case of working flat out on a response.

Previously she was Executive General Manager Enterprise Finance and Operations and over her career built skills in bringing people and teams together to address problems. The coronavirus outbreak was also already on her radar.

“I had already been doing a lot of research around COVID because I have a couple of underlying autoimmune issues and so I was concerned at a personal level,” she says.

IAG had been encouraging flexible working, but the wholesale move out of offices was a significant project. People using office desktops now required laptops set up by the IT team. Deadlines were tight as equipment was imported, with Australians everywhere scrambling for supplies, while delivery plans needed to minimise in-person contact.

“It wasn’t as easy as saying go home and work – we actually needed to get kit to them,” she says. “So we had to be creative and one of those solutions was creating a drive-through pick-up.

“People could get their technology in a box and then go home and set it up and start working.”

IAG provided $400 each to employees for home office costs, and an additional $40 a month to cover expenses. Protocols were developed for those who faced risks or particular issues due to the changes. Social connection and interaction also became a focus for team leaders amid uncertainty over how long the changes would last.

“At one stage, we were still working on effectively transitioning people to working from home and we were already considering how to open our worksites effectively,” Ms Storrie says.

The situation remains fluid around Australia as companies assess future working arrangements.

Melbourne faces a slower path to re-opening after entering tougher Stage Four restrictions. New South Wales has been keeping new daily case numbers under control while an outbreak in New Zealand after mostly returning to normal shows the virus is not easy to vanquish.

Ms Storrie says there is little certainty without a vaccine, and risk management requirements could keep changing for three months, six months or longer as responses remain in a state of flux.

“People are going to need to be adaptable to the local circumstances,” she says. “That might mean that they start coming in and working in the office, and then if a flare-up happens they may need to go back to working from home. So, people being adaptable is pretty important.”

Australia’s first recession in nearly three decades was confirmed last month, putting the heat on the Federal Government as political battles wage over border re-openings and the path ahead.

Ms Storrie says IAG will remain cautious as physical working arrangements are adapted, precautions put in place and events assessed.

“We are being quite considered about that and of course working with the Government to understand their approach as well,” she says. “We will continue to work with the authorities and with our people to weave our way through that.”

Experience in Western Australia, where life is close to normal, points to a shift toward employees embracing a greater level of remote working arrangements, even as the risks have eased.

“What has shifted through COVID is that there have been people who previously may not have considered working from home, or were maybe working flexibly a day a week, and now they are saying, ‘actually I could work flexibly and work from home two or three days a week’.”

IAG’s existing support for flexible working was a factor in Ms Storrie joining the company from the National Rugby League, where she was Chief Operating Officer. Previously she had worked for firms including Qantas and Commonwealth Bank and had completed university masters studies in tax law and accounting.

Rip currents and coronavirus

Safety at the beach has a different meaning this year as summer holidays are pencilled in amid the uncertainty of the coronavirus.

Both water safety and COVID-19 matters are of particular interest to Suzanne Storrie, who is on the board of Surf Life Saving Australia and chairman of Surf Sports Australia.

The virus has already caused the annual Coolangatta Gold endurance race to be cancelled, given difficulties in competitors from around the country attending, while usual beach activities have been affected by restrictions.

“Each of the different states have had to work with their government authorities to determine what is safe and when they could patrol, or if they had to close down patrols given COVID, and we are working through plans to re-open for the summer,” Ms Storrie says.

Surf life saving has become a passion for Ms Storrie, who grew up riding horses rather than waves on a farm near the small town of Ungarie, some 500km west of Sydney. Later she went to boarding school in Albury and then moved to Sydney for university, opening the way for her interest in life saving.

After years of active participation, including with her children, she is a strong advocate for the iconic organisation.

“We have 173,000 voluntary members contributing 16 million volunteer hours a year. It is a huge organisation really focused on saving lives and building communities,” she says.

Ms Storrie, who sits on the board Finance, Audit and Compliance Committee, was Australian Surf Life Saver of the Year in 1996 and gained her bronze, silver and gold medallions. She has this year launched a women’s mentoring program and is a life member.

“I remember earning my bronze medallion and learning how to do resuscitation, and thinking ‘wow, I have actually learned a skill in a night that could save someone’s life’, and I have had to use that skill,” she says. “It’s something that I certainly love being involved in.”

Inclusive approach: Ms Storrie wants to break down barriers to flexible working

The shift into the insurance world came after a chance meeting with a corporate recruiter at the Derby Day spring carnival races in Melbourne. A few weeks later he got in touch and declared he had “the perfect job” at IAG.

Ms Storrie was well-disposed toward the company, having heard good things about its culture, and was a long-term NRMA customer. Soon she was being interviewed for the position of Executive General Manager, Operational Partnering.

At that stage she was seeking a work arrangement that would allow time for active involvement in the care of her father, who had been diagnosed with Lewy Body Dementia, and who died about two years ago.

“I would take my Dad out to lunch, buy him fish and chips, which was his favourite meal, and a beer and spend some time with him because I knew that opportunity was going to pass,” she said.

“That was really important to me and I remember my final interview was with (now former chief executive) Peter Harmer, and us having a very real conversation about my need for flexibility and why, and Peter being perfectly okay with that and completely supportive.

“I don’t know that there would be many organisations or CEOs who would be, because I was taking on a big role.”

Ms Storrie says there’s a need to break-down perceptions that working full-time is necessary for senior roles, and allowing flexibility when it’s needed is important and brings benefits for employees and companies.

At IAG Ms Storrie has also promoted measures to enhance diversity and inclusion, including developing a platform for celebrating women in the company and working with Australia Chief Executive Mark Milliner on an industry approach through the Male Champions of Change initiative.

A framework used at Qantas in relation to safety was adapted to group leadership team commitments in support of diversity, with actions aligned to the personal values and concerns of individual members to underpin a strong focus.

“There was no point just picking names out of a hat and allocating them to different stream or themes of diversity and hoping the magic would happen,” she told Insurance News. “It really created this concept of a mosaic of people’s interests, matched to them supporting different elements of diversity.”

The enterprise finance and operations position that Ms Storrie took up in April last year offered a role with wide responsibility across the group, reporting to the chief financial officer.

“People said ‘oh my gosh, it is a big broad role’, but I’d spent 30 years of training for that role,” she says. “Certainly, big broad roles and leading large change programs is what I have enjoyed in my career.”

While the future in relation to the coronavirus is still uncertain, Ms Storrie says a commitment to safety remains a priority as IAG considers the path forward and the way in which people are able to return to workplaces.

“Our purpose is that ‘we make your world a safer place’, and we take that seriously, so we want to make sure we are doing that in an appropriate way and not putting people’s health at risk,” she says.

“We know that this will be around for some period of time so we have built systems and processes and governance to really support an extended response.”

insuranceNEWS October/November 2020