Panel Discussion 29/09 - The role of insurers in 2030

The panel members:

• Hilde Vernaillen, CEO at P&V Group
• Heidi Cortois, CCO Broker Channel at NN
• Dorsan van Hecke, CEO at Athora Belgium
• Cedric De Vleeschauwer, General Manager at Alan
• Jean-Philippe Thirion, BU Leader Financial Institutions at TriFinance

The panel was moderated by Francesca Vanthielen, news anchor for Kanaal Z.

Some of the questions they raised are:

• How will the insurers of the future better support customers throughout their life cycle?
• How important will company culture be to attract talent in ten years' time?
• Which evolutions are necessary to support economic and societal growth better?

Highlights of the evening

It was a pleasure having so many guests amongst us on that occasion! The event pictures and recording of the session are available here:

Discover the panel

Hilde Vernaillen, CEO at P&V Group

Hilde was recruited after her studies by what was then CODEP Savings Bank, a subsidiary of P&V. This savings bank was meanwhile merged with Bank Nagelmackers and sold to the Delta Lloyd Group. In April 2002, Hilde made the switch to P&V. In 2006, she became the first woman to join the Executive Committee. She was appointed as Vice-Chairman of the Executive Committee in 2010 and succeeded chairman Jacques Forest in 2011. P&V is a cooperative insurance group that works exclusively in Belgium using a multi-brand and multi-channel sales policy. Next to her function at P&V Group, Hilde is also President of the Belgian Insurance Association Assuralia and Chair of the ICMIF (International Cooperative and Mutual Insurance Federation).

Heidi Cortois, CCO Broker Channel at NN

Heidi has spent 23 years working in the financial sector at Crelan and TriFinance among others, before joining NN in 2020. Heidi is a member of the Executive Committee of NN Belgium, responsible for the operations, customer care, change and sales for the Life insurance retail solutions distributed via bank partnerships, tied agents and brokers. As of February 1st, 2022, in addition to her Retail role, she takes up the responsibility of customer care, sales and change of Self-employed and Employee Benefit.

Dorsan van Hecke, CEO at Athora Belgium

Dorsan joined Generali Belgium (now Athora Belgium) in 2015 as Director Life. In 2018 he became Chief Distribution Officer before becoming CEO in 2019. He started his career at Accenture, where he worked as a consultant between 2003 and 2005. From 2005 to 2006 he worked for Callataÿ & Wouters (today Sopra Banking Software) as a group controller. Then he was regional financial controller for Citigroup until 2008. As of 2008 and before joining Generali-Athora, Dorsan van Hecke held various management positions at Delta Lloyd Life: planning & control manager, corporate strategy officer and head of marketing.

Cedric De Vleeschauwer, General Manager at Alan

Cedric launched the activities of digital health insurer Alan in Belgium in 2020. Alan is a hyperfast growing insurtech company, positioning itself as a one-stop health partner, going beyond traditional health insurance. Before Alan Cedric worked for fast growing tech scale-ups, mainly in go-to-market leadership positions. He’s a proud member of the 'Netlog mafia’, launched two startups himself, and was a member of the EMEA leadership team of Showpad. He’s also active as mentor and coach for tech startups.

Jean-Philippe Thirion, BU Leader Financial Institutions at TriFinance

TriFinance is an innovative service provider that offers tailor-made pragmatic advisory and transition & support services in risk & compliance, finance, operations and human development. TriFinance is present in 4 countries, in 13 offices with more than 800 consultants. It has an extended network of Interim Managers and more than 100 are active in the organization today. Since the start of its activities in 2020, Jean-Philippe is also Business Unit Leader of TriFinance Luxembourg.

Francesca Vanthielen, Moderator

Francesca Vanthielen is a news anchor for the Business News Broadcaster, Kanaal Z, where she also presents the weekend programme, Trends Talk. Francesca obtained a master’s degree in Applied Economics and in International Politics at KU Leuven. For a long time, she combined her work with various social commitments, as an ambassador for UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees), as one of the initiators of the G1000 movement (Belgian platform for democratic innovation) and a co-founder of the NGO Klimaatzaak (Climate Case).