This award goes to a company or other insurance industry organization that has made significant contributions to the industry and/or society. This award is designed to help support all the strategic goals and especially those of enhancing the reputation of the industry. An organization selected for this award will highlight accomplishments with respect to civic and community involvement, innovation, education, and industry leadership. The award will be based on four overarching criteria:

Social responsibility
(This must be met satisfactorily before the other criteria can be considered):

Community Support

• Organizational resources are allocated to support involvement in community activities outside the organization
• Senior leaders and employees at various levels are involved in community activities, civic organizations, and associations that support the community.

Ethics

• Has a formal system to train ALL employees about ethical business practices
• Has effective system in place to meet or exceed legal and regulatory requirements
• Senior leadership and other employees make and/or support presentations, publications and research that help promote ethical behavior

Sustainability and Public Responsibility

• The organization’s business activities include systems to analyze, anticipate, and minimize risk and hazards to public indicators for risk are identified and monitored
• The organization considers the impact that its operations, products, and services might have on society and implements strategies to make improvements. (i.e. “greening” the organization’s operations or promoting green products and initiatives)
• Organization supports research on how insurance organizations can help protect the public (i.e. testing for safer products and home materials, encouraging safer workplace practices, assessing benefits of health and wellness programs, using discounts to promote loss reduction)

**Activities which demonstrate innovation will be given additional credit**

Organizational Performance
(especially with respect to recruiting, and developing the next generation of talent)

• Organization has well-implemented and innovative recruiting and developing of next generation talent
• Organization has demonstrated innovation (i.e. new products or services, use of technology, progressive ERM practices)
• Organization has had good operating results over past 5 years
• Organization appears to have financial viability for future
• Organization provides high level of support for employees seeking professional education (i.e. professional programs like CPCU, CLU) and college degrees

Industry Contribution

• Resource allocation for industry professional associations
• Leadership in industry professional associations
• Support for organizations that help promote a better understanding of insurance (i.e. educational programs, trade associations, financial literacy, and risk management.)
• Providing activities to encourage NEXT generation talent to consider the Midwest industry (providing scholarships to study risk and insurance, mentorships, internships, job-shadowing experiences, diversity programs)
• Education of industry- Senior management and employees teaching public classes, do industry presentations, or publish material that improves knowledge
• Support research on insurance and risk management topics
• Support for educational conferences, symposia, and other events in the Midwest that help educate professionals in the industry

**Activities which demonstrate unique innovation will be given additional credit**

The Microinsurance Centre: Winner of 2012
Innovation and Leadership Award

Category: Insurance Organization

The Microinsurance Centre, based in Appleton, Wisconsin, has a mission of helping over three billion low income people living in the developing world to get good value insurance. These people, more than any others, need the protection that insurance provides. They accomplish this by working with regulated insurers and appropriate delivery channels, who efficiently provide simple, market responsive microinsurance products. Thier clients include commercial insurers, foundations, bi- and multi-lateral development agencies, regulators, NGOs and others. These organizations work with the Microinsurance Centre to ensure the best potential for success with their microinsurance activities. Our work with clients includes various aspects of microinsurance from product development and training to research and advocacy. The Centre’s  team has implemented microinsurance activities in over 60 countries over the last sixteen years

The Centre is dedicated to developing partnerships around the world to help provide insurance products to low-income people across the globe in a manner that benefits policyholders, and is profitable to for insurers. The Centre’s founder Michael McCord came up with idea in 1994 while managing a microcredit facility in Uganda. He saw that the main reason his clients and their families who had thrived after building businesses from microcredit fell back into poverty  because of deaths, illnesses, accidents, thefts, and fires and other insurance events. He felt that insurance would provide these people with the safety net needed to keep them from falling back into poverty. He shopped the idea of insuring his clients around to different companies and finally was able to find a new managing director at AIG in Uganda, willing to try to provide insurance to the poor. The experiment worked, and Michael subsequently founded the Microinsurance Centre. The Centre now has 25 team members working around the world to help provide insurance to the world.

If you’d like to learn more about the Microinsurance Centre and their activities please see http://www.microinsurancecentre.org/