Chief claims and operations officer, general insurance, Australia and New Zealand
When she joined Zurich in 2016, Hilary Bates had already racked up nearly 20 years of experience in the insurance industry, starting in private practice for insurance, risk management and litigation practice groups before focusing solely on insurance in 2004. Since then, she has held several senior claims management roles, responsible for delivering on customer, people, financial and transformation objectives. A two-time member of the Elite Women list and named to IB’s Global 100 list for 2020, Bates says she is passionate about business transformation and delivering on the promise to Zurich’s customers.
When the pandemic struck, Bates picked up yet another fundamental role within the company. “I am also currently the crisis controller, working with a team of people to coordinate our local response to the COVID-19 pandemic across our Zurich Australia and New Zealand businesses,” she says. “This included moving 95% of our staff across 15 offices to working-from-home arrangements, ensuring our team members could work remotely and our on-site critical staff were in a safe work environment.”
This shift in responsibility and work environment has also led Bates to update her goals for 2020. “My goal for the remainder of the year is to lead the business through our return-to-office pilot and into a formal wave one for return to o ce in the third quarter, recognising all the cultural changes we are seeing to a traditional office environment as people have adapted and, in many cases, prefer working from home,” she says.
