Rising Star: Tyler Kerr

Tyler Kerr is a specialty and casualty underwriter at Mereo Insurance. He began his career in the operations team at Validus Re before moving to underwriting.

After a few years in the specialty underwriting seat at Validus Re, and under RenaissanceRe following its purchase of the company, Kerr spent a year travelling through Thailand, training and competing full time in martial art Muay Thai at a professional level.

He then looked to re-enter the market in a way that allowed him to deploy and expand his existing experience. He landed a role at a reinsurance start-up from day zero, which he took as an opportunity to challenge himself further, gaining exposure to the inner workings and formation of a reinsurance company, and building out a highly diversified portfolio of 30 lines of business from scratch.

Can you start by telling us what inspired your career?

The re/insurance space dominates the Bermuda market and is front and centre here on our little island. Many successful people I knew growing up were active in this space, and it inspired me to learn more.

After learning how re/insurance impacts our world in many ways across various specialist niches, it inspired me to pursue a career in this space. The more I learned, the more interested I became.

What elements of your career do you enjoy most and why?

I enjoy the balance between the technical and people-oriented nature of the job. Getting into the weeds of technical deal analysis and fostering relationships with core clients, brokers and internal teams is extremely enjoyable.

Equally enjoyable and somewhat unique to the specialty space is the variety of types of risks and lines I work on – I can start my day looking at a nuclear risk and end it looking at cyber or aerospace. There is never a dull day!

Can you share an example of a challenge you overcame that significantly shaped your career trajectory?

I started my career in operations – a segment I didn’t know about prior to joining – and absolutely loved it. It served as an amazing foundation, giving me exposure to deals from all lines of business, geographies and reinsurance structures. I excelled in this role and was given many opportunities to take on responsibility and more complex tasks, but progression was somewhat finite, and I didn’t know where to go next.

I spoke with various teams within my company – actuarial, finance, claims and underwriting – to understand what they work on better, what day-to-day looks like and what they enjoy and dislike about their jobs. I landed on underwriting as the best fit for my skills and goals.

I reached out internally to shadow our underwriting team – my proactive efforts were noticed and I was recruited to join an underwriting role by someone I consider an industry leader and mentor. It fundamentally changed my life and career path.

What are your career ambitions? And how will you work to achieve them?

They are closely tied to my aspirations in life, which, put simply, is to live a happy and fulfilling life. It may sound silly, but life and career aspirations can become complex and stressful and it’s easy to lose sight of each or get caught up in things that aren’t conducive to ‘success’ in either arena.

I aspire to continue advancing in my underwriting career, challenge myself to expand my knowledge and progress towards a leadership role, as I’ve found myself naturally falling into leadership positions in life and work alike.

Equally importantly, I am aiming simply to enjoy life and the process of personal and professional development, continuing to challenge myself to improve. I’ve found continuous growth and overcoming challenges rewarding and fulfilling. Although I do have some specific career aspirations, for now, I am simply putting my best foot forward each day towards these goals.

How do you stay motivated and continue to learn in such a dynamic sector?

I thoroughly enjoy the work I do! It is diverse and the dynamic nature of our industry keeps me interested and motivates me to continue learning and becoming an expert in the classes I lead.

I’ve found that having a great team and network around me is very empowering – I am constantly learning from my peers and being trusted or challenged with certain tasks is a real motivator constantly to learn and improve.

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