By George Abbott

May 16 - (The Insurer) - Emma Smith and Victoria Gobey, both international property line underwriters at Inigo, attribute their career success to their unique job-share arrangement.

Asked whether the duo would be where they are in their careers without the job share, Smith replied: “Probably not, no.”

The duo pioneered the London market’s first underwriting job share in 2017 while both were working at Atrium as senior underwriters. They originally conceived the idea to balance their workload with raising children.

The general premise of the job share is that they work as one line underwriter, with Gobey working Monday to Wednesday and Smith working Wednesday to Friday. At the beginning of 2025, they moved to Inigo under the same job-share arrangement.

“We just kept coming back to the fact that we didn’t want to both work part-time. It wasn’t what we wanted. So then, as you get chatting, ideas come up, and we thought, why don’t we split the week?” said Gobey.

“You know, prior to COVID, if you said you wanted to work part-time, it sort of meant that your career faltered a little bit. And that was one thing that really motivated us. We had this idea of our career trajectory going in one direction, and we just really weren’t willing to go off that path. So this was our solution,” she added.

Feedback from Gobey and Smith’s brokers was positive, which helped make the job share possible.

“Our brokers were brilliant. They were really good. We quickly communicated with all the brokers, and they talked. It’s a relatively small industry in the London market, and they got the hang of it really quickly,” said Gobey.

“We knew we had to have them on board to make it work, because otherwise, we would have been failing. And they were really supportive,” Smith added.

The duo said they believe there is a real possibility that job shares could work at C-suite level, such as a chief underwriting officer role.

“I just don’t see why not. I think if the opportunities are there and if you can put a business plan and strategy together, why can’t it work?” said Smith.

Both agreed that if job share roles like theirs had existed when they first started in the industry, fewer women would have been forced to exit the market due to the inability to balance work and childcare.

“A lot of people left the industry back in the ’90s when there wasn’t flexible working or agility. I saw so many good candidates leave the market, mainly women, which is just a shame because there’s no need for it,” said Gobey.