President's Message - April 2019

We also had quite a lot of fun and raised funds for both the Insurance Charities and Suffolk Mind!!

Whilst it wasn’t quite as warm as last year, the weather was still generally kind to us on what was a cool but bright and dry evening. With dinner, raffle, an auction, prize giving and then dancing all ahead of us, it was lovely to see so many people arriving early to be greeted by Jacob Baker playing a baby Grand Piano. Jacob was supported by the Insurance Charities during his study at the Guildhall Junior School in London - he currently lives in Vienna, teaching and working with various musical groups but came back to Suffolk especially to play for us at the start of the night.

Kesgrave Hall is a magnificent venue and the staff there did us proud. We rely heavily on sponsors to enable us to hold our dinner at such a great venue and our sincere thanks go to our kind sponsors; Employment Specialists Ltd, Willis Towers Watson, Broadspire by Crawford & Company, Ryan’s and Woodward Markwell.

We were really pleased and honoured to host a fabulous “top table” including guests from neighbouring Institutes, Suffolk Mind and Jonathan Clark, the President of the CII. It was great to hear Jonathan address the dinner and encourage us all to come together in support of the Insurance and Financial Services industries. We would like to thank all our top table guests for their support and company on the evening.

Our Top Table Guests, standing left to right:

Richard Brame (President of the CII of Ipswich, Suffolk and North Essex), Marianne Brame, Jonathan Clark (President of the CII), Beverly Coghlan, Stuart Cullen (President of the CII of Chelmsford and South Essex), Kellie Cullen, Phil Hayes (Vice President of the CII of Peterborough), Jon Neal (Chief Executive, Suffolk Mind), Amanda Sturgeon (Relationships Manager, Suffolk Mind), Holly Heald (Deputy President of the CII of Norwich) and Sarah Deacon (Deputy President of the CII of Ipswich, Suffolk and North Essex)

After the excitement of a game of “heads and tails” and the fulfilment of a fantastic three course meal (and cheese and coffee), we moved on to present the 2019 prizes. We have a huge number of members sitting exams each year, often working towards these exams and qualifications alongside many other commitments. It is both important and rewarding to recognise and celebrate examination success.

This year, the dinner awards went to:

Jessica Tuckwell (Advent Underwriting) – Taylor Prize for best overall results in Advanced Diploma in General Insurance

Clare Abbott (Price Forbes) – Ivan Howlett Prize for best overall results in Diploma in General Insurance

Matthew Thickitt (Willis Towers Watson) – Ina Barker Prize for best result in a risk management paper

Eamonn Hyland (QBE) - Harry Theed Cup for best result in a motor paper

Jenny Williams (Beckett Investment) – Award for best results in the Advanced Diploma in Financial Planning

Ben Griffiths (Swallow Financial) – Award for best results in the Diploma in Financial Planning

Kelly-Ann Quirke (Willis Towers Watson) – Gordon Warren Young Achiever Award for high achievement under the age of 30

Savannah Watts (Willis Towers Watson) and Lisa Carr (Policy Bee) were also short-listed for the Gordon Warren Award and Lisa Carr went on to receive this year’s Council Award

Matthew Thickitt (Willis Towers Watson), Jenny Williams (Beckett Investment), Kelly-Ann Quirke(Willis Towers Watson), Savannah Watts (Willis Towers Watson), Lisa Carr (Policy Bee), Richard Brame (President of the CII of Ipswich, Suffolk and North Essex)

After the formalities of dinner and the prize giving, dinner guests were then able to catch up with others informally, enjoy a drink and a chat and of course show their moves on the dance floor - in fact the dance floor was full for most of the rest of the evening. It was great to see so many people stay on until the end of the night, clearly enjoying themselves.

Whilst everyone had a great time; we were also able to raise money for both the Insurance Charities and Suffolk Mind.

A number of local businesses and organisations had donated prizes enabling us to run a raffle and an auction during the dinner.

With some great prizes on offer, people were very generous and we raised over £3,000 which will be split between the two charities.

The total funds raised for the Presidents chosen charity – Suffolk Mind – now total over £6,000 across the last 12 months.

We again thank our dinner Sponsors, our top table guests, our prize winners, those who donated prizes and everyone that helped make our Annual Dinner such a success.

And so finally … during the evening we used Slido to run the silent auctions. We also asked people to use a word to describe how they felt about the evening.

The most popular words then generate a “word cloud”. The final version of this is shown below:

“Fantastic”; “Fabulous”; “Great”;

Next year’s Annual Dinner will again be held at Kesgrave Hall on Friday 24th April 2020 – further details will be made available shortly