Other Majors

Really, almost any college major can lend itself to a successful risk management and insurance career. When you start to ask a few risk management and insurance leaders what they majored in, you quickly find out that no one type of education is necessary.

It’s not a cookie cutter industry, and recruiters aren’t looking for a cookie cutter candidate.

Take Kathleen Crowe. She studied political science and Mandarin in college and is now a successful global insurance analyst. In fact, in her current role, having a diverse background helps.

“The types of things that you touch, the projects you work on, and the things you are engaged in on any given day are totally all over the charts,” she said, “and I think that’s great for people like me—I would get bored super easily if I did the same thing every day.”

Certainly, some majors prepare students most for particular career paths. If you want to be an actuary, for instance, it’s a tremendous help to have a background in mathematics. Accounting, economics and finance lend themselves well to roles like business and financial analyst.

But, even in those cases and many others, risk management and insurance firms offer generous training programs—not only training you in how they operate, but also offering to pay for continuing education so you can build your skills and make yourself more marketable.

Here are some career roles that are potentially open to anyone with a liberal arts degree:

• Insurance agent
• Claims professional
• Policyholder services
• Customer service representative
• Human resources

How to Make It Happen

High school and college will generally provide you with the skills necessary to make the most of on-the-job training, a.k.a. taking useful notes, asking smart questions and properly applying the information you gain. Basic stuff.

In terms of applying and interviewing, even if it seems like your skills don’t directly apply to job descriptions, think of how your abilities broadly translate to making you an effective hire. For instance, if you majored in history or psychology, describe how you can absorb lots of complex information and keep track of important details.

That said, it helps to not be totally clueless about what someone who has the job you’re applying for actually does on a daily basis. Continue exploring our site for more general information about how risk management and insurance works, and certainly spend a few hours researching the company before you write your cover letter or show up for an interview.

While it may seem difficult to determine the nuances of any given company, you will soon find that risk and insurance firms manage all kinds of different risks and policies, so you’ll want to be familiar with a company’s specific specialties.