Diary of an Insurer: Avantia Group’s Mark Eastham

Monday

My morning always starts with coffee and is then followed by the school run, before I head to the train station. 

I commute from Hertfordshire to our office in south west London two to three days a week, so the train journey is a good opportunity to plan for the week ahead.

Insuring the ‘non-standard’ – people who want to buy a unique property, unoccupied properties, holiday homes, listed buildings or flood risk properties – has always underpinned our expansion strategy. 

It’s a rapidly growing part of the market, and because many home insurers are set up to only insure standard risks, our point of difference is being able to help people access home insurance, regardless of their circumstances – helping to solve the problem of providing fair, affordable cover is what gets me out of bed in the morning.

Being in the office is about connecting as a team, so I walk the floor when I first get in and say hello to everyone. I’ll then head into one-to-one meetings – a great way to catch up with my senior leadership team while checking in on our weekly goals.

Typically, my week revolves around three core areas: Monitoring our customer and business performance, supporting team engagement, and managing relationships with partners and our investors. 

In the afternoon I attend a meeting looking at sustainable growth initiatives for the business, which brings together people from all areas including commercial, customer solutions and marketing.

Back at home, my wife and I prepare dinner together as we catch up on the day. Afterwards, we relax with a box set before heading to bed.

Tuesday

Claims are such a pivotal touchpoint for customers, it’s where the promise of insurance is truly tested. I work closely with our chief operations officer, as we remain laser-focused on transforming our claims experience. 

From moving our claims supply chain in-house to integrating new AI-driven technology, our goal is to make the claims process faster, simpler, and more transparent for customers when they need us most.

I then work with our PR manager to finalise some media comments on storm preparation – there are things you can do that can help prevent damage to your property, so I always try to share some practical tips.

Wednesday

Wednesday is a work from home day. We’ve had a culture of flexible working since before Covid, and I believe a flexible working policy is key to creating a genuinely inclusive working environment, and to attract the best talent.

One virtual meeting I have today is with HR director to discuss our upcoming Town Hall, an in-person event we do twice a year. 

It’s a great opportunity to get the whole business together, hear presentations from different teams and invite an external speaker – this time it’s John Sills, founder at customer growth consultancy, The Foundation, who we’ve previously partnered with to help us improve transparency within our customer journey.

With no commute, I’m able to fit in a ride after work – we have a twice-yearly distance challenge at work where we have a virtual team race to a European destination. 

It’s a great way to build relationships and cheer each other on, trying to get your team to the finish line first.

Thursday

First on the agenda is a meeting with our chief technology officer about an upcoming AI research and development project. 

AI is something we’ve been using for years to make intelligent real-time decisions for our customers – we built our first AI-powered platform back in 2017, enabling real-time decisions on risk and retail pricing. 

One exciting avenue we’re now exploring is digital twins, essentially creating virtual models of key operational roles. This would allow us to predict challenges, streamline workflows, and scale efficiently without significantly increasing team size.

I break at lunchtime for our monthly brunch event in our office breakout space. It’s something we introduced last year, where we organise a meal on us so everyone can eat together. It’s a really good way to build relationships with people that you may see mostly on screen.

The afternoon is for stakeholder meetings in London. They’re not just about exchanging updates but about strengthening relationships, aligning on strategy, and staying ahead of trends, like responding to shifting customer needs or preparing for regulatory changes.

Friday

One of my favourite meetings happens every other Friday, our sprint reviews. In these meetings, the whole company can dial in and see what each team’s been working on. 

The objectives and key results framework we follow – and the fact that we have built most of our technology rather than bought it – means we can work in a really agile way and make operational transformation happen really fast – what takes some businesses years takes us a matter of months.

As the week draws to a close, I reflect on how far we’ve come. We have grown significantly over the last few years, steadily building our capabilities and expanding our customer profile. 

We are now a top 10 player in UK home insurance but there is a lot more market share and opportunity to go for. Consequently we’re always asking, ‘what’s next?’ 

We’re committed to building a business that makes insurance more accessible, claims more transparent, and every interaction more customer-centric. I believe it’s this mindset that will continue driving our growth into the future.

The weekend is a perfect opportunity to unwind and recharge. Depending on the weather, I alternate between high-intensity training sessions or heading out for a longer road ride to clock some kilometres for the work distance challenge, followed by catching up with friends over a drink at the local pub – the perfect balance for the weekend!