I worked in a few different sectors (even in a different continent!) before stumbling into the pensions world, although all those experiences were related to our transition to longer lives. My academic background was in European Studies, and during my masters degree I spent most of my time looking into welfare policies. Naturally when I started working, I wanted to do something related.

My first job was at a care-tech company in Hong Kong, and I also interned for Public Health England’s Older People’s team. After I completed my masters, I joined the Association of British Insurers’ Long-term Savings team before taking up a policy research role at Phoenix Insights in 2022.

My role has now evolved to sit between Phoenix Group Public Affairs and Phoenix Insights. My day-to-day job is to influence public policy using our original research. I am currently working on a few projects on helping people to achieve adequate retirement income. These include the recent launch of our policy report at Westminster where the new Pensions Ministers discussed her priorities on the subject.

Why I want to help everyone to have a chance to retire comfortably

My grandfather was diagnosed with dementia when I was finishing my undergraduate degree in Hong Kong. It was clear to me that having a financial means to support needs in later life will be crucial to everyone, even if it doesn’t seem to be important when you are in your early 20s. It can be equally important if you want to support your loved ones. At that time, I spent a lot of time both inside and outside my study researching the social care system and the proposal of creating a state pension in Hong Kong, with reference to international examples.

I am really keen to help everyone to have a chance to retire comfortably. The biggest challenge to do so in the UK is no different from other countries. This mainly lies in the decision of who pays and how much, and there will constantly be a tension among employers, the state and individuals in coming to a consensus to the right balance. I am pleased to be part of both Phoenix Insights and Public Affairs, to provide evidence-based solutions and policy influence on a topic that is important to the society and to me personally.

What I do in my role at Phoenix Group

Earlier this year, I coordinated an open letter calling for the government to conduct a holistic review across the state and private pension systems to ensure they deliver adequate income. The letter was co-signed by 10 other organisations across the industry and third sector. We were pleased to see it has been adopted by the government as they committed to conduct the review.

I recently also led on a policy recommendation report for Phoenix Insights, which summarises our research on pension adequacy and puts forward potential policy recommendations that the government should consider when scoping its pension review. This is based on our existing and upcoming research on the subject, including a new model on measuring saving adequacy that we developed with Nest Insight, which will be published later in 2024.

This work has firmly established our thought leadership with a balanced view between commercial benefits and social good, which I am very proud of.

My experience of working at Phoenix Group

I am very pleased to have two teams that are both equally supportive of the goal to reduce undersaving in this country. They use different methods to achieve this aim and are extremely powerful when working in collaboration - especially in evidence-based campaigns like our adequacy work this year. Working between the two teams, I often think about the final quote from the film Metropolis – ‘The mediator between the head and hands is the heart’ – which is very much the essence of our teams’ collaboration and the key to achieving policy change.

It is very easy for an organisation to make big claims about their social responsibility without concrete actions, but I think Phoenix has done a lot to walk the walk and also to bring others along on our journey.

Changes and future aspirations

With a new Labour government I’m keen to see changes in how the government work – particularly in having a more joint up approach across departments. We need to remember that while policies are separated under different departments due to the Government’s own structure, they serve the same people. It is important to have a holistic and coherent strategy – not unlike how pension providers are expected to develop their customer journey.