Brian Duperreault
President and CEO, AIG
A Sense of Confidence
Brian Duperreault made his mark in the insurance
business by identifying companies and executives
that possessed potential and then helping them
develop that potential. This same formula appears
to be in play as Duperreault returns as president
and CEO to AIG, the company where he spent
the formative decades of his career.
“AIG has a great culture with a spirit of collaboration and collegiality
that gives me great confidence that we’re going to get our plans done,” said
Duperreault, who took over the reins at AIG in May.
Duperreault said he saw ample reason to praise his new teammates at AIG in
watching them respond to the catastrophes that caused so much human pain in
the third quarter of 2017. Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria, the wildfires in
California and the earthquake in Mexico all exacted a withering toll.
“I have been extremely impressed with our employees’ responses to those
disasters, whether they were located in the impacted areas or helping colleagues
around the world,” Duperreault said.
Structurally, Duperreault said he wants to create better-defined businesses
within AIG and clearer lines of accountability.
One high-profile example of that is with AIG’s excess and surplus lines
company, Lexington. Rather than run excess and surplus business through the
other branches of the company, Duperreault picked AIG stalwart George Stratts
to run Lexington as more of a stand-alone company.
“He will be building on AIG’s strong core capabilities and history of
innovation, along with focused distribution strategies to meet the needs of our
clients and brokers in this niche segment,” Duperreault said.
Look for Duperreault and his fellow underwriters at AIG to raise prices in
2018.
“We have successfully begun to raise rates appropriately as a result [of Q3
losses] and we will continue to do so,” Duperreault said. — Dan Reynolds
Seraina Macia
Executive Vice President and CEO,
Blackboard
To Boldly Go
As mission statements go, “reimagining how
commercial insurance is done” is an intriguing
one, but it might sound like too lofty an
ambition.
If anyone is capable of achieving it, though,
it’s Seraina Macia, the executive vice president
and CEO of Blackboard, a technology-focused subsidiary of AIG. Macia was
previously the CEO of Hamilton USA and has held numerous executive
positions at AIG.
“Seraina brings to AIG a rare combination of deep insurance expertise and
an acute understanding of the role that technology and data analytics are playing
in the ongoing evolution of our industry,” said Brian Duperreault, president and
CEO, AIG. “Her perspective will be a valuable one to have on our leadership
team.”
Under Macia’s direction, Blackboard will build upon the work of Hamilton
USA, applying the cutting edge of technology to risk selection, pricing and
claims-handling processes.
“We want to leverage emerging technology and data science to transform
underwriting and claims by providing new tools and better information to the
underwriter and claims adjusters to make better and faster decisions,” said Macia.
“This will help clients and brokers move faster and with more insight so
that they can focus on what’s important: relationships, building business and
reinvesting for growth.”
The name Blackboard represents a clean slate, and Macia says she feels
blessed to have the opportunity to build a dynamic platform at a such a pivotal
moment for the industry.
“Beyond 2018 and into the future, our aspiration is to put Blackboard at the
forefront of innovation and technology in the insurance industry.”
— Michelle Kerr
Mike Lebovitz
Senior Vice President, Innovation,
FM Global
Corralling Intangibles
For many executives, the challenge in 2018
and beyond is clear and compelling. Grow the
business. Make the business more profitable,
etc., etc.
But for Mike Lebovitz, who heads a new
innovation team at FM Global, the challenge
isn’t in the known; it’s in the unknown.
Many business leaders accept that the world 10 years from now could be
unrecognizable from what we know today, “But we have little idea how it’s going
to be different,” Lebovitz said.
Now seven months into building his team, Lebovitz faces a two-headed
challenge. On one side, he needs to add value to his FM Global teammates
across the company in this era of rapid change. Rather than taking on the mantle
of innovation, he needs to find a way to help the entire company keep pace.
“This group is about thinking differently, coming up with ideas, utilizing
resources within the organization and people within the organization to bring in
new ideas,” he said.
The other side of the challenge is assisting FM Global’s clients, the customers
who, in fact, own the mutual insurer, to achieve their goals.
“That is going to be our opportunity: to engage with our clients and
understand their jobs to be done and help them do them faster, better, smarter,”
Lebovitz said. To achieve this dual challenge, Lebovitz wants to recruit talent
who understand that “to order to innovate you have to be able to fail.”
“I need people who understand science and technology, people who
understand data and digital, people who understand business,” Lebovitz said.
“I’m looking for people that have the ability to fail, learn from it, and then
move on to the next challenge,” he said. “If you’re not failing in innovation,
you’re not taking enough risks,” he said.
— Dan Reynolds
Alfred Bergbauer
Vice President, Head of Multinational
Underwriting, The Hartford
Filling a Multinational Void
Recognizing a need for multinational solutions
in the middle market, The Hartford embarked
last year on a top-down initiative to expand their
capabilities in global risks.
“Most middle market companies are
uninsured, underinsured or improperly insured
for multinational risks,” said Alfred Bergbauer, who came on board as The
Hartford’s vice president and head of multinational underwriting last year.
“Eighty percent of middle market companies have international exposure, but
half of them are never educated about international solutions by their broker.
Educating that segment is our challenge and our opportunity,” he said.
The Hartford’s team of more than 1,000 underwriters, including 15
multinational specialists, work side by side with brokers to identify clients’
multinational exposure using specific criteria.
“We developed six critical questions for brokers to ask every client to
determine their level of risk,” Bergbauer said. “Underwriters, brokers and
insureds all have to be a part of the conversation.”
In 2018, Bergbauer expects to be challenged by a perception that global
business is cooling off, imperiled by nationalistic and protectionist movements
around the world. Market research paints a different picture.
According to United Nations reports, foreign direct investment has steadily
trended upward since 1990. In the last two years, though, U.S. investments have
shifted away from emerging markets to more mature markets with established
customer bases that mirror domestic buying behaviors.
In particular, investments by the small and mid-size segments have increased
sharply.
“Watching the market indicated to us that we need to serve these smaller
companies moving to establish presence in mature overseas markets,” Bergbauer
said. — Katie Dwyer
