All our insurance sector hiring data covers senior level appointments, moves and promotions, sourced from TALNT, Sheffield Haworth’s proprietary AI-driven platform for tracking executive moves, which gathers and analyses data from 300+ reputable public sources around the globe.
Of the 119 senior global insurance moves tracked over the last month, the ones that received the most interest from our subscribers on TALNT were:
- Zhao Peng, who has been appointed President of China Life Insurance Ltd, following the departure of previous president Su Hengxuan. Peng joins the company from the Agricultural Development Bank of China, where he was Vice President from 2020 until 2022.
- Chris Wei, who has been appointed Executive Vice-President and Chief Client and Innovation Officer (CCIO) at Sun Life in Toronto, Canada. Wei brings over 25 years of global leadership experience in insurance and wealth management to the role, where he will be responsible for continuously improving the client experience.
- Mike Wilkins, who has announced that he is stepping down from his role as Chief Operating Officer at United Fire Group (UFG). Wilkins will retire on Friday, 30th September after spending his entire career at UFG.
- Steven Anderson, who has been appointed Director of Cyber Underwriting at Safety National, a multi-line specialty re/insurer and member of the Tokio Marine Group. Anderson brings almost 30 years of industry experience to the role, which includes previous leadership positions managing cyber and E&O insurance offerings at global cyber insurance carriers.
- Will Self, who has stepped down as CEO of Curtis Banks Group PLC. Nonexecutive Chairman David Barral will serve as executive chairman while the business searches for a replacement CEO. Barral has more than 40 years of experience in financial services and previously worked as CEO of Aviva PLC’s largest business unit, UK and Ireland Life.
- Kimie Chenik, who has been appointed Chief Operating Officer of NorthStar Life Services. Chenik joined NorthStar in 2009 and has worked in a variety of roles within the organization, most recently as executive vice president. She has more than 20 years of experience in the life insurance industry, with special expertise in policy origination, premium financing, loan and policy servicing, and premium optimization.
- Jeff Lang, who has been appointed as Executive Vice President, Retail Services, at California-based re/insurer Venbrook. Lang will be responsible for expanding the company’s property and casualty, employee benefits, student insurance, and government defence divisions, with a special emphasis on growing high net worth personal lines. He joins the firm from USI Insurance Services and has held positions at Aon, Marsh, and Chubb.
- Gabor Jaimes, who has joined the Swiss Insurance Association (SIA) as its new property, cyber, and natural hazard expert. Jaimes joins the SIA from his role as deputy CUO and underwriting officer at VIG Re. That followed a role as CUO of UNIQA Re. He also worked for 17 years at Swiss Re and was the founder of Gaja Consulting.
- Cedric Franklin, who has been appointed VP Regional Director, Canada, of Commercial Bonds at AXA XL. Franklin joins from BFL Canada where he served as Vice President, Surety.
- Ben Barker, who has been named Head of Claims, UK at Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance (BHSI), the insurance arm of Warren Buffett’s global insurance and reinsurance company. Barker has nearly two decades of industry experience and joined BHSI in 2018. He was previously Head of Executive & Professional Lines Claims for the UK.
Global senior insurance hires, August 2022
The following chart shows the overall trend in senior global insurance hires since January 2021. After a 20-month peak of 170 new senior appointments in June, the number has fallen slightly in July and August. However, this represents the normal summer slowdown. Given that August’s total figure of 119 is the third highest since January 2021, the market looks buoyant. We would expect to see an uptick in the autumn.
Global senior insurance hires by sub sector, August 2021 – August 2022
Looking deeper at senior hiring trends by sub-sector, we can see that Non-Life is still very much dominating the overall numbers. It’s worth noting that InsurTech and Reinsurance hires are up slightly on last month. Reinsurance has remained fairly consistent throughout the year, while Non-Life is steadily trending upwards.
Gender balance of senior global insurance hires, August 2022
Of the new senior appointments we tracked last month, the average global gender split was remarkably similar across all regions, with just under 1/3 of appointments being women:
Top 10 companies with the most new appointments in August 2022
Here are the global insurance businesses who made the most senior appointments in August:
