Councilcast

The Pulitzer prize winner discusses his new book. Davis is also the author of The Gulf: The Making of an America Sea for which he was awarded the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in history. He is a professor of history and the Rothman Family Chair in the Humanities at the University of Florida. Davis is a polymath—historian, environmentalist, researcher and raconteur—placing the reader into the context of several pivotal moments over the last 300 years of co-existing with the bald eagle. He discusses his latest book The Bald Eagle: The Improbable Journey of America’s Bird.

The newly launched Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company, which aims to provide hundreds of commonly used prescription medications to patients at steep discounts, officially opened for online orders earlier this year. Using Truepill, a health tech platform, to fill and deliver prescriptions, the company keeps prices down by cutting out pharmacy benefit managers. Leader’s Edge caught up with co-founder Alex Oshmyansky, a medical researcher and former professor at Stanford University, and Ron Harrison, the company’s vice president of business development, at The Council’s Legislative & Working Groups Summit, to hear about the company’s goal to curb drug costs by working both as a retailer and its own PBM.

Sam Lisi, product director for Resilience cyber insurance, explains modularity, a cyber policy production process that allows for more flexibility and individuation of coverage. The policy architecture enables parallel policy work so that new product variations and/or provision variations can be efficiently developed and pushed to market without delay or interruption to the production process.

Matt O’Malley, US Country Manager for AXA XL, shares his path from middle school teacher to insurance executive and discusses the need to expand industry recruiting. We also talk about the trends driving insurance pricing and where AXA XL is investing in data-driven new products and initiatives.

Amy Steadman, Chief People Officer at Newfront San Francisco shares what makes a good workplace culture, what changes need to be made to the brokerage industry and how she approaches management in her position.

In this episode of Falling Into It, we meet Ben Peach, a 26-year-old associate director of digital assets at Aon. A graduate from the University of Birmingham in England, Peach studied international relations, political science and political economy. Peach shares his passion for cryptocurrency and blockchain technologies, and how that led to him to working in the insurance industry.

The Council's Republican leaning SVP Joel Wood, Democratic VP Joel Kopperud, and middle-focused director Blaire Bartlett join us for an earful. We cover the Supreme Court, vaccine mandates, mid-term elections, and threats and opportunities for employer-sponsored insurance.

Daniel Pink is one of the best-selling non-fiction authors of the last decade. We discuss his latest title, The Power of Regret: How Looking Backward Moves Us Forward, and how some of the lessons he has learned through research can shape the future of our work and personal lives.

Scott Naugle is president of consumer solutions for BXS insurance and co-owner of Pass Books/Cat Island Coffeehouse in Pass Christian and Gulfport, Mississippi. As an independent bookstore owner, writer, and book lover, Scott is bringing his expertise and author network to Leader's Edge in a monthly book review column and podcast series.

Moving from the broker side to the carrier side of the industry gave this AXA XL exec a unique view. June Dwyer, senior vice president and Americas broker relationship leader for AXA XL, shares her journey from broker to carrier, and how that helps align her perspective with broker clients. She also discusses the crucial role brokers play in product development, DE&I progress in the industry, and AXA XL’s commitment to addressing climate change on all fronts.

In this episode of Falling Into It, we meet Eyad Kabbani, a 26-year-old assistant vice president who works in the Cyber and E&O Center of Excellence at Marsh. A graduate of the Fox School of Business and Management at Temple University, Kabbani studied risk management and insurance and earned a Council Foundation scholarship after his internship at Johnson, Kendall & Johnson in 2017. We discuss what attracted him to the industry, how his internship helped solidify his decision to pursue a career in insurance brokerage, and how growing up working in his family's small business shaped his work ethic and prepared him for the corporate world.

Guiding the Healthcare System: A Q&A with former U.S. HHS Secretaries Alex Azar and Donna Shalala

In this episode we talk with Lori Bailey, Chief Insurance Office at Corvus. With over 20 years of experience in cyber liability, Bailey shares her thoughts on the evolution of cyber risk and whether coverage has kept up. We also talk about the lack of historical data for cyber underwriting and how that's being addressed, as well as where the market is headed.

Karl Olson, vice president, professional management liability practice leader at Burns & Wilcox, talks about how healthcare organizations have managed this balancing act and what new risks may emerge as a result of COVID.

As one may suspect, the COVID-19 pandemic has hit the labor-intensive agriculture industry particularly hard. But as Denise Brown and Rick Harrison from InterWest Insurance Services explain, how your Ag clients fare during coronavirus, and how they handle risk, will depend on many factors.

In this episode of our podcast series with U.S.-based insurer, Nationwide, we meet the company’s vice president of cyber insurance, Catherine Rudow, and its senior vice president and chief information security officer, Todd Lukens. Together, we explore the dynamics of ransomware, cyber entry points that businesses of all sizes should be aware of, the evolution of the threat actor, and how the public and private sectors can come together to improve the nation's cybersecurity. Rudow and Lukens warn that as we evolve as enterprises and as a society, threat actors will also evolve. They say business processes—beyond just systems and data—are at risk, and exposure is not going away any time soon. In this conversation, we identify ways organizations can improve their cyber hygiene, and better adapt to and manage the current cyber threat environment.

Amrit David works with management teams, private equity firms and alternative capital providers across a variety of transactions in the insurance brokerage space. We check in with him periodically on M&A and sat down recently to discuss brokerage IPOs, the use of SPACs, and other recent trends in brokerage transactions. Click for the podcast.

Hagerty, a global automotive enthusiast brand and classic car insurer, recently announced plans to merge with SPAC, Aldel Financial. The deal, which is valued at $3.13 billion, according to reports, will allow Hagerty to go public and trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol HGTY. We spoke with Fred Turcotte, Hagerty CFO, to discuss the recent merger, where Hagerty plans to grow, automotive trends, and, of course, the classic car market.

AXA XL’s Bob Peretti, Chief Distribution Officer, Americas, shares how his team is approaching broker relationships in the face of multifaceted risk, a constantly changing M&A landscape, and the ongoing pandemic

In this episode of Falling Into It, we meet Eleanor Ko, a 29-year-old account manager at Woodruff Sawyer. A graduate from Seattle University with a degree in business administration and management, Ko shares what she wished she had learned in college about the insurance industry, her passion for learning new skills, and what it’s like juggling her professional and personal life, while working from home.