Leader's Edge

Everyone in the insurance value chain wins when the broker is equipped with better data, says Jeff Cohen, senior vice president at Zywave.

Cohen paints a vivid picture of what a fully optimized digital industry could look like, but cautions that we’re not there yet. He discusses where the industry is on this journey, why digital evolution is moving at the pace that it is, and what we can do about it. He also digs into the differences between manual and digital processes, how to bring out useful data points for insureds, and how Zywave is building its data from the ground up.

Council of Insurance Agents & Brokers executive chairman Ken Crerar sits down for a candid conversation on leading The Council through 30 years of growth, change, disruption, and success.

Being a bank-owned premium financing company means that the economic environment, especially changes in banking, is a major factor in the business landscape, says Ben Rubin, chief risk officer for FIRST Insurance Funding & Wintrust Life Finance. In this podcast, sponsored by First Insurance Funding, Rubin  discusses the particulars of the current financial services environment and how brokers can position premium financing in their conversations with clients. He also explains the different options it provides, how different sized companies might use premium financing in different ways, and more.

In this episode we meet Ryan L. Smith Executive Vice President of Atlanta Life Insurance.

Smith shares how his childhood entrepreneurial mindset led him to working with NBA legend Magic Johnson. He also discusses his perspective on life insurance, and why its vital for a family member to have. 

For hundreds of years the insurance market known as Lloyd's of London has played a notorious role in the world of risk and finance.

To understand how this market started, podcast producer Zach Ewell spoke with Geraldine Morgan, a history enthusiast who gives tours in London England around the history of Lloyds and insurance. Morgan takes us on a tour from the great fire of London of 1666 to the establishment of Lloyd’s Coffee Shop.

 To learn more about Morgan's tour you can visit her website. 

One year into the newly created role of head of North America, AXIS' Mike McKenna joins the Leader’s Edge podcast to discuss how he plans to execute on opportunities in the market as Axis dives deeper into specialty lines.  McKenna drills down into where the opportunities are in the difficult casualty market, discusses the company’s new Lloyd’s syndicate focused on the energy transition, and talks about serving the lower middle market effectively.

As Fall conference season gears up, BrokerTech Ventures’ John Jackovin, Executive Director of the BrokerTech Ventures Accelerator, shares some insight into the upcoming BrokerTech Connect, a broker-focused mini-event held during InsureTech Connect in Las Vegas in October. Jackovin discusses the evolution of the conference over the years and what’s hot in Insurtech right now. 

Can we fix the polarization that has engulfed our politics and government?

According to a recent Pew Research Center poll, public trust in government has edged near all-time lows in recent years.

The nonpartisan organization She Should Run believes part of the answer to fixing this problem includes increasing the number of women in public office. To understand how increasing women’s participation in public office could improve public trust in government, podcast producer Zach Ewell spoke with Tracey Vasile, a member of the Planning Board for Foxborough, Massachusetts, home of the New England Patriots. Vasile is also senior vice president for client strategy at Verisk, an information services company that specializes in risk. The New England native discusses her journey serving in elected office, the importance of women running, and recent risk trends.

In this edition of our AXA XL podcast series, chief client and distribution officer Matt O’Malley sits down with Leader’s Edge after taking on this newly created role for the insurer. He explains the interconnected risk that drove AXA XL to create this position and what he hopes to achieve in the role. He also talks market trends including the early Atlantic storm season, cyber risk, and opportunity in casualty.