AIRROC's The Legacy Life

In this episode of The Legacy Life , we are joined by Connie O'Mara, independent arbitrator, mediator, expert witness, and member of AIRROC's Advisory Council. Connie reflects on a career spanning more than four decades in the insurance and reinsurance industry, sharing stories from the early days of asbestos and environmental claims, the growth of the legacy market, and the mentors who...

This week on The Legacy Life , we are joined by Grace Hanson , Founder and CEO of Elysian . Before launching Elysian, Grace built an impressive career as a lawyer, claims professional, and Chief Claims Officer, handling some of the industry's most complex and high-exposure matters. Grace shares the story behind Elysian's creation, including how conversations with her son, a software engi...

This week on The Legacy Life , we are joined by Mory Katz , Head of ILS Casualty & Legacy at Juniper Re . Mory's career has spanned nearly every corner of the insurance industry, from his early days in claims and insurance analytics to leading a direct auto insurance company and ultimately becoming a recognized leader in the legacy and reinsurance market. Along the way, he has gained a un...

This week we are going international again as we are joined by Janic Schilling, Head of Legacy Origination at Swiss Re in Zurich, Switzerland. Janic heads up a team of legacy experts that find solutions for a wide range of clients and partners. Janic tells us about his career in legacy and how it ties in to his passion for football ("soccer" for our U.S. audience). He encourages young pr...

This week we are joined by @Steve Norrington, President and CEO of Cranmore. Steve offers tremendous insight from decades of experience in the industry, from his early days in London to his fateful decision to take a leap and move to Bermuda in his mid-20s and enter the legacy market, and now in his role as an executive for one of the industry's leading companies.  This podcast is brought to...

This week we are joined by Ben Dovey, Head of Commercial & Operations at Xitus and a member of the NextGen Council. Ben joins us all the way from Bermuda (by way of Makhanda, South Africa) where he manages a plethora of activities for Xitus, from capital management to deal pricing, operations, and investment strategy. Ben also provides some great advice for young professionals in the legacy sp...

Our guest this week is Elaine Caprio, Chief Reinsurance Officer of R&Q Re in Liquidation and a member of AIRROC's Board of Directors. Elaine takes us through her career path, starting in legal and environmental claims for Liberty Mutual and becoming their first dedicated reinsurance counsel, to her current position at R&Q Re in Liquidation and as an independent arbitrator, mediator, a...

This week, we’re joined by Dawn Ballin, Senior Vice President and Head of Claims at Enstar Group (U.S.) and Chair of AIRROC’s Board of Directors. She reflects on the experiences that shaped her career, where she is today, and why staying open to new opportunities matters. Dawn offers practical insights for professionals at every stage, along with a look at what’s ahead for AIRROC under the Board’s...

This week, we’re joined by Robbie Kerr and Louis Isaacson of PwC’s Corporate Liability Restructuring team in London. Robbie and Louis were part of the team behind PwC’s sixteenth Global Non-Life Run-Off Survey, presented last October in Jersey City. In this conversation, we explore how to position the legacy market for a new generation of purpose-driven professionals and highlight the wide range o...

Our guest this week is Samit Bin Alam, the 2025 winner of the Trish Getty Scholarship. Samit is a senior at St. John's University in New York, majoring in quantitative risk & insurance. We cover a breadth of topics with Samit, ranging from his post graduation plans, to the insurance market in his home country of Bangladesh. Samit also shares the story of when he learned that he had been s...

Welcome back to The Legacy Life! After an extended hiatus, AIRROC's NextGen Council is proud to kick off season 5 of the podcast. There has been quite a bit of activity at AIRROC since our last episode. Our new hosts, NextGen's Joel Ridd and David Silvers, are proud to interview Katie Reynolds as the first guest for season 5. As our listeners might recall, Katie is a founding member of N...

We are joined by Juliana Toes, an Associate at Mayer Brown, this week on AIRROC’s The Legacy Life.  Juliana is a member of the AIRROC NextGen Council, and we have been keeping her very busy with speaking engagements this year. She has presented at the 2023 Deal Forum, the 2023 Regional Education Day in Chicago, the 2023 Demystifying Legacy event with RE40 in NYC and moderated a panel at the 2023 S...

This week we are joined by Layla Trummer, a Reinsurance Structurer at Munich Re Insurance America Incorporated. Layla is an active member of the AIRROC NextGen Council. If she sounds familiar, you may have heard her speaking at the 2023 Deal Forum, the 2023 Regional Education Day in Chicago or the 2023 Demystifying Legacy event with RE40 in NYC.    Layla discovered reinsurance in university while...

We’re talking to Sandy Santomenno and Eric Pince from WTW this week. Sandy is the soon-to-be retired Senior Director in charge of the legacy liabilities space at WTW which includes asbestos, environmental and health hazard claims. We’re glad we caught her before she left! And Eric is currently transitioning into the Senior Director role.  In this episode, we talk about the future of the legacy spa...

In the legacy spotlight this week is Natalie Weedman, a Portfolio Management Analyst at Swiss Re. Natalie is also a member of the AIRROC NextGen Council and has been actively involved with NextGen almost since its creation in 2020.   Natalie started her career working at an insurance agency as a license producer for personal lines P&C. Three years into that role she decided she never wanted to...

This week on The Legacy Life we are talking to Megan McHugh, AVP on the Assumed Reinsurance team at Brandywine Group of Insurance and Reinsurance Companies. Only a few of our guests have had linear career paths, and Megan is certainly not one of them. During our conversation she explains how she left the reinsurance industry to raise her children and then successfully reentered the industry thirte...

Welcome to season 4 of AIRROC's The Legacy Life! We are thrilled to be back and chatting with Eric Haller, CEO and co-founder of Fleming Insurance Holdings. For those not in the know, Fleming was founded in 2018 with the goal of reimagining the legacy space through LPT solutions, changing how risks are shared and applying modern technology to old claims.  Eric started his career in insurance...

This week we’re joined by Lee Vuu, Vice President of Reinsurance Claims at Argo Group. Lee discusses how she started her career as an Executive Assistant with no reinsurance experience and eventually became a VP of Reinsurance. The secret to her success? “It’s really asking a lot of questions,” she says. And while she asked a lot of questions of her co-workers, she also looked outside her company...

This week we're joined by Jose Martinez, Vice President of Reinsurance and Commutations Expert at Swiss Re.  We asked a lot of Jose in this episode and he rose to the challenge. In addition to describing his role and career thus far, Jose also discusses his practical strategies for engaging potential future insurance professionals from grade school to adulthood, the importance of knowledge tr...

We have two guests joining us this week: Dustin Loeffler, Managing Director and Head of U.S. Legacy Reinsurance Solutions at Aon, and Matt DiSanto, Associate Director of Reinsurance Solutions, Capital Advisory, also at Aon.  When we turned to the topic of bringing new talent into the legacy space, Dustin had some data for us. He cited a survey created by Ward that said 70% of the companies surveye...

Chris Hampshire is the Vice President of Gallagher Bassett’s Carrier Practice and the President and Chair of the CPCU Leadership Council. In this episode of The Legacy Life, Chris discusses his career, his work with the CPCU Society and his thoughts on how to bring new talent into the insurance industry.  “I think we need to be talking about the social good that we do,” he says. “I don’t think we...

We’re talking to another NextGen rising star in this week’s episode of The Legacy Life: Richard Burrows, Principal Associate at Weightmans LLP. Richard discusses his current role at Weightmans, his career path thus far, his love of emerging risks and some recent initiatives in the UK designed to bring new talent into legal careers. Richard also discusses the benefits of joining professional associ...

We’re back for Season 3 of AIRROC’s the Legacy Life! This week we’re talking to a NextGen rising star, Megan Kuzniewski. Megan works for Enstar Group as an AVP and legal counsel in M&A Corporate Development. Megan started her career as outside counsel for insurance companies. She decided to go in house at Enstar about a year ago. Megan talks about what she loves about her job and how supportiv...

In our season finale, Ed Hochberg, Head of Global Risk Solutions at Guy Carpenter, stops by to discuss his legacy career and his thoughts on why broking firms have been successful at attracting and retaining young talent. "I think that we offer a pretty wide variety of things to get involved with,” he says. He notes that providing challenging and rewarding work to young professionals, as well...

We are joined by Paul Ginnett, CEO of Allianz Reinsurance America, in this week’s episode of AIRROC’s The Legacy Life.  Like so many of us, Paul fell into insurance. “After I got out of college, I was, like many graduates, I was in need of a job quickly. The week I graduated also coincided with the birth of my daughter, and so that was extra motivation to get to work,” he laughs. That was nearly 3...