Storage of data just as significant as other risks; RMs looking for products

What do you see as the greatest risks companies face today?

First, let me say I think it is an exciting time to be in the commercial insurance business. More companies are going global, and our clients tell us they are optimistic about the future. Along with the pursuit of growth opportunities comes new exposures, and businesses need more knowledge and guidance to navigate emerging political, regulatory, and competitive threats.

The role of the risk manager continues to be an important one. Clearly, the identification, evaluation, and comprehension of risk exposures is key, but risk managers are finding that their role as insurance buyer is becoming even more significant as organizations grapple with expansion and make critical strategic decisions that impact their operations day in and day out.

What are the emerging risk issues?

Political, economic, and regulatory risks take center stage. But, perhaps just as significant are the risks related to data and information. Businesses are witnessing how their core operations are at risk — customer information, employee data and many more proprietary operating systems are vulnerable.

Whether an organization is dealing with their own proprietary information or the information they hold on behalf of their customers, the stakes are high and risk managers are looking for robust insurance products that can help them address cyber liability, reputational risk, and the range of privacy issues. Recognizing the clamor in the market, and how the nature of cyber risks continue to rapidly change, ACE has created products and services to help mitigate cyber and privacy risks at all stages, from preparedness to post-event.

Is the insurance industry doing enough to adequately address these risks?

Generally, the insurance industry comes out strong in response to rising challenges. It’s like evolution; it may look like the industry is moving slowly compared to the pace of change, but then we rapidly adapt to meet market demand. For example, we’ve worked hard at ACE to build out our global network, recognizing how growing numbers of clients have exposures in foreign markets. Although it didn’t happen overnight, we are now at a point where we can deliver multinational insurance programs quickly and expertly to our brokers and clients.

As risks take shape, it’s important that we stay close to clients and brokers. For the past eight years, I’ve been chairing a client advisory board at ACE. Over that span of time, we have introduced dozens of product and service improvements to address the pain points our clients are facing. We’re making progress thanks to direct client input.

What keeps you awake at night?

I have a strong team backing me, so I generally sleep pretty well at night. But, in all seriousness, on a practical level, we don’t know exactly where the next greatest risk management challenges will come from. And it’s just as well—while our clients want us to think about the future, they need solutions to their immediate problems. We recognize the challenges we all face in managing the changing risk landscape, but if you’re in a culture of constant improvement, like I am, you’re ready to adapt and solve problems that exist today.

In your opinion, what is the single most important risk development in the past 12 months?

Globalization and data management are key themes. Consistent with that, ACE continues to focus on two areas:

1. The expansion of our offerings and our geographic locations — to be where our customers need us to be.

2. A sharp focus on cultivating our own risk intelligence as well as that of our clients with data analytics and predictive modeling — two important tools for risk management.

Technology has been advancing insurance at every stage of the coverage cycle — from quote and submission, to servicing and claims. But we’re at a point where a holistic approach is in order. We started down this path with our ACE Worldview® portal and it’s exciting to see how technology is enabling us to integrate our distinctive applications into one platform where our customers can access exactly what they need, when they need it.

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Chris Maleno was appointed senior vice president of ACE Group in March 2014.  In addition, he continues to serve as division president, ACE USA — a position he has held since March 2013. In this role, he oversees all operations for ACE’s US-based retail commercial property and casualty franchise. Maleno served as chief operating officer of ACE USA since January 2011. He has been with ACE since 2007.