Around the world’s major insurance hubs, the big global brokerages have been quietly rotating country bosses and regional chiefs. During the last few years, what looks like routine succession management from the outside has, in many markets, created rare pockets of uncertainty inside otherwise tightly run machines – and that is exactly where rivals are trying to prise open the door.
2023 was a particularly big year for leadership changes. To name a few: at Aon, Kristin Kraeger was promoted to CEO of the Professional Services Practice for North America, taking charge of a core growth segment for law firms, consultants and accountants.
Marsh McLennan created a new Pacific‑wide leadership layer: David Bryant was named CEO Marsh McLennan Pacific in addition to his Mercer Pacific role, explicitly to “deliver innovative solutions and greater client impact” across Marsh, Mercer, Guy Carpenter and Oliver Wyman in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and PNG.
In continental Europe, Howden consolidated its German operations under Karl‑Heinz Holz, appointing him CEO of Howden Deutschland AG and creating a “freshly aligned leadership team” across its German brands.
This list of named promotions is the visible tip of a larger churn. It’s likely there was much more leadership turnover under the radar. The appointments of some executives and practice leaders don’t always get announced publicly.
New Zealand is a neat microcosm of these global currents. Over the last two years, WTW, Aon, Marsh and Howden have all appointed new CEOs or leaders for this country. The latest leadership change was made by Howden in August when the firm appointed Chris Hughes as CEO of its broking business in New Zealand, replacing Nigel Wallace who became chair.
For local brokers and clients, that means the faces at the top of almost every major house have changed since 2021.
Within that churn, Howden is deliberately casting itself as the outsider with momentum.
It has youth on its side. Marsh traces its New Zealand history back more than 60 years, with its local company founded in 1963. Willis/WTW’s New Zealand entity dates from 1965. Aon New Zealand was founded in 1995. By contrast, Howden only planted its flag in 2021.
Read next: Aviva unveils new CEO
Howden is casting itself as a disruptor in New Zealand’s insurance market and the more open minded, stable, growth‑ready alternative to broking rivals.
“The market is essentially disrupting itself, with unrest in some of the networks and lots of cultural change across the various large competitors in the New Zealand market,” said Hughes.
The new CEO said there is a gap for someone “new with some fresh ideas.”
“The word ‘disruptor’ can be used a bit too freely, but I think that’s exactly what we need to be,” said Hughes.
In his view, that leaves a gap for a “non‑traditional” player prepared to move faster and sell a different story to staff and clients.
He points to clients “knocking on our doors” and to a market “dominated by two brokers” where Howden’s job is to challenge the status quo with “new ideas, energy and capability.”
Strip away the marketing gloss and the underlying calculation is familiar to brokers everywhere: when rivals are distracted by integration, leadership changes or internal politics, there is a window to poach people and accounts.
In continental Europe, Marsh has been recalibrating its leadership and structure. In 2023, Christos Adamantiadis became CEO, Continental Europe succeeding long‑time regional head Siegmund Fahrig who was retiring.
Marsh framed the change as part succession, part strategic re‑weighting. The new CEO was tasked with overseeing “the management and development of Marsh’s risk advisory and insurance broking operations across Continental Europe,” at a time when clients in the region are facing “some of the greatest economic and geopolitical challenges of their time.”
For rival brokers, that’s another example of a major house using a leadership reset to reposition itself in a core region – and another moment when relationships, carrier panels and senior talent may be slightly more in play than usual.
The recent wave of leadership moves at the big global brokers is only the visible edge of a deeper structural reshuffle. Years of deal‑making – from Marsh/JLT and Gallagher/AssuredPartners to Howden’s roll‑ups in Germany and New Zealand – have left overlapping entities, hierarchies and brands that now have to be rationalised, and that inevitably throws up new job titles and some exits. At the same time, the groups are re‑cutting the map: creating regional “super‑roles” such as Marsh McLennan Pacific, or combined Australia–New Zealand heads at WTW, to drive cross‑selling, shared analytics and more centralised carrier strategy instead of purely local fiefdoms. On top of that sits a war for talent. Elevating internal stars into regional and global slots is one of the few reliable tools these firms have to stop their best people drifting to rivals, MGAs or start‑ups. And all of this is happening against a risk backdrop that demands more technical firepower at the top.
For brokers on the ground, new country and regional bosses arrive with their own lieutenants and ideas, making relationships more portable and talent more poachable than usual. Carrier strategies are being re-cut from the top down, tightening global placement and squeezing some insurers off the big-broker panels – a chance for independents and mid-tiers to pitch flexibility and access. And while every newcomer claims to be a disruptor, the outfits that pair that rhetoric with capital, ownership for producers and a willingness to tackle difficult risks are genuinely shifting where business – and ambitious brokers – choose to go.
