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Area Executive Vice President
Arthur J. Gallagher
San Francisco

For several years workers' comp was a dirty word in California. Its rates were the highest in the country, so in 2003 and 2004 it launched its reform program that ultimately reduced the rates by 50 percent over the past four years.

That meant brokers placing workers' comp insurance before and after the reforms had to stay on their toes, keeping track of the workers' comp rates.

When the rates were high, Dennis O'Hara moved his client--a California diocese--from an insured program to a group captive with other Catholic archdioceses so they could afford workers' comp.

"There was no affordable coverage, so they returned $3 million of the premium by doing it that way," said the diocese's director of finance. Since then, California's reforms have cut rates dramatically, "so now we're fully insured again and it's a good market," he said.

Of course, earthquake insurance is a difficult subject in California, but O'Hara found a way to overcome the hurdle as well.

"There's not much capacity, so we have to share the limits with other dioceses," said the client, meaning less property limits are exposed.

Altogether, the Roman Catholic Diocesan of California represents more than $6 billion in property values with double the available limits and greater access to these limits. O'Hara restructured the statewide program while increasing the catastrophic earthquake capacity among 10 dioceses.

Area Senior Vice President
Arthur J. Gallagher
San Francisco

When working with a California school district in 2007, John Chino didn't just concentrate on making sure the district had the right kinds of insurance.

He wanted to make sure the client clearly understood how to avoid the risks that could lead to claims. And they weren't just traditional risks, either.

"He was one of the most creative brokers we've ever worked with," said the school district¿s risk manager. "He's multifaceted and comes up with solutions to nontraditional risks by putting prevention before the risk."

"He aligned services with the curriculum side of the house," the risk manager said. For example, Chino created a training program for teachers called the "Q-Book," an electronic program that he convinced an underwriter to partner with in order to reduce the cost to the district.

One of the programs focused on issues related to the Americans with Disabilities Act's requirement stemming from a federal court case to provide training to every administrator in the school district.

With the help of a clinical psychologist, Chino developed an anti-violence program for middle-school students by educating the teachers in how to deal with the violence.

"He doesn't just think outside the box. There is no box," the school district risk administrator said.

Area President
Arthur J. Gallagher
Denver

A risk manager with a large county community college district described Karen Graham's brokering skills by telling a story:

"When Karen was promoted two years ago, she had handled our account. But she still wanted to stay active on our account when she was promoted. We had a problem yesterday, and she took it right on. We heard back from her the next day. Yet, she heads a team."

"She calls once every couple weeks, and we can call her even though she's a big shot, and just because she's a big shot, she doesn't have to handle that any more. She's only kept a few accounts because it's a challenge. Our account goes out to bid next year, and I hope it works out with her so we have five more years with her."

Another university risk manager is thankful she has helped with their efforts to get their enterprise risk management program moving ahead.

"We've been halfway there for a long time," he said. "Just bringing in the limits was kind of slow."

But he said Graham looked at their efforts from a consultant's perspective and met with the school's vice chancellor, chief finance officer, and the vice president for finance and administration.

"For something this big," said the client, "we wanted to bring in her expertise." And Graham got the executives' buy-in.

Managing Director
Arthur J. Gallagher
Itasca, Ill.

It may be sacrilegious, but from a client perspective, Peter Persuitti practically walks on water.

"He is the most intellectually challenging person in insurance," said one client, a risk manager with an archdiocese.

The risk manager is most impressed with how Persuitti is constantly coming up with new ideas to keep clients, and others, apprised of risk management issues.

"There's no real network (for archdioceses), so he developed a webcast to bring all the diocesan risk managers together," the risk manager said. The webcasts are bimonthly so the risk managers can support one another.

In addition, Persuitti has created a program he calls "Common Ground," where he brings together the chief executives and legal experts of self-insured denominations of Methodist, Episcopal, Southern Baptist, Salvation Army, Roman Catholic, Campus Crusade and Presbyterian, in an effort to discuss common insurance issues.

The most recent gathering focused on modeling catastrophic reinsurance for coastal churches, in locations such as California and Florida.

"He's been a broker for 35 years, and finding someone like him is very refreshing," said the risk manager.

Persuitti, who has advanced degrees in Greek and Latin and has done postgraduate work in Rome and Athens, is "truly a renaissance man," according to his client.

Area Senior Vice President
Arthur J. Gallagher
Orlando, Fla.

Richard Terlecki had an unusual way of signing up one client, the insurance pool for a Northwest association of counties. But the results have been nothing but positive.

"He just came in off the street one time," said the pool's director of marketing and insurance programs. "He was working for a company in town, and for some reason he sat down and introduced himself. He looked at our (insurance) package and said, 'I can certainly do better for you.' Our CEO happened to be in the office, and he and our CEO established a rapport, and he's done a good job for us ever since."

This client also likes how Terlecki is comfortable meeting with the pool's board of trustees at their regular retreats, giving his report on the state of the pool's insurance.

Terlecki's also highly praised by the operator of a large Midwest international airport that needed to insure its runways without breaking the bank.

"Other brokers have been reluctant to take this on because it was so unique," said the risk manager.

Instead of basing the value on the actual square footage, Terlecki worked with the carrier to come up with an agreement that "the most we could recover would be $100 million"-- a lot more palatable than previous agreements.

The client called that "good faith negotiations."

Area Assistant Vice President
Arthur J. Gallagher
Itasca, Ill.

Brokers can play many different roles for their clients. In Ryan Isaacs' case, he worked with an insurance department in a Midwestern state to create the platform for public-school corporations and independent colleges to form pools and trusts for property/casualty insurance, which had been previously forbidden by state statute.

"Isaacs was so knowledgeable about what was typical about school pooling across the nation, from inception to implementation to the ongoing operation," said the insurance department's deputy commissioner.

Isaacs knew that to create a registration system he had to set the standards for the conduct of insurance trusts.

Previously, the state insurance department had worked with its risk management commission that had handled its claims, but that wasn't working well for all the municipalities. It became difficult for some to get liability coverage due to their different structures. But now?

"I don't hesitate to pick up the phone with a question," the deputy commissioner said. Now that the recommendation for the ongoing operation of self-insured risk trusts and pools for public-school corporations has been submitted to the legislature, it has to be approved.