Greig Woodring joined General American Life Insurance in 1979, just six years after its launch and by 1986, had assumed responsibility for its reinsurance business in 1986, which became RGA.
By 1990 it had grown to be the second-largest reinsurer in the US, and in 1993 Woodring led its initial public offering. Under his leadership, it became one of the world’s leading life reinsurers, with offices in 26 countries and annual revenues of more than $10 billion.
Today, RGA is a Fortune 500 company with approximately $3.5 trillion of life reinsurance in force and assets of $89 billion.
“RGA would not be the company it is today without Greig’s vision,” according to current RGA chief executive officer Anna Manning.
More than four years after retirement, Woodring continues to be active in the insurance industry. He is a mentor of the International Insurance Society’s (IIS) RGA Leaders of Tomorrow programme and serves on the board of governors of the Longer Life Foundation, a research collaboration he conceived that focuses on the factors predicting mortality and morbidity.
He is also co-founder and executive chairman of Genomic Life, which offers genetic and genomic-based products and services as an affordable employee benefit.
During the 2021 annual conference of the ISS, Woodring was inducted into the Insurance Hall of Fame. He discussed his career with James Vickers, IIS honours committee chair and chairman of Willis Re International.
“Time spent on reinforcing the culture is absolutely vital.”
Greig Woodring, Insurance Hall of Fame
The mother of invention
Vickers noted that under Woodring, RGA established a reputation for working differently, and it is one of the things Woodring remains proud of today.
“The things I like to think back on most were the things we did differently,” he said.
“In those early years, we did things that changed the way life reinsurance is conducted,” he recalled.
“We innovated a lot of the things now taken as part of the way life reinsurance business works, and I think the people at RGA are quite proud of that.”
Much of that was due to the need to compete when the company was still relatively young.
“We were one of more than 30 life reinsurers just in the US marketplace,” he said. “It was clear to us we wanted to do things differently—to solve problems in a way that wasn’t the same as everybody else, to give us a bit of an advantage.”
That persisted even as the company grew. And as it did, the business was more deliberate in its nurturing of that culture.
“We had a culture that came about because of the interaction of the people and who we were. It wasn’t until some time later that we realised what the culture was, and that it was worth protecting, and we became conscious about stating, perpetuating and reinforcing it,” he said.
For Woodring, the importance of that has only grown.
“Especially in today’s world where things are done virtually, time spent on reinforcing the culture is absolutely vital,” he said. “That is a real secret of how successful companies are built.”
“There’s a communication gap to bring those products and services out of the scientific community and into the general population.”
Theory into practice
Part of the culture of innovation was to look outside for new thinking. It was this that led to the Longer Life Foundation, established by RGA and the Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis in 1998.
Collaborations between the business and a research institution are not always easy, admitted Woodring. “There’s a learning process on both sides,” he said. “It takes work.”
However, at their best, such collaborations can help dramatically accelerate the journey from research insights to practical applications.
“A lot has been incorporated—if not into the direct underwriting policies at RGA, but certainly into the thinking process of the lead underwriters,” he said.
He continues to see the same today with his involvement in Genomic Life.
“We have an industry in genomics that is fresh out of the scientists’ labs. It’s still innovating, changing every week, and they don’t necessarily know how to translate that into practical applications that people can really use in their lives.
“There’s a communication gap to bring those products and services out of the scientific community and into the general population in a way they can understand,” he said.
This doesn’t apply only to life business: in a world of increasing complexity, it is also an issue for climate change, artificial intelligence and cybersecurity, he added.
“There are a lot of benefits that insurance generally can bring to the public by taking complicated technical issues and then translating those into products and services that they can understand.”
Image courtesy of Shutterstock / Brian A Jackson
