People

Swett & Crawford appointed Meredith Dyson as senior vice president. Dyson, who will assist the company with its marketing efforts and other related activities, will be based in New York.

Most recently, Dyson was with Mercator Risk Services Inc. as senior vice president and Northeast property manager. She began her career in 1990 at Marsh & McLennan Inc. in the risk management property division. After becoming assistant vice president in 1994, Dyson moved to the global broking property division in 1996 where she specialized in the marketing of risk management accounts to retail, wholesale and facultative reinsurance markets. She was promoted to vice president in 1998.

Later that year, Dyson moved to Aon Specialty Re. In May 2000, Dyson returned to Marsh Inc. as an account executive in the Japan client service group. She joined the global division of Marsh Inc. in July 2001, where her specialty was the marketing of risk management accounts to the wholesale marketplace.

Prior to working for Mercator, Dyson was a founding associate of RMC2 LLC, a start-up wholesale insurance brokerage. RMC2 was sold to American E&S in July 2003.

Jackie Oddo has rejoined Buffalo, N.Y.-based regional wholesaler Russell Bond as a professional liability broker, handling management liability, professional and environmental coverages.

Oddo has 20 years of insurance experience. She began her insurance career with General Accident Insurance in 1986, first joining Russell Bond in 1998 as an underwriting assistant. From 2003 to 2007 she worked as a professional liability broker for another wholesale firm.

Harvey Insurance Group, a Mid-Atlantic independent insurance broker, has named Brian Dietrich as executive vice president. As a member of the senior management team at HIG, Dietrich will be responsible for oversight of the day-to-day operations and strategic planning process.

Dietrich comes to HIG with 19 years of insurance industry experience in agency, carrier and risk management positions, most recently as vice president of The Addis Group in King of Prussia, Pa. Prior to that, he worked in the insurance brokerage and risk management fields and served as a vice president of a large regional brokerage firm.

The agency, based in West Chester, Pa., is licensed to conduct business in all states, and does so primarily in Pa., N.J., Del., Md. and N.Y.

Atlanta, Ga.-based Beecher Carlson, a commercial insurance brokerage firm, appointed Steve Denton as president.

Denton has served as the chief operating officer since July 2006. In his expanded role, Denton will plan and direct the execution of Beecher Carlson’s client services and growth initiatives. Denton has also been elected to Beecher Carlson’s board of directors. He originally joined Beecher Carlson in 2004 as managing director.

Tom Golub remains as chairman and CEO of Beecher Carlson.

Denton has more than 20 years of experience in commercial insurance and risk management. Prior to joining Beecher Carlson, he held several senior management positions at Aon Risk Services. He also worked at Marsh and began his risk management career at Ford Motor Co.

Robert Swayze, executive vice president of Eustis Insurance & Benefits in New Orleans, has been elected president of RiskProNet International, a network of 26 independent insurance brokers throughout the United States and Canada.

Three new board members also have been elected. They are Gerry O’Connor, senior vice president of Old National Insurance in Indianapolis; Bradley Potter, vice president of operations of BFL Canada in Vancouver; and Phil Marsh, senior vice president of Wick Picher Insurance, Inc. in Phoenix.

Safeco announced that Paul Chmura has joined the company as Northeast regional executive. Chmura comes to Safeco from The Hanover Insurance Group, where he had served as the regional vice president of sales and distribution for the Northeast region since 2004.

The Northeast sales region comprises 10 states — Conn., Del., Maine, Mass., N.H., N.J., N.Y., Pa., R.I. and Vt.

Chmura has extensive industry experience, starting as a commercial lines producer in 1987. He will manage the business from the service office located in Farmington, Conn.

Safeco also named Rauline Gonzales Ochs executive vice president for sales and marketing. Ochs, formerly Oracle’s senior vice president for North American alliances and channels, has more than 20 years of experience building sales, marketing and distribution management teams.

The Proformance Insurance Co., the main operating subsidiary of National Atlantic Holdings Corp., based in Freehold, N.J., has appointed Thomas Glowacki as vice president of claims.

Prior to joining Proformance, Glowacki served as the New Jersey regional liability claims manager for The Hanover Insurance Group. Previously, he was with Commercial Union Insurance Co. and Safeco Insurance Co.

Charlotte, N.C.-based LMC Capital LLC, named Patrick Vaughn as managing director. He will lead LMC’s mergers and acquisitions practice for insurance technology and services companies.

Previously, Vaughn was a managing director at Triarch Partners, a Charlotte, N.C., boutique investment bank, where he led the firm’s technology mergers and acquisitions practice. Prior to Triarch, he was president and CEO of Market Velocity Inc., a technology services company formed by the merger of Atlanta-based TradeUps and Charlotte-based MoonBuzz Inc, which Vaughn founded in 1999.

Thomas J. Crowley, vice president of Maran Corporate Risk Associates in Southampton, N.Y., has been appointed to the board of directors of the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of New York. Crowley will represent the agencies in the Metropolitan-Suburban region, which includes Long Island.

Crowley is no stranger to IIABNY: In 2006, he received the association’s Outstanding Local President Award as president of the Suffolk County chapter.

Topics Agencies Risk Management Human Resources