People News: Chubb, The Jacobson Group, PDA

Scott Gunter has been appointed senior vice president, Chubb Group, division president, North America Commercial Insurance. In his new role, he will have executive operating responsibility for the retail commercial property and casualty insurance business that serves the middle market in North America, through 48 offices in the U.S. and Canada. His responsibilities encompass strategy, production, product development and management, and P&L performance.

Gunter, with more than 30 years of insurance industry experience at Chubb, most recently served as chief operating officer in Chubb’s North America Personal Risk Services division. Prior to the ACE acquisition of Chubb in January 2016, he served as Chubb Commercial Insurance global chief underwriting officer. He will report to Paul Krump, executive vice president, Chubb Group president, North America Commercial and Personal Insurance.

Gunter succeeds Steven R. Pozzi who, after a distinguished 36-year career in the insurance industry, will retire at the end of this year. Through the remainder of 2017, Pozzi will be available to Gunter to ensure a successful transition, and he will also serve as an advisor on special projects for Chubb’s North America and Overseas General divisions.

The Jacobson Group, a global provider of insurance talent, has named Oyauma Garrison senior vice president. In this role, Garrison will head Jacobson’s temporary staffing practice, which provides experienced insurance professionals on a temporary and temp-to-hire basis to help organizations successfully manage workload fluctuations. He will also assist in Jacobson’s strategic development as a member of the executive management team.

An industry veteran with more than 20 years of experience, Garrison has held positions with Allstate, Nationwide and State Farm. Throughout his insurance tenure, he has maintained a multi-functional focus with roles in sales, underwriting, pricing, claims, marketing and operations.

Garrison holds the Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter and Associate in Claims designations, as well as Ohio property and casualty, life and health, and Series 6 licenses.

In addition to active involvement within the insurance industry, Garrison is a dynamic community leader. He was recently awarded the inaugural 2015 Emerging Leader Award for the United Way of Central Ohio and has been recognized with numerous other leadership and community service awards. Currently, Garrison serves on the Board of Directors for BuildOn, an international nonprofit empowering U.S. urban youth to transform their neighborhoods and the world, and the Columbus Marathon Diversity Advisory Council.

PDA Names Nance Chief Compliance Officer

Texas-based Property Damage Appraisers (PDA) named Grady Nance chief compliance officer. Nance has more than 30 years of leadership experience in the fields of insurance, automotive repair and law enforcement with a primary concentration in compliance, strategic planning, auto physical damage and developing customer-centric environments.

In his role, Nance maintains, oversees and manages compliance, quality assurance and quality control issues. He functions as an independent and objective body that reviews and evaluates compliance issues and concerns, while managing strategic and tactical planning and performance reporting that supports and underpins the corporate planning for PDA.

Before his promotion, Nance served as PDA’s associate vice president of sales and operations. Prior to joining PDA, Nance was general manager of Gerber Collision & Glass in the Columbus, Ohio market. Before that, he served in a number of leadership positions with Nationwide Insurance, where he managed material damage teams as a front-line manager, associate director, technical director and ultimately, national total loss and salvage recovery director. In this role, he centralized Nationwide’s fire and theft operations and developed one of the first mobile electronics replacement units.

Before Nationwide, Nance served in law enforcement, rising to the rank of colonel in North Carolina’s third-largest sheriff’s office.