The turnaround at Aspen Insurance Holdings—the result of a multipronged, multiyear effort—is bearing fruit with a return to consistent profits. Mark Cloutier, executive chairman and CEO, attributed Aspen’s turn of fortune to a focus on its people and hard work to reunderwrite its book.
Executive Summary
When Mark Cloutier took the helm of Aspen to return the company to profitability, he knew a vital first step would begin with its group of talented people. There were cultural challenges that needed addressing along with the reunderwriting of its portfolio. People are at the heart of a corporate turnaround.When Cloutier joined Aspen in 2019, he knew that he and his team had to get on top of challenges including level of volatility in the company’s results, its lackluster return on equity and its lagging performance across market cycles.
“We also recognized that there were…people and cultural challenges within the business. That’s not to say there wasn’t a terrific group of people in the business,” he emphasized during an interview with Carrier Management. In fact, he recalled that when he told people in the industry that he was soon to join Aspen, he heard a common message: “We really like the people. The company has struggled, but man, you’ve got a bunch of good, talented people there.”
