“Having been in this industry for 30 years, I have seen the evolution of the acceptance of women and the recognition of them.”
Name:
Beth Levene
Company: TransRe Job:
Executive vice president, chief claims officer
Timeline: 1998—Executive vice president, chief claims officer, TransRe 1990—Casualty claim director, CNA Insurance 1984—Senior claims examiner, GEICO
Beth Levene is executive vice president and chief claims officer for Transatlantic Reinsurance, New York. Levene manages the claims operations, which includes treaty and facultative claims arising under proportional and excess of loss reinsurance agreements for property and casualty business, assumed and ceded. She is responsible for and manages all domestic claims arising from the brokered underwriting unit as well as the direct underwriting unit. The lines of business include traditional casualty (auto [personal
and commercial], workers’ compensation, trucking, general liability, products, umbrella, etc), specialty casualty (D&O, A&E, healthcare [doctors, nurses, facility, hospital, etc], financial institutions, accountants, etc), marine, aviation, property and surety. Levene has been in the insurance/reinsurance industry since 1984 and was previously employed by CNA in Chicago, Illinois and GEICO in Dallas, Texas.
Why did you choose to work in this industry initially? I became acquainted with the industry at school. I took a position in claims, while I was considering going to medical school and I really enjoyed the challenge of claims adjusting and understanding the liability and evaluating them. At the beginning I thought it was going to be a part-time filler and it became a full- time interest.
What has been the highlight of your career so far? On a personal note, it would have to be becoming and executive vice president, chief claims officer of TransRe, having a woman at the helm and able to get views, opinions and strategy across.
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I think it’s a transition in evolution that has occurred with more women in higher positions. It was a real highlight for me and it still continues to be.
What has been the biggest challenge you have
encountered? Having been in this industry for 30 years, I have seen the evolution of the acceptance of women and the recognition of them. In the early days, the challenge was to be respected and thought of as a peer and a colleague in a collaborative environment. Over the evolution of these last 30 years, that’s no longer the issue. You would start off in the back and worked your way forward and I think that going forward now, the women that are right behind me are going to go further and do better and grander things. Another challenge that
I’ve found is trying to get the right
balance of being a wife, mother, daughter and an employee. At times you struggle with one and other times you struggle with them all. You have to accept that you can’t have perfection in all areas and that you have to give your best at all times and it will probably work out in the end.
If you had chosen a different profession/career path, what would it have been? It would have been medicine. I have two daughters who are in medical school now and that would have probably been my other choice. I thought I would switch from claims, but I liked the intellectual challenge of claims and it does give me a glimpse of the medicine when reading about it.
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