Gary A. Williams joins MBG as President and CEO-Elect
Gary A. Williams of San Antonio, Texas, has been named President and CEO-Elect of Mutual Benefit Group (MBG), a regional property/casualty insurance carrier based in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania.
“I’m very excited that Gary will be MBG’s next CEO,” says Steve Sliver, MBG President and CEO. “We were searching for a great leader and someone who was tightly aligned with MBG’s culture. Gary is that and more. He is an accomplished insurance professional, whose familiarity with and success in leading various areas of insurance operations – marketing, product and pricing, and underwriting – will serve MBG quite well over the next decade. I believe Gary’s leadership, leveraged with our strong surplus and financial strength, will noticeably improve MBG’s growth and profitability.”
Williams was most recently employed with United Services Automobile Association (USAA) in San Antonio, where he served in executive capacities since 2010.
During his more than 25 years in the insurance industry, Williams has seen repeated success by employing an authentic management approach that empowers top-performing teams within fast-paced environments. He has led both business and IT teams and has worked to devise forward-thinking strategies that optimize profitability while creating a continuously positive culture, forging long-lasting professional partnerships and engaging with direct reports to deliver ambitious objectives.
He has experience driving growth and profitability from non-standard automobile, motorcycle and small commercial insurance books of business through independent agents. He has led profitable growth from large agency sales and service teams, territory sales managers and affinity partnerships.
Williams’ areas of expertise are revenue growth; property/casualty innovation and development; driving engagement in corporate culture; product management/marketing; insurance agency sales and service. His professional accomplishments include expanding marginal pre-tax income from $12 million to $103 million in just three years; Introducing a first-to-market, patent-filed ridesharing endorsement for personal auto insurance coverage; maintaining the property/casualty industry’s greatest customer and product retention rates while growing a book of business more than 30%.
During his first seven years at USAA, Williams served as Assistant Vice President, Auto Product Management, cultivating USAA’s first-ever product management team and delivering $1 billion plus pre-tax income with over 5% member, product and revenue growth year after year from 2010-2017. In 2017, he took on the position of Assistant Vice President, Brand Management/Affinity Account Management for USAA. In this role, he exceeded new member goals and net product plans for bank, life and property/casualty business. He also incorporated an integrated affinity marketing approach for all risk segments, expanded marketing channels and optimized best-performing tactics.
A graduate of Wake Forest University with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and a master’s degree in business administration, Williams is a Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU) and holds certification in process excellence and product management (PMC).
Prior to beginning his insurance career, Williams served with the United States Air Force in Honduras as Fuels Officer for Central America and as a manufacturing manager with Sara Lee Corporation in Jamaica.
His first insurance position was with National General Insurance in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where he was a property/casualty production manager. While at National General, he was promoted to Senior Product Manager, Specialty Auto, and then to Vice President, Enterprise Business Execution, where he played an essential role in enhancing product and pricing speed to market. Prior to joining USAA, he served as Director of Underwriting, Pricing and Product for Aviva PLC in the United Kingdom.
Williams and his wife, Jada, have a teen-aged daughter, Kennedy.