Getting to Know Peter Kamford

American Mining Insurance Company is now a part of the W.R. Berkley company, falling into the Admitted Specialty Lines section. Like AMIC, these companies offer a breadth of products that are distributed through wholesale and retail brokers, and through local agents who have specialized expertise in the classes of business underwritten by each of these operating units. Peter L. Kamford is the Senior Vice President of Admitted Specialty Lines.

How long have you been with W.R. Berkley? Where were you before joining Berkley?
Peter Kamford: I joined W.R.Berkley in January of 2006. Prior to joining, I worked for Guy Carpenter & Company for 26 years as a treaty reinsurance broker. Back in 1986, I worked on my first reinsurance transaction on behalf of Berkley, that being a reinsurance treaty for what is now known as Clermont Specialty Managers, so my association with our firm goes back a bit.

So, you’ve been with W.R. Berkley almost two years. How are things different here than at previous companies you’ve been involved with?
P.K.: Over the years I have had the opportunity to become quite familiar with dozens of insurance operations. We run our business differently than the vast majority of them. Most firms have some form of a Home Office/ Branch Office Structure where decision making primarily takes place in the Home Office and the Branch Offices are then involved in executing or implementing those plans and decisions. The prevailing view is that your best and brightest people will ultimately wind up in the Home Office, where they supposedly will be in the position to make the best decisions that ultimately will impact the customer base across the country.

Our business model turns that view on its ear so to speak. Each of our individual operations, wherever they may be located, formulate and execute their own business plans with a level of guidance and oversight taking place here at WRBC. But our view is that you should know your customer base far better than any one here in Greenwich. Our model provides for more individual empowerment and that of course requires that alot of trust be placed in the hands of more people as opposed to fewer.

What’s the thing that you find most rewarding working with W.R. Berkley?
Hopping on the Berkley bus was easy because of the folks already on the bus. I am surrounded by intelligent professionals with values that I share. We enjoy each others company and respect one another and when you are lucky enough to experience that , you want to protect it. You work to make sure that you never let your colleagues down. There is an implied pressure in that but you welcome it.

You’ve been in the industry for over 25 years. What do you think has been the most significant change since you started?
The most significant change I have seen in our industry is not particularly unique to our industry. The amount of data that we can capture and the speed with which we can now generate, analyze and share that data is of course light years ahead of where it was 25 years ago. It really does make you wonder how the complex business of running an insurance company was done successfully back then. Based on the number of players that are no longer around, I think we have an answer.

What advice would you offer to someone just getting started in the industry?
Whether it means getting started as a producer or as an underwriter I would simply say that your personal conduct and your ethics will in the long run either propel you or sink you. There is a quote by Mark Twain on the back page of this year's Annual Report which is relevant "Always do right. This will gratify some people, and astonish the rest".

There is a lot more beautiful artwork at the Birmingham office now. Can you tell us a little about it? How it came to be?
Well, our Chairman is an art collector. Each year he chooses a work of art from his collection to be placed on the cover of our Annual Report. So what you now have is what the shareholders of the W.R. Berkley Corporation have been receiving over the years. He has done this every year since the firm became public with the exception of one year....that year we did not make money. So please look forward to many more years of art on the cover.

We know you love the industry, but what do you do when you’re not working? Hobbies? Family?
I have a son in college and a daughter in high school and both of them have been deeply involved in athletics over the years since they were very young, so I have spent alot of enjoyable weekend time simply watching them play on their respective teams. I know I will really miss it when they are both out of school. Most winter weekends I spend on the slopes skiing. I am beginning to wonder how long that will last with climate change !