People and Places

Kokomo, Ind.-based First National Bank & Trust announced the promotion of Frank Renfro to the position of president of First National Insurance, a wholly-owned subsidiary. Renfro was promoted to the position following the promotion of John O’Donnell to president of First National Bank & Trust, which has 27 branches throughout central Indiana.

Most recently, Renfro was vice president and operations manager for First National Insurance, a position he held since 2001. He was responsible for adding several new products to the company and reorganizing the agency to better meet customer needs.

Before joining First National Insurance, Renfro owned and operated his own insurance agency located in Anderson, Ind. For more than 25 years, Renfro worked to build that agency into a solid, multi-million dollar insurance agency.

Independent broker network RiskProNet International Inc. (RPNI) has named Robert W. Lampus as its new president. Lampus is senior vice president and general counsel for Cleveland-based Dawson Insurance Inc.

RPNI, based in Menlo Park, Calif., has 28 members in the United States and Canada.

Lampus has been with Dawson Companies, a group of integrated financial services firms with offices throughout Ohio and Florida, since 1994. He has more than 30 years experience in the insurance industry. He is also a member of the Ohio Bar, specializing in risk management and agency acquisitions.

He previously served as president and trustee of the Insurance Board of Greater Cleveland and as a District 12 trustee of the Independent Insurance Agents of Ohio.

RPNI’s 28 partners last year had combined revenues of $497 million, giving the organization significant market strength. Each of the 28 partners is an equal owner in the association, which gives its members the geographic diversity and shared knowledge base to serve clients with national, international or highly specialized exposures to risk. Total written premiums in 2003 were $4.8 billion.

Charles E. Symington has been named as the new head of the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America’s (IIABA) federal government affairs program.

Symington comes to the association from the House Financial Services Committee, where he served as a senior counsel for the Republican majority and focused on insurance issues, including congressional efforts to assess state insurance regulation. Symington has served on the Financial Services Committee staff since its inception at the start of the 107th Congress in 2001. He begins his new assignment with IIABA March 1.

During his time with the Financial Services Committee, Symington was actively involved in drafting the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act of 2002, the Financial Services Anti-Fraud bill, the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003, and other legislative proposals.

Before joining the Financial Services Committee, Symington worked as a majority counsel for the House Committee on Energy & Commerce, where he concentrated on health care policy and the panel’s oversight responsibilities. Prior to working on Capitol Hill, Symington was an attorney with the law firm of Matricardi & Moylan in Springfield, Va., and before that was an associate attorney with the firm of Drew, Eckl & Farnham in Atlanta, Ga., where he specialized in insurance defense litigation.

IIABA also announced the promotions of Wes Bissett to senior vice president of government affairs and state relations, and Justin Roth to vice president of government affairs.

RewardsPlus, a provider of benefits management solutions, announced that John Nail has been named executive vice president of sales and marketing. Nail brings more than 28 years experience in sales, management and leadership positions in the employee benefits industry to RewardsPlus. He will head up the company’s sales and marketing unit and be responsible for new business development, expanding partner relationships, sales administration and positioning the company in the marketplace.

Nail’s experience includes more than 17 years with UNUM Provident Corp. where he served the company in various employee benefit sales, sales management and regional/corporate management positions in New York, Chicago, Michigan, Baltimore and Washington, D.C.

Robert Nesbit has been named senior vice president and chief human resources officer at USI Holdings Corp. He’ll be based in USI’s corporate office in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., and will report to Bob Schneider, executive vice president and chief financial officer.

Before joining USI, Nesbit served as vice president of global staffing and diversity at Campbell Soup Co., where he created a corporate staffing function in collaboration with senior management and human resources leadership.

Prior to that, he held a senior human resources position at AOL Time Warner where he implemented cost saving through Web-based recruitment technologies and internal research function. Nesbit also oversaw the implementation of acquisition and integration plans at Wachovia (then First Union) first as human resources transition director and later as senior vice president of human resources.

Chicago-based brokerage Hub International Ltd. announced that several of its senior managers have taken on new responsibilities in a redeployment aimed at accelerated growth.

Martin P. Hughes, Hub’s chairman and CEO, said the changes are part of an ongoing effort to adapt corporate management approaches to the rapidly increasing size of the insurance broker’s operations. In the four years ended Dec. 31, 2002, Hub posted a 54 percent compounded growth rate for revenues, as a result of both internal growth and an active acquisition program. Through the first nine months of 2003, revenue grew at a 33 percent rate in comparison to the prior year.