By Loretta Worters, Vice President – Media Relations, Triple-I
Throughout Girls’s Historical past Month, the insurance coverage trade celebrates leaders who’re shaping its future. One such chief is Kristen Martin, President and CEO of Utica Nationwide Insurance coverage Group, whose path to the highest displays each willpower and the facility of neighborhood assist.
Martin turned CEO in 2024, following the retirement of Richard Creedon. For her, the function is deeply private. Rising up close to Utica Nationwide’s headquarters, she handed it virtually day-after-day and even visited as a center schooler for a Authorized Eagles program.
“Main the group right this moment feels surreal,” Martin mentioned. “It’s a full-circle second that underscores my connection to Central New York and the individuals who have helped form my profession.”
She credit mentors, colleagues, household – together with her husband, sister, and sister-in-law – and shut associates, for supporting her ambitions whereas elevating a household. Elevating two sons with a associate who shares tasks has given them a wholesome view of teamwork and respect. Martin hopes they proceed to embody values she sees in them already: kindness, accountability, and the significance of displaying up for others.
“You generally is a devoted mum or dad, associate, {and professional} concurrently,” she mentioned. “Main Utica Nationwide exhibits the facility of assist, illustration, and neighborhood, and motivates me to assist others really feel the identical sense of chance.”
Martin’s profession started at Utica Nationwide in 2001 as an examiner after working as a trial legal professional. Claims work, she explains, is without doubt one of the finest methods to know the insurance coverage enterprise, providing perception into distribution, underwriting, danger administration, and buyer impression. These early experiences formed her management philosophy: ask considerate questions, keep curious, and contemplate the real-world penalties of each resolution.
Over time, Martin held roles throughout underwriting operations, governance, and government management. Serving as President and COO beginning in 2019 supplied useful preparation for the CEO function. Positions corresponding to Company Secretary to the Board and Common Auditor broadened her understanding of governance, danger, and operational mechanics. Mixed along with her authorized coaching at Albany Legislation Faculty, Martin developed a disciplined method to decision-making, emphasizing readability, situation planning, and evaluating impression.
Regardless of progress, girls presently maintain solely about 22 % of C-suite positions in insurance coverage. Martin believes progress requires three key shifts: overtly discussing resilience, letting go of perfectionism, and being clear about profession targets.
“Construct a assist system, deal with your self, and ask for what you need,” she mentioned. “None of us succeeds by ourselves.”
Addressing the trade’s expertise hole is one other precedence. Martin emphasizes early publicity by internships, which permit early-career employees to attach with trade professionals and discover a number of profession paths. “Management isn’t the one path to a significant profession. Particular person contributor roles are equally useful. Mentorship can be crucial, serving to younger professionals develop whereas staying genuine.”
For younger girls contemplating insurance coverage, Martin advises them to “encompass your self with various views, step exterior your consolation zone, continue to learn, and don’t be afraid to ask for what you need. Persistence and authenticity are important.”
Martin is optimistic in regards to the subsequent technology. By means of internships, she sees younger girls arriving assured, curious, and wanting to find out about management and profession paths.
“As I meet our interns and see the boldness and curiosity they carry, it makes me extremely constructive in regards to the future,” she mentioned. “After I take into consideration the place they’ll be in 15 or 20 years, I see a technology of ladies who will proceed to increase alternatives and form the way forward for this trade.”
