Who is now leading Willis Towers Watson Canada

Laura Samaroo (pictured, above) is the new Canadian region leader for Willis Towers Watson PLC, the Dublin-based brokerage announced Tuesday.

Samaroo is based in Vancouver. She had been Willis Towers Watson’s Western Canadian market leader and Canada co-leader until being appointed to her new role. Samaroo joined the Wyatt Company in 1991as an actuary. In 2010, Watson Wyatt Worldwide Inc. merged with  Towers, Perrin, Forster & Crosby Inc. to form Towers Watson. Then in 2016, Tower Watson merged with Willis Group Holdings plc.

Brian Parsons had been Willis Towers Watson’s Canadian CEO until early 2021. That was when Parsons joined BFL Canada as president of its risk management division.

In addition to placing commercial P&C insurance, Willis Towers Watson offers a variety of other services including human capital as well as benefits delivery and administration, among others.

In Canada, Willis Towers Watson has about 1,000 employees in Canada (including but not limited to commercial P&C risk and broking), with offices in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary, said Ofelia Isabel, managing director, Toronto market leader and Canada co-leader, in an earlier interview.

Samaroo has more than 20 years of experience in assisting organizations achieve business goals through effective plan design, funding, risk management and executive pension arrangements. She has bachelor of science degree in statistics from Simon Fraser University and  is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries and the Canadian Institute of Actuaries.

Her previous roles include retirement practice leader, Western Canada for Watson Wyatt.

Before the 2016 merger, Towers Watson provided a variety of services for the insurance industry including actuarial valuation, due diligence support for mergers and acquisitions, product development, predictive modeling, claims consulting and catastrophe modeling for the insurance industry.

Willis Towers Watson is the world’s third-largest commercial brokerage after Marsh and Aon.

In August, 2020, shareholders of Aon PLC and Willis Towers Watson approved a merger. But that deal was called off in July, 2021. That was shortly after the United States federal justice department announced it would be asking a U.S. court to block the merger. The court never made a ruling – as to whether a merger would violate U.S. competition law – because Aon and Willis Towers Watson voluntarily terminated the merger agreement.

Feature image courtesy of Willis Towers Watson