Dr. Swenja Surminski Joins Marsh McLennan as Managing Director of Climate and Sustainability

May 16, 2022

Dr. Swenja Surminski has joined the Marsh McLennan Advantage Insights team as Managing Director of Climate and Sustainability. 

Dr. Surminski will be responsible for leading Marsh McLennan’s thought leadership on climate and sustainability in partnership with the Company’s deep bench of climate talent across its four businesses: Marsh, Guy Carpenter, Mercer, and Oliver Wyman. Marsh McLennan is the world’s leading professional services firm in the areas of risk, strategy, and people.

Knowledgeable on both the physical impacts and the net-zero transition agenda, Dr. Surminski is a leading international expert on climate change, resilience and disaster risk management with a special focus on risk financing, insurance and risk governance in a broader sustainability context.  

She joins Marsh McLennan from the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics, where she was Deputy Director and the Head of Climate Adaptation Research, and where she continues to hold a role as Distinguished Policy Fellow focusing on Sustainable Finance and Natural Capital. 

She has held several advisory roles with corporates, regulatory authorities and governments, including as Visiting Academic at the Bank of England, and with insurers working on climate stress testing and scenario analysis. With the World Bank she developed the Triple Resilience Dividend, a tool now widely used to assess the co-benefits of resilience. Prior to her academic career Dr. Surminski worked at Marsh UK.

Dr. Surminski currently chairs the Munich Climate Insurance Initiative and is a Senior Associate at the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.  She was a founding member of the ClimateWise Management Committee. 

Dr. Surminski was also a contributing author to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and has led the work on business and industry for the UK's Climate Change Risk Assessment. The UK Government recently appointed her to the UK Climate Change Committee, an independent statutory body that advises the UK government on emissions targets and reports to Parliament on progress made in reducing emissions and preparing for and adapting to the impacts of climate change.

She was a Fulbright scholar and earned degrees in political science and ecological economics.  She is the author of several books and many reports and journal articles on climate and sustainability.

Marsh McLennan offers a wide breadth of climate and sustainability capabilities.  It works with clients to understand and quantify climate risks, helps businesses and financial institutions set and execute low-carbon transition strategies that collectively chart a path to net-zero, and advises clients on how to prepare, engage and empower their workforces to execute these transformations. 

About Marsh McLennan

Marsh McLennan (NYSE: MMC) is the world’s leading professional services firm in the areas of risk, strategy and people. The Company’s 83,000 colleagues advise clients in 130 countries.  With annual revenue of approximately $20 billion, Marsh McLennan helps clients navigate an increasingly dynamic and complex environment through four market-leading businesses. Marsh provides data-driven risk advisory services and insurance solutions to commercial and consumer clients. Guy Carpenter develops advanced risk, reinsurance and capital strategies that help clients grow profitably and pursue emerging opportunities. Mercer delivers advice and technology-driven solutions that help organizations redefine the world of work, reshape retirement and investment outcomes, and unlock health and wellbeing for a changing workforce. Oliver Wyman serves as a critical strategic, economic and brand advisor to private sector and governmental clients. For more information, visit marshmclennan.com, follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter or subscribe to BRINK.

Contact:
Amelia Woltering
Marsh McLennan
+1 347 703 5358
amelia.woltering@mmc.com