Aegon appoints ex-Sesame boss Gale as distribution chairman
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Aegon has appointed Iain Black as chief operating officer of distribution and Patrick Gale (pictured) as chairman of the distribution board overseeing its two independent financial adviser businesses, Origen and Positive Solutions.
Source: Michael Walter/Troika
The news follows a £16m loss across Origen and Positive Solutions for 2009, which Aegon revealed in its results last week.
Black will report to Aegon UK chief executive Otto Thoresen, working closely with Origen managing director Stephen Greenstreet and Positive Solutions chief executive Jim Reeve.
Black has previously led a number of key business development projects within the Aegon UK group, including the launch and development of its Dublin business, and subsequently two years as operations director of Aegon Ireland. Most recently he was managing director of Aegon’s group risk business.
Gale has been appointed chairman of the distribution board, the non-executive board which oversees Aegon’s distribution businesses. Gale was chief executive of Sesame from 2000-2007, after which he joined Just Retirement as chief operating officer, but left in October 2008.
The appointments follow the announcement last week that Aegon UK chief executive Otto Thoresen has restructured the business, creating two separate management boards – one for the life and pensions business and the other for the distribution business, each with a Chief Operating Officer responsible for the operational delivery of strategy in each business.
Last week, Adrian Grace was confirmed as chief operating officer, life and pensions.
Thoresen says: “The retail distribution review brings challenges for our adviser businesses and it is essential that we push through the same focus on delivery against strategy in Origen and Positive Solutions, as we do in our Life and Pensions business.
“Iain Black is an accomplished leader of business change and organisational development, with an impressive track record of strategy delivery across different areas of our business. Patrick Gale brings a wealth of valuable experience and insight from inside the adviser community to the non-executive chairman role.
“Both Origen and Positive Solutions have made good progress over the last 12 months and I know that with Iain and Patrick working together with Stephen Greenstreet and Jim Reeve, we will achieve success for our adviser businesses.”
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Readers' comments (1)
snooks | 4 Mar 2010 5:01 pm
Best of luck. I am more and more convinced that Financial Advice is a small firm's niche. I worked with a wise old boy once who said to me that 'everybody knows that as a client you geta better service from a small firm than from a big one.'
It's a pity that the FSA seem determined to take up more and more of small firms' time and money servicing the Regulator and not servicing our clients. I would like to see more respect for teh small business in general and a move away from giant supermarkets and DIY warehouses to proper shops and ironmongers. And some respect from teh Regulator for our integrity in being able to build up and sustain local small IFA firms. You can't do that without treating customers fairly and we should not have to defend ourselves against allegations of not doing so. I honestly beiieve that the small established local IFA firm should start with teh benefit of any doubt about that.
But big, provider owned IFA firms---don't think that'll work like!
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