Page 211 - harryDEC12_clean.iba

THE WHITE HOUSE - WASHINGTON DC - OCTOBER 2000
There are only four people sitting at the dining table: the president of the USA, George Bush jr., the undersecretary of state Grant S. Green, Maurice Hank Greenberg, and his representative Martin J, Sullivan. At the end of the meal Bush suddenly said:
“There is something else I’d like to tell you in confidence. In the next two years there will be war in a sensitive geographic location. I thought that could interest your company and have consequences for your business policies.”
Greenberg said thanks. Bush did not have to be any more precise - he had a plan already. From his limousine he rang his head of human resources:
"Get on the phone to all the top head hunters in London. I’m looking for a successful Lloyd's underwriter, not older than 45, who is looking for a challenge and is hungry, financially I mean".
+++++++++
A vision that would have direct impact on my own future concerning one of my future partners - I was convinced of this but decided to keep it to myself.
"Things do not happen. Things are made to happen".
John F. Kennedy once said - that was also Greenberg's motto. Next morning we met in Howie’s office and Howie, encouraged by Greenberg’s words, gave us a new commission for a worldwide re-insurance cover for liability insurance of dockyards. A new business section for AIU, but on the basis of a worldwide network with great potential. From a courtesy call to cultivate relations with a client a new business had arisen. More than we could have hoped for. Satisfied, we flew back next day to London.
oOo
210