Mary Ellen Luning

Mary Ellen Luning joined the M.S. in Enterprise Risk Management program at Columbia University in 2020. Ms. Luning draws upon her extensive background in insurance, reinsurance and enterprise risk as lecturer for the Insurance Risk Management course.

Most recently, Ms. Luning held the position of President and Chief Risk Officer of Lincoln Benefit Life, which is an insurer of Life, Health and Annuity products.  Prior to assuming the role of president, Ms. Luning led the Planning and Capital Management efforts for the company, which brought together the work of both Finance and Actuarial functions.  The company was part of a larger acquirer of Life/Health companies and blocks of business and therefore the experience involved significant analysis from both the seller and buyer side of insurance company transactions.

Prior to Lincoln, Benefit, Ms. Luning’s career spanned over 30 years and included several positions at Swiss Re Life & Health including Managing Director, Head of Actuarial and Appointed Actuary.  She also spent several years as an Actuarial consultant with Ernst & Young.  Ms. Luning is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries, Member of the American Academy of Actuaries, and served as chair of the SOA Reinsurance Section Council.  She has a degree in Economics from the State University of New York at Stony Brook.