Willis, a WTW business, announces new leadership appointments aimed at strengthening its growth platform across Corporate Risk & Broking North America. Michael Butch joins as growth operations leader for North America, a newly created role. He will drive alignment, efficiency and consistency across growth initiatives, with the aim of accelerating pipeline development and conversion, request for proposal (RFP) adoption, and recruitment. Butch brings more than 20 years of experience in sales analytics, financial analysis and data-driven decision-making. He joins Willis from Marsh, where he most recently served as North American sales analytics and insights lead. Jim Blaney is appointed growth enablement leader, North America, with immediate effect. In this role he will focus on equipping teams with the tools, insights and capabilities needed to support new business generation, client retention and disciplined sales execution. Blaney has held multiple leadership positions throughout his career at WTW and most recently served as head of sales and client management. He brings expertise in organic growth, disciplined sales execution and specialisation-led strategies. Butch and Blaney join Brian Hetherington, strategic growth leader, North America, on the North America growth leadership team. All three report to Paul Graziano, chief growth officer for Willis. Together, the team will work to accelerate growth and strengthen client engagement across North America. Graziano says: "These appointments mark another step in building a stronger, more connected growth platform across North America. Mike, Jim and Brian bring deep expertise, trusted leadership and a strong commitment to culture and community, key reasons clients choose WTW and continue to grow with us over the long term."
