Margaret Meister

Margaret Meister has spent her entire career at Symetra, which she joined in 1988 as an actuarial student. She rose through a series of increasingly senior roles — leading business units spanning annuity products, commercial mortgage loans, IT operations, and brand communications — and was appointed Chief Actuary in 2004 and Chief Financial Officer in February 2006. As CFO and a member of the executive leadership team, she played a principal role in Symetra's 2010 initial public offering and in the company's 2016 acquisition by Sumitomo Life Insurance Company. In February 2018 she became President & CEO, and she also serves on Symetra's Board of Directors.

Meister is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries and a member of the American Academy of Actuaries. She earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Whitman College (Walla Walla, Washington). Her tenure as CEO has included steering Symetra through the low-interest-rate environment and the COVID-19 pandemic, with a stated emphasis on product innovation and on diversity, equity, and inclusion as both business and social priorities.

Beyond Symetra, Meister has held leadership and board positions in the broader insurance and civic community. She serves (or has served) on the board of directors of the American Council of Life Insurers (ACLI), the Washington Roundtable, and the Henry Art Gallery, and has been recognized in the insured-retirement industry, including a feature by the Insured Retirement Institute (IRI). The "Trustee" label in the source data most plausibly refers to one of these board/trustee-style civic or industry roles rather than an investment fund trusteeship.

• No documented personal angel or venture investing activity was found. As a corporate CEO, her "investment" purview is Symetra's corporate strategy — capital deployment through acquisitions and reinsurance transactions, product development, and general-account investing — not startup equity checks.
• Symetra's recent corporate M&A focus has been on group life & disability (L&D) and benefits — expanding scale in employee-benefits lines (see Notable Investments/Deals below).
• Her personal leadership philosophy, in her own words: an "open-minded approach and willingness to try new things will determine who succeeds" — reflecting a willingness to move beyond fixed job descriptions and embrace change.