Tommaso Bazzi is the Chair of WING’s Board.  He has served on the Board for 3 years and has been a member of WING since 2009.  His professional insurance career began in 2005 after he received a master’s degree in Engineering from Politecnico University of Milan. He spent two years at Foa & Son, brokers in New York City. He was their point of contact between European mother companies and their USA subsidiaries; he learned to value the importance of successfully bridging disparate insurance models and cultures.  He returned to Italy to join his family business – Bazzi Insurance Partners, as head of the International Department. He became their CEO in 2017. He led Bazzi Insurance Partners to be today one of the most relevant independent brokerage firms in Italy, with specific expertise in multinational clients.

Annelie Smith has been a member of WING’s Board since 2018, becoming Vice-Chair in May 2020 and was re-elected for another 4 year term in November 2022.  She is responsible for providing legal input on the statutes as well as being involved in general items relating to the management of WING. 

Annelie has over 30 years’ experience of the international insurance industry servicing major corporate and global portfolios in underwriting, claims management, account executive, strategic management and executive roles. She is currently Executive Head of the Corporate and Specialty insurance division and is on the Management Committee of Risk Benefit Solutions (RBS) in South Africa.

Annelie and RBS hosted the WING spring conference 2023 in Cape Town, lauded as a very successful and an enjoyable conference by all attending members.

Christina Holzinger has been a Board member of WING since 2015 with responsibility for new membership applications. She has more than 15 years of experience in the insurance broker industry which has been spent working within the family firm BüchnerBarella as well as different brokers abroad.

She became their CEO in 2023 and led BüchnerBarella to be today one of the most relevant independent family owned brokerage firms in Germany.

Chris was elected to the WING board in 2023. 

He did a full circle tour with the family business – Reliance Group of Companies. He started out as an account manager in 1995. He then left in 1998 to learn from the best of the best on Fortune 1000 accounts for some of the largest insurance firms in the world; gaining extensive expertise in developing complex risk management and insurance programs in New York, and San Francisco. Chris returned to Reliance Insurance in 2005, where he has served as CEO. During this time he has served on various insurance and business industry boards while continuing to expand and grow his orginzation's Canadian operations nationally and develop new MGA verticals.

Emanuel Wessel joined the WING Board in November 2023 with responsibility within the organization for the treasury. He has been an active member of WING since 2014.

Emanuel began his professional career in 2003 with Allianz AG in Berlin, after completing his degree in Business Studies. In 2007, he moved to the Group Headquarters in Munich, working with the Allianz with the Allianz Business Area Growth Markets. He followed this up with several years’ overseas in the Group’s Asian business units where he gained experience of the challenges involved in organizing and managing international insurance business. In 2014 Emanuel Wessel joined GGW – Gossler, Gobert & Wolters, a group of privately owned brokerage companies, where he is now Managing Partner.

The GGW Group is an association of highly qualified, owner-managed insurance brokers. Its origins date back to 1758 and there are currently 1700 people working within the Group so that GGW is today one of the largest insurance brokers and managing general agents (MGA) in Germany.

Sam is the secretary for WING and is responsible for supporting the Board and organising the conferences.  Prior to WING Sam’s roles have included managing events, international conferences and exhibitions for Cisco Systems in EMEA.  Sam lives in the south of England with her family.