Francis Bouchard is an accomplished global public affairs professional who serves as an advisor, catalyst, and contributor to a series of climate resilience and insurance initiatives. Most recently, he served as the group head of Public Affairs & Sustainability for Zurich Insurance Group, where he focused on aligning the group’s government affairs, sustainability and foundation activities around impactful public affairs and social impact campaigns.  

He originally joined the insurance sector in 1989, and since has held a series of industry-focused advocacy, communications, sales, citizenship, and public affairs roles, both in the United States and in Switzerland.  

Following early-career roles with the National Association of Life Underwriters and the Reinsurance Association of America, in 1998 Bouchard joined Zurich where he held a series of externally oriented roles, including:  head of government affairs in North America (1998-2005); global head of corporate communications (2006-2010); head of proposition development for general insurance (2010); head of sales, distribution, and marketing for global corporate (2011-12); group head of Government & Industry Affairs (2012-2015); and Group Head of Communications & Public Affairs (2017-2019). In each of these roles he has focused on aligning thought leadership, citizenship, and stakeholder management to deepen the impact of insurance on economic, societal, and individual risks.  

Between 2015 and 2017, Bouchard also served as managing director at the Washington DC-based public affairs firm Hamilton Place Strategies and established his own consulting firm called Thred Consulting. 

Bouchard earned bachelor’s degrees in magazine journalism and history from Syracuse University and his Juris Doctorate from the George Mason University School of Law. He currently serves as chairman of the board of directors of SBP, a national non-profit focused on reducing the time between disaster and recovery, and as a member of the Syracuse University Regional Council Washington, DC Chapter. Francis has served in several other leadership roles, including on the Boards of Blue Marble Microinsurance, the Atlantic Council, and the Swiss-American Foundation, as well as on a series of World Economic Forum and Insurance Development Forum working groups.