In a major win for Crawford & Company Australia, its forensic accounting market position has been bolstered with the hire of renowned industry player Chris Ehlers.
Chris is widely considered an expert across property, energy and cyber claims and joins Crawford Forensic Accounting Services (CFAS) as National Technical Head.
Head of Specialty Loss Adjusting Craig McLeod said the National Technical Head position is a newly created role.
“This is a significant appointment for Specialty – Chris is already bringing unquestionable value in terms of both the professional development of our broader team within CFAS and also when it comes to improving our overall value proposition in the forensic accounting space,” McLeod said.
“Chris brings a nuanced difference to what we’ve historically had in the team in that he’s built his career around extremely high precision forensic accounting, which is critical when it comes to claims of extreme high value or complexity.”
Chris holds a Bachelor of Science in Applied Mathematics (Actuarial Studies) and is a dual qualified Australian Chartered Accountant and a US CPA.
“With this hire, we have added depth to our forensic accounting service offering; when there’s a dispute over indemnity, the numbers need to be absolutely precise and this is what Chris is known for,” McLeod said.
However, McLeod stressed Chris’ skills set is complementary to an already “strong and unstoppable” team in its own right.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that when it comes to claims management where a financial loss has occurred, or is in question, then our CFAS team is one of the best in the country. With Chris Ehlers in the building, it’s giving us an opportunity to also hone the skills of some of the more junior members of the team to an even further extent,” he said.
Chris said that Crawford already feels like home due to his existing connections with senior Crawford adjusters.
“Internal relationships are so important in order to get the right outcomes for our clients. To do our jobs really well, constructive relationships must exist across the major loss teams and the forensic accounting adjusting teams. For years I’ve worked alongside and had great respect for Crawford’s Construction, Power and Energy specialty adjusters for example, given Crawford is widely considered the ‘go to’ for claims management and loss adjusting services,” Chris explained.
Chris joins Crawford after a 20+ year career focusing exclusively on providing independent forensic accounting advice across Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands, after beginning his career in the US and UK. Early in his career he worked for Aon and Mercer.
“I’m most looking forward to the teaching and mentoring part of this role and getting back to spending more time in the technical detail of claims. Obviously when you run a business like I did in recent years, you spend a great deal of time on running the actual business and managing the operation which is a necessity. But the reality is that I love the technical detail of working on claims, so I’m really excited about this new career chapter,” explained Chris.
Crawford Australia President Tim Jarman reflected on this most recent hire:
“The competition for talent is rife and has been for years. We’ve lost some people in the past who we would have rather not lost, and we’ve picked up other top talent along the way. But, without question, when I look at where we are today, our specialty loss adjusting area is stronger than it’s ever been.”
The new National Technical Head role reports into the Head of Crawford Forensic Accounting Services, Graham Peters.
