Why Brian Thompson's killing has prompted companies to think about executive safety and corporate purpose

‘Executive security used to be something of a hard sell,’ says Iylia Lavatelli, a former close-protection security provider, now working at operational resilience firm Restrata, talking about budget as well as executive willingness playing their parts in what any security manager can achieve.

That, of course, changed with the shooting of Brian Thompson, UnitedHealthcare CEO, in New York last week. The news today is of companies scrambling to organize their security and senior profiles being removed from corporate websites – health insurance firms in particular.

UnitedHealthcare removed from its website the photos, names and biographies of its top executives. Other organizations have taken similar steps in the face of what the New York Police Department reportedly described as a ‘heightened security risk.’ Medica, a Minnesota-based non-profit healthcare company, closed its offices, allowing staff to temporarily work from home.

It is now well reported that Thompson was on his way to UnitedHealth Group's investor day when he was targeted. Centene, a government health insurance provider, switched its own investor day on December 12 to a fully virtual format, rather than in-person as originally planned. ‘Health insurance is a big industry and a small community; many members of the CenTeam crossed paths with Brian during their careers,’ said Sarah London, Centene CEO, in a statement announcing the switch to online ‘in the wake of the tragic loss of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO.’

Identifying threats

Lavatelli points out how easy it is to work out where an executive – particularly of a publicly listed company – is likely to be. ‘Information around events are so highly publicized and you can often find out quite easily that a company typically uses one particular hotel chain for its travel, for example.’

While he says it’s surprising that Thompson had no security with him, especially given the ‘emotive’ sector he worked in, Lavatelli also notes how easy it is to look at a situation with hindsight.

‘[Some high-profile] people of course like to try to live normal lives,’ he adds, noting it isn’t necessarily easy to filter genuine threats from low-risk frustration in order to convince a company or an individual that security is required. Thompson’s wife had reportedly told police of threats received in the past.

‘It’s the separation of information versus intelligence,’ explains Lavatelli, a Victoria, Australia police veteran. ‘It’s about the preparation phase, having the appropriate personnel in terms of boots on the ground.’

In terms of what that means in practice, he talks of ‘situational awareness,’ of identifying ‘baseline threats in the immediate area, formulating plans for these exact sort of things, having anti-surveillance and counter-surveillance’.

Lavatelli also explains how he worked in close protection: ‘I would be attached to the individual that we’re protecting. Then there would also be an advanced party, whose role is to be five or 10 minutes ahead, making sure routes are cleared, making sure there is nothing untoward.’ He worked with a certain family where consistency of personnel was important, but this typically wouldn’t be a permanent team, he adds. Most firms will likely use external support as and when required.

Whether such an arrangement could have prevented what happened to Thompson is impossible to say but Lavatelli believes ‘there was certainly a gap there that wasn’t filled – because Thompson didn’t have any sort of protection.’

He also frames this as a reputation issue, citing the fact that UnitedHealthcare’s share price plunged after Thompson’s killing. According to Morningstar data, UnitedHealth Group (parent of UnitedHealthcare) stock lost 13 percent in December and dragged down the Dow Jones Industrial Average to six straight days of losses.

A board consideration

Whether the risk to other executives is heightened or if more attacks are likely are not the big questions. A Harvard Business Review (HBR) article following Thompson’s murder describes ‘workplace violence driven by disgruntled employees or job-site disputes [as] unfortunately too common in the US,’ but notes that the targeting of CEOs is ‘relatively rare’.

However, the HBR author echoes a point made by Lavatelli linking the already heightened risk level in the US following two assassination attempts on Donald Trump this year. ‘The risks to executives in just about any industry cannot be minimized,’ states the HBR author.

This is now a board-level issue, where executives and directors alike must consider the ‘low-risk, high-consequence’ reality at hand.

Many of the points in the article are reflected in what Lavatelli talks about: whether budget is made available, whether threats are taken seriously or whether executives themselves are willing to accept the need for security. ‘A lot of past issues have been around complacency, and I know security managers are pulling their hair out trying to get the message across,’ he says.

Public rage

Part of the reason other companies are now taking the executive threat seriously is not just that it appears Thompson was targeted specifically, or that ‘wanted’ posters have reportedly appeared around New York featuring other CEOs; it is also the shocking response from ordinary Americans online.

Any quick search of social media will present a multitude of hostile comments – as well as jokes and much sympathy for Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old arrested on suspicion of Thompson’s killing.

An article from the Yale School of Management (SOM) describes this as ‘a very un-American response’ from a ‘vocal fringe’ from an ‘unholy alliance between the far left and the far right’.

Citing the 2024 Edelman Trust Barometer survey of 36,000 respondents across 28 countries, the SOM article argues that business remain well-trusted institutions. ‘[The Edelman survey] suggests that, to a majority of Americans outside the far fringes, business leaders are seen as widely admired, stabilizing forces in society, not caricatured greedy villains out to harm regular people,’ write the authors.

For Alison Taylor, clinical professor at NYU Stern Business School and author of Higher Ground: How Business Can Do the Right Thing in a Turbulent World, the Edelman Trust Barometer is a particular bugbear – and, multiple other surveys paint a very different picture.

For example, Pew Research shows the percentage of Americans who view capitalism negatively increased from 33 percent in May 2019 to 39 percent by August 2022.

According to a 2024 Gallup poll, just 16 percent of Americans now say they have ‘a great deal’ or ‘quite a lot’ of confidence in major companies – down from 28 percent in 2001. 

‘A wider reckoning’

Taylor describes the response to Thompson’s killing as capturing ‘the public mood, the public rage against business greed.’

‘In my book, I make the argument that the root cause of all corporate reputational problems is their impact on human beings, on not treating people with dignity and respect,’ she tells IR Magazine. For Taylor, the online response clearly points to ‘business-model issues’.

‘If you’ve got the general public laughing quite openly about a murder, you need to ask yourself some hard questions about the impact of your business,’ she adds.

While the focus on executive security (an area Taylor used to work in before finding the ESG universe) is understandable in the short term, Taylor stresses the need for ‘a wider reckoning’.

Taylor talks about the Thompson story as pulling together many themes of the moment: ‘So you can write about executive security, but it’s like papering over the cracks: who is going to reframe and rethink the role of a business in society?’

It seems that today, more than a week after Thompson’s killing and with a clear message sent to corporate America by those angered online – and in real-life too – UnitedHealth is attempting to address the cracks.

‘We know the health system does not work as well as it should, and we understand people’s frustrations with it,’ UnitedHealth CEO Andrew Witty wrote in a New York Times op-ed mourning Thompson. ‘No one would design a system like the one we have. And no one did. It's a patchwork built over decades 

‘Our mission is to help make it work better. We are willing to partner with anyone, as we always have – health care providers, employers, patients, pharmaceutical companies, governments and others - to find ways to deliver high-quality care and lower costs.’

Such change will not occur overnight, nor will the wide gap between business and society. In the interim, corporate America may yet need to address the safety of its people.