Ray McFeetors may have moved upstairs to the chairman’s office at Great-West Lifeco Inc. after 16 years as its CEO, but that doesn’t signal changes in the company’s strategy or direction. The 64-year-old plans to remain intricately involved with the Winnipeg-based holding company and its Canadian, U.S. and European operating divisions.

A trio of executives — Allen Loney, William Acton and Mitchell Graye — replace McFeetors as CEO of the Canadian, European and U.S. divisions, respectively, a reflection of the current heft of those divisions. and the parent company’s intention to continue pursuing acquisitions and growth. All three report directly to McFeetors.

“These are big companies that they’re running,” McFeetors says. “We want to continue to grow them very substantially.”

McFeetors describes his move as part of a larger transition involving GWL’s parent company, Montreal-based Power Financial Corp. Robert Gratton, who served as Power Financial’s president and CEO for 15 years, is stepping down as executive chairman to become deputy chairman. Gratton, 65, is also retiring as chairman of the boards of GWL and its subsidiaries, Great-West Life Assurance Co., London Life Insurance Co., Canada Life Assurance Co., Great-West Life & Annuity Insurance Co. and Canada Life Capital Corp. In all instances, McFeetors is replacing him.

“I’m changing roles,” McFeetors says. “Robert is retiring, so we had to decide what we were going to do. [Moving to chairman] seemed like the best option. It’s time to bring in some new blood and develop some younger people. It was an opportune time to make this transition.”

Moving up the ladder at GWL are Loney, who assumes the role of president and CEO of GWL and Canadian operating companies Great-West Life, London Life and Canada Life; Acton, who becomes president and CEO of Canada Life Capital Corp., the holding company for the European operations; and Mitchell Graye, who takes over the top job at Denver-based Great-West Life & Annuity. These are positions previously held by McFeetors.

McFeetors will spend much of his time working with the new CEOs and chief financial officers on the direction of the three divisions. He will also continue to have principal oversight of GWL’s investment activity as chairman of its investment committee.

McFeetors has few regrets about leaving his long-time post. “I’d like to be 16 years younger again,” he says. “It’s a long time to be on the job. I think a lot of good things happened in that period. I’m still going to be around for a while.”

Indeed, the GWL family of companies has grown from minor-player status in 1992 to an international juggernaut with a reputation for making significant acquisitions around the globe.

When McFeetors was promoted to CEO from head of investment operations and chief investment officer in 1991, GWL’s Canadian operations made a $48-million profit. Current forecasts call for that division to rake in more than $1 billion in the fiscal year ending Dec. 31, 2008; the entire company is expected to have net income of about $2.2 billion in 2008. In its first quarter alone, GWL reported net income of $654 million, a 27% jump from $514 million in the same period a year earlier.

There’s no question about the most important development during McFeetors’ tenure — the 1997 acquisition of London Life. The move cost $2.9 billion but, more important, signalled that GWL was staking out its turf in the insurance industry.

“It was the seminal event, not only in my time but in the history of the company, that made everything subsequent possible,” he says. “It was a huge transition for us at the time. We had learned a lot with our attempt to save Confederation Life in 1994. That didn’t work out by acquisition or merger, but we learned how to integrate and manage businesses.”

Loney, who joined Canada Life U.K. as an actuarial assistant in 1971, says his goal is to continue the momentum created under McFeetors’ watch. Loney has steadily moved his way up the corporate ladder, culminating in his appointment as executive vice president and chief actuary of GWL’s capital-management division in 2005.

“This has been an extremely successful company over the past 20 years,” Loney says. “We’ve grown to be a major player in the international insurance market. My plan is to ensure we maintain our place among the ranks of the leading insurance companies in the world. We have tremendous strength, and we have wide and deep product distribution. We’re No. 1 in virtually all lines of business in Canada. A lot of our strategy is about maintaining those strong positions and building on them.”

@page_break@Loney is reluctant to compare his management style with that of McFeetors: “Having worked at Canada Life for many years, I find myself very much in tune with the policies and strategies of the group. I won’t be planning to change things radically at all.”

The management changes do not appear to have rattled analysts. John Reucassel, an analyst with BMO Capital Markets Corp. in Toronto, has rated GWL’s stock an “outperform” and lists it as one of his top 15 income stock selections.

“We do not expect any change in strategic direction of the firm,” Reucassel wrote in a research report that was released shortly after the changes were announced. “Ray McFeetors will remain a very active chairman and the CEOs from the three geographies — Canada, U.S. and Europe — will all report directly to him. We recommend that investors maintain an overweighted position in [GWL].”

Tom MacKinnon, an analyst at Scotia Capital in Toronto, rates GWL as “sector outperform” with a low-risk ranking and one- and two-year share price targets of $38 and $43, respectively. The stock was trading in the $31-$32 a share range for much of the spring.

McFeetors, for his part, acknowledges that his career at GWL is winding down after 40 years.

“You can’t go on doing this forever,” he says. “I’ll be looking, over the next few years, to transition more completely away from it.” IE