Ron Williams

Ronald Allen Williams (born 1949) is an American businessman and board director on corporate, public sector and non-profit boards. Williams is the author of Learning to Lead: The Journey to Leading Yourself, Leading Others, and Leading an Organization, which appeared on The Wall Street Journal's best seller list. He is founder, chairman and CEO of RW2 Enterprises, LLC. Williams is the former chairman, president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Aetna Inc.. Aetna is now part of CVS Health.

Following his retirement from Aetna, Williams formed RW2 Enterprises, LLC where he coaches and consults with senior corporate executives.

Business leadership
Williams serves on the board of directors of Boeing and Warby Parker. He previously served on the boards of Johnson & Johnson and American Express. He is an operating advisor to the private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice. (CD&R). He is chairman of the board of agilon health which launched in 2016 and is chairman of the board of apree health, formed by the combination of VERA Whole Health and Castlight.

Williams is chairman of The Conference Board and participates with the Committee for Economic Development (CED). In 2023, he began as a member of the McKinsey & Company External Advisory Group.

He previously served as vice chairman of The Business Council from 2008 to 2010 and chairman of the Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare (CAQH). He was an advisor to The Wall Street Journal CEO Council and a former member of the GE Healthymagination Advisory Committee.

Aetna leadership
Williams served as both chairman and CEO of Aetna until November 2010 and as chairman through April 2011. He also served as chairman of the Aetna Foundation from 2006 to April 2011. During his tenure, Aetna was named Fortune magazine's most admired Company in the Health Care: Insurance and Managed Care category for three consecutive years. In 2011, Aetna's revenues were $34 billion, and the firm ranked 77th on the Fortune 100 list.

Mr. Williams joined Aetna in 2001 and in 2002 was named president and joined Aetna's board. He was named CEO in February 2006 and chairman of the board in October 2006. In 2001, Aetna reported a net loss from continuing operations of $292 million and earnings per share loss from continuing operations of $0.46. In 2011, full-year operating earnings were $2.0 billion with operating earnings per share of $5.17 producing a 12.3 percent operating EPS CAGR over the last five years.

Public service
Williams chairs the Health Systems Initiative at MIT Sloan. He also serves on MIT's North America Executive Board.

In March 2011, Williams was appointed to the President's Management Advisory Board, which was assembled by U.S. President Barack Obama. He served in that capacity until 2017. He serves on the board of the Peterson Center on Healthcare board of advisors, the Peterson Institute for International Economics and the RAND Health board of advisors.

In 2013 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, an independent, multidisciplinary policy research center, and became a trustee of the Committee for Economic Development, a non-profit, non-partisan, business-led public policy organization.

Early business career
Prior to joining Aetna, Williams served as group president, and president of WellPoint (now Anthem), having joined WellPoint's predecessor firm, Blue Cross of California, in 1987. Previously, he was co-founder of Visa Health Corp. and group marketing executive of Control Data Corporation.

Education
Williams holds a Bachelor of Arts in psychology from Roosevelt University and a Master of Business Administration from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

External activities, awards and recognition
During his career, Williams has received media recognition and other awards including:


 * Modern Healthcare magazine's "100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare 2009"
 * Black Enterprise magazine's "100 Most Powerful Executives in Corporate America, 2009"
 * Institutional Investor magazine's 2009 "America's Best CEOs Health Care – Managed Care category"