Michael Diekmann studied law and philosophy at Göttingen University in Germany.

In 1988, he took a job with Allianz as executive assistant to the head of the company's Hamburg office. In 1990, he assumed leadership of the Hamburg Harburg Sales office, and moved from Head of the Hannover office (1991) to Customer Relationship Manager in Munich (1993) to his role as member of the executive management, as well as Head of Sales for the region of North Rhine–Westphalia, in 1994.

In 1996, he moved to Singapore to lead the Allianz Asia-Pacific region. Two years later, he was given a seat on the Allianz management board and assumed additional responsibilities for Eastern Europe, Middle East, Africa and Group HR. Mr. Diekmann became the Head of all Allianz insurance businesses in the Americas in 2002. Since April 2003, he is the Chairman of the Board of Management and CEO of Allianz AG (since October 2006 Allianz SE).

Mr. Diekmann is a member of the board of Allianz Deutschland AG and Chairman of the Board of Allianz Global Investors AG. In addition to his responsibilities at Allianz, he is Deputy Chairman of the boards at Linde AG and BASF SE and a member of the board of Siemens AG. He also sits on the boards of Allianz France S.A. and Allianz S. p. A.