Head of Underwriting Platform

Serve as a Platform Owner for projects, applications and technologies within Protection New Business and Underwriting.  Directly support the overall Underwriting organization transformation by creating and delivering on the strategy for our Platform Modernization. Primarily responsible for driving large-scale change, fostering innovation, and ensuring operational excellence to position MassMutual and Protection New Business and Underwriting for speed, quality, and competitiveness.

Work as a strategic partner with business owners, project leaders, product managers, technology, and other stakeholders to lead the improvement of the Underwriting Products & Platform operating model. Works with partners across the enterprise to implement tools and processes that will support the strategies, optimize business processes, and enhance employee and customer experiences. Will be responsible for leading the transformation and change initiatives required to both stabilize and transform the product management target operating mode.

Job Description

As a Platform Owner, you will drive continuous improvement and stability to support our customer and employee experiences. To be successful, you will:

• Lead a team focused on delivering and improving the Underwriting Engine and Platform modernization
• Create, lead and evolve a strategy based on a long-term vision for the platform and needs of the organization
• Oversee the design and implementation of the platform’s architecture.
• Contribute to the broader, long-term New Business and Underwriting strategy and transformation, leading efforts to redesign underwriting processes and workflows.   
• Develop a roadmap to deliver on the desired target operating model, including processes and functions integral to the support of the Underwriting platform, focusing on increasing quality and speed.
• Advocate and lead the platform development team, partners, and stakeholders to make sure all are aligned around the strategy the product needs to be going on for success
• Create short-term and long-term goals, and make strategic decisions that will benefit the platform and the organization long-term
• Act as a liaison between Underwriting/New Business and other teams and advocate for necessary changes

• Maximize customer and business value by both creating a product vision and leading platform strategy in partnership with key stakeholders
• Translate customer and employee needs into actionable solutions with clear measurement mechanisms in service of business outcomes
• Leverages research and data-driven insights to identify opportunities, propose solutions, create, and maintain roadmaps, and improve performance
• Generates buy-in and facilitate cross-functional collaboration with a wide range of technical stakeholders.
• Prioritize features and enhancements against a prioritization framework
• Ensure development outputs meet business expectations by maintaining strong cross-functional relationships with technical and architecture teams
• Provide leadership to the change management process for the implementation of new Underwriting tools and processes aligned with the platform modernization.  
• Support Business owners and peers to align roadmaps
• Be sought as a key resource for resolution of unique or complex business problems
• Drives continuous improvement and efficiencies beyond own scope of responsibility

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Finance, Information Technology, or a related field.
• 10+ years’ experience leading large-scale projects and driving execution of complex technical work
• 5+ years’ experience managing business stakeholder relationships, analyzing relevant data, and delivering solutions in partnership with technical teams from ideation to execution to meet business needs
• Strong understanding and demonstration of Product Management and Platform Architecture
• Strong insurance and business acumen with a demonstrated ability to evaluate new business models and assess key assumptions
• Ability to drill down from the big picture to process details
• Ability to think strategically and develop and execute on strategy
• Strong leadership skills
• Ability to collaborate across diverse teams and organizations
• Experience in Agile methodologies and practices
• Must have excellent professional presentation skills, and the ability to interact and engage all levels of management/leadership

Preferred Qualifications:

• Life Underwriting Experience and in-depth knowledge of life insurance products, underwriting processes and regulatory requirements.
• Proactive Leader who enjoys solving complex problems and improving team processes
• Exposure to customer experience/user experience practices
• Proven ability to partner with cross-functional teams to design, configure, test, and deploy
• Demonstrated ability to work with external vendors
• Demonstrated ability to adapt to changing business priorities
• Experience with vendor management, RFPs, SOWs, and the procurement process
• This role can be remote for the right candidate.

MassMutual is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer Minority/Female/Sexual Orientation/Gender Identity/Individual with Disability/Protected Veteran. We welcome all persons to apply. Note: Veterans are welcome to apply, regardless of their discharge status.

If you need an accommodation to complete the application process, please contact us and share the specifics of the assistance you need.