From the bureau's night batch to the insurer's board papers

Mandate

Modernise new-business systems without putting the administration of older promises at risk, and give the board a defensible account of ICT and supplier dependencies.

Outcomes

• Renewed mainframe outsourcing for five years with a tested exit plan, accepting €3.0 million more than the ten-year offer
• Moved new unit-linked and pension business to a cloud platform from 2024
• Documented 214 legacy product variants and corrected €312,000 of credits for 2,140 policyholders
• Made multi-factor authentication mandatory for 1,900 broker portal users within nineteen days

Decisions in context

I inherited a department that ran well day to day but struggled to explain its dependencies. My first year went into a map of every system that touches a policyholder payment, who operates it and how we would recover or replace it. From that map came the separation of our estate into a cloud platform for new business and a mainframe ledger for closed books, and the three decisions described on this site. I work closely with the chief risk officer, the actuarial function and the data-protection officer. The executive committee sets priorities; my role is to show what each one would require and what it would leave exposed. I hold no directorship. The decision now in preparation, on the 2027 option in the outsourcing contract, will show whether the exit planning we paid for was worth its price.

Reason for the move

Current role; I would add one non-executive seat to it rather than leave.

Mandate

Make recovery arrangements and supplier oversight demonstrable rather than assumed.

Outcomes

• Rebuilt recovery tests to end with a business user completing a live transaction
• Created an evidence register for 31 material supplier contracts
• Reduced major incidents from fourteen in 2018 to five in 2020

Decisions in context

Operations and resilience made me responsible for what happens when things go wrong. I inherited recovery tests that ended once a server restarted, and changed them so each test finished only when an underwriter or claims handler had processed a real transaction on the recovered system. The first two tests under that rule failed, which was the point of the change. I also found that our supplier oversight rested almost entirely on monthly service reports. We built a register of thirty-one material contracts listing the evidence we held, the audit rights we lacked and the date each was last reviewed. That register later became the foundation of our DORA work. Major incidents fell from fourteen in 2018 to five in 2020, partly through better monitoring and partly by retiring two unsupported interfaces that failed repeatedly.

Reason for the move

Chosen to succeed the retiring chief information officer in April 2021.

Mandate

Prepare policy systems and data for Solvency II without destabilising the core ledger.

Outcomes

• Delivered Solvency II policy-data extraction and quarterly reconciliation without altering core programs
• Agreed about 120 data definitions with the actuarial function
• Launched the first quotation tool for tied agencies in 2015

Decisions in context

I came back to the Gemmaldi relationship as its customer, responsible for the application side of the life and pensions business. Solvency II defined those years. Actuarial and risk colleagues needed policy data in far more detail than our ledger had ever produced, and the safest route was to extract and reconcile it rather than change programs that had worked for two decades. We agreed about 120 data definitions with the actuaries before writing code, and reconciled the extracts to the ledger every quarter. I also led our first quotation tool for tied agencies in 2015, which showed me how strongly agents' working habits should shape a screen. My thirty-four colleagues worked beside the outsourcer's maintenance staff, and I learnt to manage a supplier through precise written specifications rather than through escalation and complaint.

Reason for the move

Promoted to lead IT operations and resilience.

Mandate

Replace manual placement records and reduce re-keying into insurers' systems.

Outcomes

• Replaced spreadsheets with a placement system recording each offer, insurer and reason
• Agreed structured data exchanges with nine insurers for common commercial lines
• Introduced individual accounts and a password manager for 280 account executives

Decisions in context

At Brescolani I became, for the first time, a customer of insurers' technology. Our account executives placed business with many insurers and retyped client details into each one's extranet. I led the replacement of spreadsheets with a placement system recording what we offered each client, from which insurer and why, which also helped the firm answer questions about advice given years earlier. I negotiated structured data exchanges with nine insurers, cutting re-keying on the most common commercial lines. The office habits I saw there stayed with me: shared desks, deadline evenings and passwords kept on paper. We introduced individual accounts and a password manager for 280 account executives, which proved far less popular than I had expected. I learnt that a security change succeeds only when the people asked to adopt it can see what it protects.

Reason for the move

Recruited by Corvelline to lead life and pensions applications.

Mandate

Specify and deliver changes to client insurers' life policy administration on the shared ledger.

Outcomes

• Led the migration of two insurers' life books onto the shared ledger
• Wrote the bureau's first product-rule specifications in business language
• Coordinated year-end revaluation runs for six client insurers

Decisions in context

As a systems analyst and later project lead, I worked on the life accounts of a bureau that administered policies for several insurers on one shared mainframe. I led the migration of two insurers' life books onto our common ledger, each with product rules that had to be preserved exactly. I began writing those rules as business specifications so that a client's actuary could confirm them, which was unusual at the bureau then. Each December I coordinated the revaluation runs for six client insurers, a fortnight in which every rule and every fund rate had to be right first time. The role showed me what a supplier understands about an insurer's obligations and what it never sees. That boundary is the one I now manage from the insurer's side, through contracts, documentation and rehearsed tests of our ability to leave.

Reason for the move

Moved to the client side of insurance technology at a broker group.

Mandate

Maintain and correct policy-administration programs for client insurers.

Outcomes

• Corrected revaluation logic after comparing code with policy conditions
• Remediated date handling in about 1,800 programs before the year 2000
• Supported the overnight batch for client insurers on a rota

Decisions in context

I joined Gemmaldi straight from university and learnt COBOL, CICS and DB2 on programs that administered other companies' savings policies. An early correction in 1997 taught me to check the policy conditions before the code, after I found a revaluation rule written for one product applied to another. Much of my later time went on preparing for the year 2000, reviewing and correcting date handling in about 1,800 programs across client systems. The work was repetitive but instructive: I saw how much of an insurer's knowledge existed only in code written by people who had since moved on. I supported the overnight batch on a rota and learnt what a failed run means for a client's staff the next morning. I had no direct reports and worked in an eight-person team under a development team leader.

Reason for the move

Promoted to systems analyst on the life-insurance accounts.