Director, Underwriting Automation

You are as unique as your background, experience and point of view. Here, you’ll be encouraged, empowered and challenged to be your best self. You'll work with dynamic colleagues - experts in their fields - who are eager to share their knowledge with you. Your leaders will inspire and help you reach your potential and soar to new heights. Every day, you'll have new and exciting opportunities to make life brighter for our Clients - who are at the heart of everything we do. Discover how you can make a difference in the lives of individuals, families and communities around the world.

Job Description:

The objective of this position is to provide leadership and guidance for all underwriting rules development activities in Asia to provide best-in-class customer experience and drive market-leading automation & efficiency gains for underwriting operations.

Major accountabilities

• Lead the implementation of Sun Life's Life & Health automated underwriting strategy by designing underwriting rules and maintaining them in our rules engine platform, including the design, specification, testing, and production stages.

• Identify and analyze the current rules and underwriting practices performed by the underwriters, evaluate the possibilities, and recommend the translation of rules into the Rule Engine in collaboration with the SMEs and other connected stakeholders.

• Design and implement required enhancements into the current end-to-end processes (journey), evaluating the feasibility of integrating capabilities developed by different areas of the Asia Regional Office and Country Operations such as predictive models, virtual underwriting, integration with medical clinics and devices to support real-time underwriting and ultimately personalized experience based on the customer's risk factors

• Build governance and best practices for Automated Underwriting following Sun Life standards and ensure that the underwriting rules development process follows the required governance approvals and aligns with the defined rules philosophy.

• Drive projects and initiatives related to automated underwriting with a focus on developing and maintaining the Sun Life Life underwriting rulebook in collaboration with the technical underwriting area, claims teams, medical research and insight area, data and analytics, predictive modeling, and other experts as required

• Develop and maintain documentation required for project implementation and also enable the tracking of rules and decision trees for further training, audit, and other purposes.

• Identify, analyze, and interpret essential risk factors and evidence to support underwriting assessment of life and health products to build a gold standard practice in automated underwriting rules.

• Support the country teams in developing and enhancing the Underwriting framework, which will define the standard components to be applicable across all customer segments, channels, and products to establish the Sun Life Omni-channel Underwriting Experience.

• Map underwriting requirements in collaboration with the technical underwriting area and case managers and translate these into underwriting rules to be implemented in the engine rules platform.

• Leverage data analytics knowledge and background to enable continuous improvement of the underwriting TAT (Turn-around-time) and accuracy of the decisions.

• Ensure consistency of underwriting decisions across different channels and underwriting methods to ensure and support the omni-channel underwriting experience.

• Conduct periodic audits on the automation and decision rules to ensure they are consistent with the internal Underwriting Manuals and Philosophy.

Specialized Skills:

• Solid understanding of Life & Health products, mainly around the new business and underwriting process

• Experience working with automated underwriting platforms, automated UW rule writing, and testing

• Strong knowledge of underwriting rules tools and decision trees existing in the industry

• Digital-driven mindset to design the underwriting rules automation integrated with digital capabilities across channels and platforms

• Good knowledge and understanding of Analytics and MI data and how they can support the automation of underwriting rules

• Strong knowledge of project lifecycles, ability to set milestones, understand the critical path, and prioritize activities

• Technical knowledge of process automation, the concept of turnaround time, and tools to design underwriting rules

• Experience in interpreting and working with data to identify and monitor enhancements

• Attention to detail, problem-solving, and decision-making abilities utilizing diplomacy, creativity, and sound judgment

• Excellent communication skills, including the ability to give clear, direct feedback, set clear expectations, and connect with people on a personal level

Education and Skills:

• Graduate or above

• At least 12-13 years of experience in Insurance and majority of the same should be in underwriting rules automation/rule design

• Experience in end-to-end journey design and process mapping across different business areas and technical systems

Job Category:

Posting End Date: