INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT – INSURANCE (Part 3)
We pride ourselves on supporting clients across a wide range of industries. Recently TGG Decision Insights and Data Services Manager, Ande Olson completed an engagement with a national insurance provider supporting an actuarial transformation initiative. Below is the third part of our industry spotlight, highlighting the type of impact our team makes in the insurance industry.
Can you give us an overview of the situation and scope of the client engagement?
Absolutely. Historically in the area of actuarial science over the last 30 years, a lot of work has been Excel based. The result is that actuaries often spend a lot of time copying work books, data tabs, and other tedious and inefficient steps.
Our client was trying to modernize how actuaries execute their responsibilities, complete their work, and identify elements of the workflow that could be automated across the enterprise. At the highest level, the goal was to free up actuaries’ time from tasks that can be automated in order to increase the actuary team’s opportunity and ability to provide strategic guidance to the enterprise. To get there, they recognized they needed to make not only process changes but technology changes as well.
How did you approach the work effort needed to support the organization’s goals for the project?
Actually, when I initially started working with the client I was brought in to work on a completely different project involving cloud automation and cloud tools. In meetings I learned the client was strategically looking at how the next generation of the organization would operate, with a focus on high performance and efficiency.
I offered additional support on this initiative as well because I have direct experience with the tools they were considering creating and implementing. It all started with a curiosity and desire to help the client in any way possible.
What was the work you actually did?
The first step was working with the project stakeholders to understand the vision and help shape the path forward so we could develop a proof of concept to show that a lot of the inefficient actuary work processes could be automated.
A big milestone in the project was when we built the back and front-end of the web application. We designed the application and I led a team actuarial developers to build the tool.
What was the outcome? How is it helping the organization now? In the future?
The initial release of the application is already helping actuaries efficiently valuate liabilities and assess claims impacts. Further releases will help price products and aid with long-term financial planning for the business.
Looking at it from just a time and value perspective, the processes we’ve automated previously took a team of two actuary modelers three days each to complete, but with the work we’ve done it’s been reduced to 4-5 hours.
The client is already experiencing an incredibly large efficiency gain, which allows the organization to more conveniently and effectively shift resources across business units when needed. As a result of the project’s early impact, we’re in the process of expanding the application beyond its current functionality, which is really exciting!
Were there any personal takeaways or highlights?
The work required on this project was about more than just delivering a great tool; it was about people, placing a premium on shared communication, and understanding a common vision and purpose. I was working on the business side of the organization but the engagement required a strong working relationship with IT, so building bridges and collaborating on the vision was critical for the progress and success of the project.
Another highlight throughout the project was how we constantly evaluated, refined, and maintained an agile approach. I wanted to lean into an agile team mindset where we were continuously delivering value and iterating on the project. I think this approach was key to the overall impact of the engagement.
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Our team at The Gunter Group has significant and strategic experience supporting insurance industry clients as they navigate transformational change. If your organization is interested in driving meaningful change in the insurance industry and beyond, we’re ready to help.
Industry Spotlight – Insurance (Part 1)
Industry Spotlight – Insurance (Part 2)
TGG CULTURE IN ACTION:
INCLUSION AND FLEXBILITY
At the beginning of 2023, we implemented a new paid holiday policy at The Gunter Group: we changed all our paid holidays to “floating holidays” so that our team can choose to celebrate the holidays that mean the most to them.
The genesis of our decision started last year when a team of our consultants came forward to the leadership team with an idea for a “Day of Service” for the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday. At the time, our holiday policy included 7 paid company-defined holidays plus one “floating” holiday, which could be used on any day during the year.
The team that brought forward the idea about the Day of Service also asked the question of whether the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday should be one of our “official” holidays. This led to a much deeper discussion about not only our holiday policy, but also Inclusion. In other words, how could we make it so that our policy on holidays would be fully inclusive and reflect our core values and Culture as an organization? Why should the company dictate that employees take off Christmas Day versus Yom Kippur, Diwali or days during Ramadan? Or New Year’s Day instead of Chinese New Year? Maybe the discussion about whether to observe a particular holiday was missing the point.
Our point of view is that Inclusion is not about a particular holiday, it’s about all of them. This is what led us to change our company policy so that TGGers can decide which days to observe based on what is most meaningful to them and their families.
Back to the Day of Service on the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday: a large team of TGGers and their families came together to assemble and deliver 35 Sack Lunches, 20 Winter Kits, and 44 Hygiene Kits to the Blanchet House in Portland, an organization that supports people experiencing homelessness and that is “On a mission to alleviate suffering and offer hope for a better life by serving essential aid with dignity”. I am super proud of the team and the support they provided to such an amazing organization.
At The Gunter Group, we strive to create an environment to support our consultants, clients, and communities such that each can achieve excellence, realize their full potential, and thrive. We live by our Non-Negotiables: Collaborative, Integrity, Intellectual Curiosity, Thrives in Ambiguity, Emotional Intelligence and Grounded Confidence. Our Non-Negotiables reflect who we are and who we will continue striving to be. We value engagement and creative ideas from our team, and we are always working to make TGG a better and better place to work!
INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT – INSURANCE (Part 2)
We pride ourselves on supporting clients across a wide range of industries. Recently one of our Senior Consultants completed an engagement with a large national insurance provider supporting a data integration and data vendor implementation initiative. Below is the second part of our industry spotlight, highlighting the type of impact we make in the insurance industry — featuring the work of TGG’s Frank Gleason.
Can you give us an overview of the situation and scope of client engagement?
Frank: Our client was trying to implement a data integration and connection project, and independently started the project early last year. However they weren’t making the progress they hoped or needed, and the initiative was stalling and losing momentum. The client brought us in, stating a strategic deadline for the project. The initiative, which involved both an internal team and an external vendor, was closely tied to business objectives, so there was a high need for clarity, planning, and a detailed timeline.
How did you approach the work effort needed to support the organization’s goals for the project?
Frank: The first thing I did was facilitate conversations with the business to identify and prioritize the actual requirements for the project and work effort. It was critical to develop clarity and responsibilities for the internal team, and drive alignment with the external vendor’s role and work effort. In order to reset and restart the initiative, and meet the organizational deadline, we had to build a focused, realistic, and accountable plan to get the project done.
After gaining foundational knowledge about the current status of the project, it was clear to me that each stakeholder would benefit from seeing and understanding how they were important to the overall work effort and business goals. To support this I went through each requirement of the data integration with the client team and prioritized the requirements based on the best value opportunity for the organization’s strategy and timeline. From there I created a detailed project roadmap that involved the internal IT team and the external vendor team. This additional step was critical to the project because it aligned and connected the two groups that were vital to the integration’s success.
What was the outcome? How is it helping the organization now? In the future?
Frank: The client wanted to reduce the amount of time needed to onboard new customer groups’ data sets in order to accurately and efficiently begin the billing process. Previously the process was done manually, which resulted in delays. The project reduced manual steps and created a streamlined process. Additionally, the initiative resulted in cleaner reports for the client throughout the process. These reports also built value for future-state planning analysis. In the future this work will help the client scale faster as the organization grows and builds out new partnerships and onboards a greater number of customer data sets.
What did you enjoy about the work?
Frank: I really enjoyed the people I was able to work closely with from the client organization and the external vendor. It was great to have the opportunity to work with both the IT team and the business team with such frequency and help move the teams and organization towards their goal. It was rewarding and motivating to serve as a bridge, if you will, and not only focus on a single part of the organization.
Were there any personal takeaways or highlights?
Frank: It was a great group of people and we worked hard to keep engagement high with the different stakeholders in a positive and collegial style. We maintained a great balance of a fun and timeline focused project which made the process even more rewarding.
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Our team at The Gunter Group has significant and strategic experience supporting insurance industry clients as they navigate transformational change. If your organization is interested in driving meaningful change in the insurance industry and beyond, we’re ready to help.
INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT – INSURANCE (Part 1)
We pride ourselves on supporting clients across a wide range of industries. Recently members of our team completed an engagement with a large national insurance provider supporting multiple strategic initiatives. Below is an industry spotlight, highlighting the type of impact we make in the insurance industry — featuring the work of TGG’s Maddie Barbera and Daemon Heydon.
Can you give us an overview of the situation and scope of the client engagement?
Maddie: Our client partner was looking to streamline their organizational teams in order to better handle strategic actuarial modeling work across their product lines. Accomplishing this would also allow specific actuaries to focus on responsibilities that drive high level strategy and are more transformational to the business.
Originally the project sponsors thought they could have internal conservations and build everything out themselves but they realized there was more depth, detail, and complexity than they anticipated, so they requested additional support and expertise.
Daemon: The client identified that actuarial teams were each doing modeling, but the process being used in order to map out the modeling was being done differently by each team. Each of the models was also highly complicated in its own right and as a result of these two dynamics the client needed a language and continuity that wasn’t there at the time. We were focused on creating a bridge to span all the modeling teams so that anyone from any team could look at a process map and understand its various elements and information. Essentially creating a language for the organization that wasn’t there before.
What was the nature of the work that took place during the engagement?
Maddie: We started with an in-depth review of the current process map for actuarial modeling and templates, which was supported by a series of interviews and multiple meetings for each process map model within the organization. We were at the table working with highly talented professionals to help articulate their work and process in a way that other members of the organization could understand. And then taking it a step further by creating documentation for different groups if the needed documentation didn’t already exist.
Daemon: In a very consistent manner we were gathering data – inputs, process steps, outputs, and bringing to life a clear description of what team members were doing at each step in the different processes. We also wanted to help position leadership to be able to answer the broader question, “How can we continue to use this information to make strategic decisions in the long run?”
What was the outcome? How is the end result helping the organization now? In the future?
Maddie: During the engagement we collected and aggregated all the information the client needed in order to support their upcoming organizational redesign efforts. Furthermore, we summarized all the different documentation sources and created an easily accessible universal catalog source to centrally house necessary documents and process information for a variety of groups within the organization. These completed work streams will help position the organization to successfully undertake and execute their broader organizational redesign effort.
What did you enjoy about the work?
Maddie: I enjoyed working with the large cross section of actuaries and how it gave our team insight into different insurance product lines. It was great to be able to work with so many different members/groups of the client team and learn about their roles and responsibilities and how they impacted the organization as a whole.
Daemon: I definitely agree with Maddie and I’d also say it was really fun and rewarding to have other groups in the organization hear about the process modeling work we were doing and then want to see if it could apply to their specific area.
Were there any personal takeaways or highlights?
Maddie: I think a big highlight was getting deep into a multi-layered process within an organization and gaining and building trust with the client partner.
Daemon: Yes, and also being able to deliver something that will provide tangible benefit to the future of the organization was certainly a highlight as well. It’s always fun when clients immediately want to build off of a completed project.
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Our team at The Gunter Group has significant and strategic experience supporting insurance industry clients as they navigate transformational change. If your organization is interested in driving meaningful change in the insurance industry and beyond, we’re ready to help.
TGG PARTNER Q&A:
2022 CONSULTING MAGAZINE BEST FIRMS TO WORK FOR
This fall The Gunter Group was recognized as a “Best Small Firm to Work For” by Consulting Magazine for the fourth consecutive year. This marks the fourteenth workplace award that TGG has received in the last eight years.
We visited with TGG partner and head of TGG’s Nevada team, Tony Schweiss to hear more about the award and the significance of being honored nationally for The Gunter Group’s culture and workplace.
This is the fourth consecutive year TGG has been recognized as a Best Small Firm to Work For by Consulting Magazine. What does this consistency and recognition mean to the team?
Tony: It’s a reflection of the amount of effort, energy and thought that we put into building a team that is aligning its culture to the work that we do and the outcomes we are trying to deliver as a team. It’s also a reflection of the caliber of people that we have on our team and the commitment our team has to do high quality work for our clients, to support each other, to collaborate and live out our Non-Negotiables, and hold ourselves accountable.
The consistency, year-in and year-out is amazing and is incredibly exciting in terms of the ongoing acknowledgement of the effort we put into our culture on a yearly, monthly, weekly, daily basis and I think everyone on the team should be really proud of it.
Not only has The Gunter Group’s team grown geographically over the past 24 months but the location of clients has been broadening as well. How does the Consulting Magazine honor validate these geographic developments?
Tony: For us it is an essential priority that as we expand as a company and our footprint grows, that we stay culturally committed to what makes us a great team. The pursuit of excellence and the goal over time to create an engaged team no matter where they are, has been a driving requirement for us as we grow.
To be recognized for this award four years in a row as we continue to grow geographically proves that it is possible to create highly engaging cultural value as we scale up as a firm. The recognition also validates the effort and resources we have dedicated to our team and organization, and serves as a celebration opportunity as well.
You are located in Nevada, what is it like for you to work with individuals across the country in different hubs/areas and how does TGG develop and maintain its strong organizational culture with geographically dispersed team members?
Tony: For me, I think it’s really exciting to work with team members from so many different areas. Whether it’s the Denver area, Southern California, the Salt Lake City area, the East Coast, or the Pacific Northwest, the variety of experiences and perspectives that generate from a collection of unique locations is exciting to be a part of and see benefit our client partners.
It’s been fun to experience but also presents a challenge: how do we maintain the value of our culture in a more virtual environment and dispersed geographies.
Having been geographically removed from our main hub for a while now, the best version of an engaging team and workplace is one that is aligned in terms of its goals and mission as an organization. And for us it’s about helping our clients achieve their goals in a way that is better and faster than what they could have done on their own.
I think it’s helped bring into focus opportunities for engagement with each other and how we’re doing our work but also how we are connecting as a team. It has forced us to try new things, evaluate quickly and then double down on methods that have really added to our cultural foundation across multiple geographies. As much as possible we continue to utilize not only virtual opportunities to engage with teammates but also encourage our local teammate hubs to spend time together in person and support that activity from an investment perspective.
What are you most excited about for the TGG team and culture in the coming year?
Tony: At the end of the day we’ve grown a lot over the last 3-4 years and we’ve grown purposefully so that our team has new and interesting opportunities in the future. As we grow we have to continue to be thoughtful about how we do our work internally, engage and connect with one another, how we collaborate, and how we deliver our work as a team.
What I’m really excited about over the next year is to continue to mature how our employee experience presents itself and matures across geographies so we can ensure a great professional opportunity for our entire team regardless of where they are located. I think it’s the most crucial work we have in front of us but it will also be the most rewarding for our entire organization in the months and years to come.
OUR NON-NEGOTIABLES:
A LOOK BACK
A year and a half ago, we introduced a blog series on our company’s Non-Negotiables. At TGG, our Non-Negotiables are six traits and characteristics that guide us in our everyday interactions with each other, our clients, and our communities. They are the pillars on which we have built, and will continue to build, the company.
The Non-Negotiables came about in a particularly organic way. We did not sit down in a “strategy session” to “identify our Non-Negotiables”. They came about naturally as we thought about the values that are important to us, how we wished to create, cultivate and maintain relationships, our culture, and most importantly….the traits and characteristics we saw really successful TGGers demonstrating. The Non-Negotiables became an articulation of how we were already living.
Our Non-Negotiables are reflected not only in our day to day interactions, but in our recruiting, our professional development, and our feedback process. They are our framework for holding ourselves accountable in our work and relationships, and it is our greatest point of pride that our team consistently reflects them.
Our six Non-Negotiables are:
- 1. Collaborative
- 2. Integrity
- 3. Intellectual Curiosity
- 4. Thrives in Ambiguity
- 5. Emotional Intelligence
- 6. Grounded Confidence
When we began this blog series, we asked different members of our team to write each of the six blogs, and we are really proud of how they turned out. The authors reflect a group of individuals with different backgrounds, varying years of experience (and time with the company), diverse perspectives, and different working styles. We also sat down and filmed the historical context of our Non-Negotiables and how they guide our focus as we grow our firm.
Little did we know that half way through this blog series, we would find ourselves in the middle of not only a global pandemic, but also significant societal upheaval in the ongoing fight for equity, inclusion and racial justice.
We knew how our Non-Negotiables guided us in “normal” times, but how would they hold up in such uncertain and stressful times?
The answer is that we have relied upon them even more heavily. We focused on taking care of and supporting each other (Integrity, Emotional Intelligence). We engaged even more deeply, and in many cases with more flexibility and an even stronger sense of service, with our clients (Thrives in Ambiguity, Intellectual Curiosity, Collaborative, Grounded Confidence). We also revamped our recruiting and evaluation processes to further embed these characteristics and traits (all six).
We believe the increased level of depth and focus on our Non-Negotiables has been motivating and rewarding for our entire organization. It has also furthered our commitment to putting people and culture first in times of prosperity and uncertainty alike.
Our Non-Negotiables continue to be the most accurate representation we have of our company’s culture. They reflect who we are and who we will continue striving to be as we build our team and company.
We hope you have enjoyed this blog series as much as we have enjoyed sharing it. We encourage leaders and teams to think critically about the aspirational and lived culture you desire for your organization and orient everything around bringing it to life.
About the Author:
Mike is passionate about client service and leading people. He enjoys watching people grow, develop, and discover their true path. Mike is a visionary and forward thinker with extensive multinational experience and a proven track record of serving clients. With more than 25 years of business leadership and consulting in a wide variety of challenging and ambiguous environments, Mike got his start in the industry at Deloitte Consulting and has since held executive leadership positions in consulting, supply chain services, and public education organizations.