General Description

The AVP of Operations Transformation supports the conversion of function’s strategic priorities into tangible programs. It oversees and is accountable for driving the delivery of the Asia Digital transformation agenda and ambitions. This role works in close collaboration with Asia Segment countries and Regional leadership to support strategy development and ensure seamless execution of strategic Operations initiatives.

The successful candidate will partner closely with the Head of Operations Innovation, Transformation and Performance to deliver against Asia and Global Operations transformation strategies across all markets. The Lead will collaborate with Country COOs as well as technology, regional partners, marketing, distribution etc., as needed. 

Key responsibilities will include:

• Best Practices and Strategy Development
  • Support in development of strategic roadmap for operations transformation in Asia, ensuring alignment with both regional and global business goals.
  • Ensure consistent and optimized execution by provide strategic guidance to country teams on best practices from other markets.
  • Collaborate with country servicing and policy administration teams on deep dives, providing thought leadership and best practice experiences from other markets.
  • Develop and track strategies and support execution of initiatives to enhance customer experience and servicing efficiencies.
  • Partner with regional Product Owner (marketing team) and technology teams to deliver regional strategy and automation standards.
     
• Customer Experience and Data Analytics
  • Support in development of customer-centric strategies
  • Utilize data analytics to gain insights and enhance understanding of the customer across all value streams(BUY, Contact Center, Servicing, and Claims).

• Coordination and Execution
  • Liaison with other regional functions and country teams to ensure timely execution for initiatives -
  • Review progress with country teams, addressing any delays and issues, providing solutions for remediation or escalation as needed.
  • Review project progress and delivery expectations with countries, offering deep dives and suggestions to enhance straight-through processing with a focus on customer-driven outcomes.

• Reporting and Tracking
  • Support monthly reporting of initiatives to regional and global partners and committees.
  • Maintain a repository of all straight-through processing (STP) related initiatives and track/report progress.

• Support and Backup
  • Provide support and backup to regional Operations, Innovation, Transformation, and Performance leads

Individual Accountabilities:

• Strategic Planning: Develop and own the strategic roadmap for operations transformation
• Process Improvement: Lead process improvement projects and ensure timely execution with desired outcomes
• Technology Implementation: Oversee the evaluation and adoption of new technologies that drive operational efficiencies.
• Performance Metrics: Develop and maintain a dashboard of KPIs to track the success of transformation initiatives.
• Team Development: Mentor and develop the operations team, fostering a culture of continuous learning and improvement.

Shared Accountabilities:

• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Work collaboratively with other department heads and senior leadership to ensure alignment of transformation initiatives with overall business goals.
• Change Management: Partner with relevant departments to create and implement effective change management strategies.
• Stakeholder Communication: Collaborate with relevant departments to ensure clear and consistent messaging around transformation initiatives.

Problems / Challenges:

• Change management: Overcome resistance to new technologies or processes. Develop and implement effective change management strategies to ensure smooth transitions.
• Resource Constraints: Prioritize initiatives and manage limited resources, including budget, time, and personnel, to successfully execute transformation initiatives.
• Complexity: Manage the complexity and scope of large-scale transformation projects that may span multiple departments and functions.
• Alignment Across Departments: Ensure cross functional alignment and collaboration, , address potential conflicts or misalignments that may arise during projects.
• Data Management: Address challenges related to data quality, accessibility, and integration across systems.

Competencies/Knowledge:

• Familiarity with scaled agile practices.
• Obsessed with the customer; ability to drive value, working backward from the customer.
• An entrepreneurial spirit and comfort working within a rapidly changing environment and able to take sensible risks and decide to continue or discontinue direction based on data.
• Demonstrated experience in strategy development and execution in a customer/stakeholder-facing environment.
• A high degree of business acumen in the financial services sector, in addition to, demonstrated leadership experience, operating in a transforming multi location environment with the ability to work with multiple stakeholders.
• Demonstrated ability to develop strategies and tactics in collaboration with external (e.g., consultants) and internal partners (e.g., Business Units).
• Exposure and experience in such areas as strategy planning, agile, project management principles, lean and systems thinking, and change management.
• Demonstrated success at senior cross-functional project delivery involving cross-functional teams, stakeholders and business functions.
• Exceptional communications judgement and the ability to communicate effectively at all levels with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Confident presentation and facilitation skills and strong interpersonal and leadership skills to facilitate working with senior management at all levels.
• Strong analytical skills and ability to deliver actionable recommendations based on analysis. Ability to translate analyses, using mediums to drive comprehensible recommendations (e.g., dashboards, graphics, summaries, etc.).
• Superior communications skills (oral, written and presentation).
• Strong analytical skills to quickly analyze external stakeholder requirements, determine key issues, and prepare and implement clearly defined solutions and/or responses.

Qualifications/Education

• Bachelor’s degree in business administration, economics, or equivalent.
• Master’s Degree in Business Administration or Science, or other advanced degree and/or executive certifications preferred.
• At least 10 years relevant experiences in actuarial / product development / product pricing / strategy / finance in the insurance industry (life insurance preferred)
• Self-motivated, independent with minimal supervision and excellent interpersonal skills
• Execution focused with a keen problem-solving mindset
• Proven track record to demonstrate strong ability to connect well with peers and interact very successfully with senior business stakeholders and regional functions as required
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills

Personal and leadership competencies required include:

Energize

Sees change as an opportunity – to learn, grow, and excel. Capitalizes on agility, adaptability, resiliency and an “always learning” growth mindset. Encourage curiosity, creativity, and establishes psychological safety and trust for the team to share freely test and learn.

• Role-models effective verbal and written communication, demonstrating poise, projecting authenticity and credibility.
• Inspires and connects with a range of audiences through storytelling, sharing personal experiences, and delivering meaningful messages aligned to the organization vision and strategy.
• Helps shape the image of the organization through influence and interaction with a wide range of internal and external audiences.
• Can navigate self and others through times of transformation, with excitement and enthusiasm.
• Looks for and champions new ways of working to enable easier, faster, more reliable experiences for our employees and customers.

Connect

Creates trust, embrace growth, and nurtures connections. Relies on team and collaborates with others to produce the outcomes our customers deserve. Removes silos to find the right person with the right skillset. Demonstrates tact and bravery to have the necessary difficult conversations to help people grow and excel. Rally people around a shared goal, to drive results for customers, colleagues, and shareholders.

• Fosters a spirit of teamwork and strategic partnership across the organization, bringing the organization together around a common purpose to advance business strategy.
• Enables leaders to build connections for their teams, connecting employees with other employees, experts or resources to foster collaboration and to produce superior outcomes.
• Promotes a positive and engaged work environment where continuous learning, coaching, and feedback are an integral part of the culture.
• Can effectively coach others and actively sponsors opportunities for leaders to build coaching and mentoring capabilities.
• Ensures that talent development is one of our strategic priorities and works with leaders to make the right talent investments to achieve our organizational objectives.

Excel

Accountable to both the company and their teams for meeting and exceeding expectations. Applies global industry trends to our customer solutions. Possesses superior business knowledge and understanding of our global business, and is also organized, clear on their priorities, and transparent in their actions with others. Can articulate the goal and the steps needed to get there, while also trusting people to do their jobs and empowering teams to make decisions to get things done.

• Creates a compelling vision and sets goals with longer-term objectives and implications for the organization in mind.
• Champions a results-oriented organizational culture and motivates others to strive for meaningful impacts for the organization.
• Utilizes business and technical knowledge to educate others and help them connect the dots between decisions, actions, and impact on business results and customer engagement.
• Translates understanding of the economic or business climate and the organization’s priorities to assist teams in structuring and prioritizing work.
• Fosters an environment where others are empowered to make effective decisions and takes action. 
• Owns the outcome and will make difficult business and people decisions when required.
• Encourages open discussion for timely identification of risks, and coaches and models risk-aware behavior and ensures appropriate resources are in place to properly manage risks for my business/function and for the organization.

About Manulife and John Hancock

Manulife Financial Corporation is a leading international financial services provider, helping people make their decisions easier and lives better. To learn more about us, visit https://www.manulife.com/en/about/our-story.html.

Manulife is an Equal Opportunity Employer

At Manulife/John Hancock, we embrace our diversity. We strive to attract, develop and retain a workforce that is as diverse as the customers we serve and to foster an inclusive work environment that embraces the strength of cultures and individuals. We are committed to fair recruitment, retention, advancement and compensation, and we administer all of our practices and programs without discrimination on the basis of race, ancestry, place of origin, colour, ethnic origin, citizenship, religion or religious beliefs, creed, sex (including pregnancy and pregnancy-related conditions), sexual orientation, genetic characteristics, veteran status, gender identity, gender expression, age, marital status, family status, disability, or any other ground protected by applicable law.

It is our priority to remove barriers to provide equal access to employment. A Human Resources representative will work with applicants who request a reasonable accommodation during the application process. All information shared during the accommodation request process will be stored and used in a manner that is consistent with applicable laws and Manulife/John Hancock policies. To request a reasonable accommodation in the application process, contact [email protected].

Hybrid