Senior Manager, IT
Dar Al Takaful Insurance Company
Total years of experience :21 years, 10 Months
• Prior to joining here, I was servicing the insurance domain; here I got to be part of the domain itself.
• My primary responsibility has been to successfully manage the implementations of all software like Premia 10 Core, Online Insurance portals Collaborator and eBab, Motor Traffic Integrator etc.
Played significant roles in these major projects from requirements gathering and gap analysis to system implementation, user training, user acceptance testing, and live run support.
• Participate in developing Strategic Plans to optimize the use of IT in support of organizational objectives. Determine IT strategy which supports business objectives.
• Equipped with hands-on experience in directing the implementation of all initiatives & development projects.
• Adopt the project management processes (Initiation, Planning & Design, Execution, Monitoring and controlling, Project Closure) to drive various IT Projects.
• One of the major accomplishments has been to lead a successful implementation of fully integrated Premia10 core system, connecting the under writing, claims, reinsurance and accounts modules with each other. Even mapped the medical department’s products requirements in Premia.
• Currently leading the project for a revolutionary online Portal for various channels like B2B (Brokers /Agents, Banks, Rent a car companies, Fleet clients), B2C, In House employees. Objective is to automate the underwriting process for Motor and some other products by up to 70%.
Major Deliverables are 1) Online Motor Comprehensive & TP, Marine, Travel, Homecare, SME products. 2) Motor renewals 3) Motor commercial l & schemes 4) Referrals 5) Fleet certificates 6) Product configurator to launch new online products in quick timeframe. During requirements gathering and UAT stages, provided many useful inputs for this project which could not be envisaged by our business and underwriting teams.
• Spear headed the implementation of Online E-Commerce application Collaborator with great success.
Successfully led highly challenging projects for integrating the Motor underwriting functions with the systems of Abu Dhabi and Dubai Traffic authorities as per their regulatory requirements.
• Managing reports and MIS requirements through in house developments saving time and cost for company. Have developed a full fledge flexible reporting system for complete Portfolio analysis of all classes in many ways, produce Loss ratios using various factors including on IBNR & Earned basis, generate various MIS & RI statistics etc. Generate instant statistics for key management decisions.
• Approve, coordinate, and control all aspects related to selection, acquisition, development and implementation of IT software applications. Build relationships and liaise with vendors for various IT Projects.
• For new software requirements, study the business process and act as a bridge between our business department and vendor’s team for a successful UAT. My functional expertise helps in identifying gaps missed out by our departments. Prepare clear cut test scenarios with expected results based on FSDs, BRDs, RSDs etc.
• Manage all change requests. Using my vast experience in Premia, have provided many work around solutions saving cost & time. Prepare clear cut functional specification documents to ensure quality and timely delivery.
• Manage new setups in the applications and provide right mappings. Have written automated scripts to do quick configurations, enhancing the productivity of I.T team and reducing human errors.
• Have developed automated scripts for timely closing of month/year in system. Do regular health checks to identify discrepancies & take corrective actions. Have written many business rules to ensure data integrity.
• Conduct IT training's for new employees and existing users to be well versed with company’s IT applications.
• Led many Insurance Projects Implementations of 3i’s products Premia 10, Premia 9 and Premia 7 versions from scratch, having performed the role of a business analyst and consultant to execute the project as well as the role of a Project Manager to sort out issues/upsets with customers, negotiate terms and conditions for new requirements, communicate effectively with my senior management and back office.
• Demonstrated great interpersonal and leadership skills by leading the teams from the front to deliver maximum output within short span of times by making fairly small and less experienced teams deliver.
• Collaborated with onsite\offshore teams brilliantly to achieve aggressive deadlines by motivating them well to work cohesively. Utilized all resources on hand efficiently setting clear objectives to meet the Project’s goals.
• Did excellent planning and prioritization of the deliverables in the projects and coordinated wonderfully to close each phase of the projects successfully ahead of time spending less than the planned budget.
These were quite significant achievements on my part as the projects were huge with lot of complexities with order value of around $400K and required flexibility, excellent technical ability, the ability to work efficiently in a high-pressure environment on a deadline, and effective communication skills.
• Executed major & complex upgrade Projects for QIC and QIIC from Premia 7(P7) to Premia 10(P10) with lot of enhancements and new customizations. The customer had been using P7 for more than 5 years and many customizations were done locally and by 3i on top of the Base P7. The base p10 product was not having many of these base p7 features and customizations. So initially we had to spend lot of time & efforts to fill these gaps. The Project had a very tight schedule from beginning and involved a lot of deliveries due to so many gaps, migration, performance issues, and new customizations.
Migration was a major challenge due to 1) volume of data being huge 2) Migration tool being developed for the first time for this project 3) Customizations happening continuously in the application 4) Setups being changed regularly 5) Team size and experience was less. 6) P10 complex design being very different from that of P7.
• As a Business Analyst, studied the client’s business processes exhaustively to analyze all the gaps compared to the software. Using a good technical acumen mapped most of the client’s business needs in the software and avoided many customizations which benefitted the clients in terms of cost and time. Prepared clear cut functional specification documents for all customizations to be developed at back office.
• Led teams to set up entire applications in various projects. Wrote automated scripts to reduce setup times by 40% which were standardized to be used in other projects by my colleagues. This added cost benefits to new projects and reduce probabilities of human errors improving the overall quality of 3i’s implementations.
• Worked in a Life insurance project where my job was to identify\resolve the implementation issues in their Policy Underwriting, Claims, Withdrawals, Loans, Surrenders, Maturity and Accounts functions.
• Imparted system training to implementation core group members of insurance companies including managers & VPs. Was always appreciated by the trainees for my abilities to explain nitty-gritty of the subjects very clearly.
• Did database administration in the projects myself mostly. Went beyond the call of duty many times to play diversified roles in Projects avoiding any impact on project cost, schedule or quality.
• Developed many documents onsite myself avoiding the need of additional technical resources which saved cost.
• Arranged KT sessions to do unreserved knowledge transfers to the Clients IT Staffs .
Worked as a Programmer
G.M College, Sambalpur University: Bachelor in Computer Science, First Class Honors with distinction (83.5%), 2001. Topped the Class