Director, Product Initiative Lead, Life & Annuity Solutions

Director, Product Initiative Lead, L&A Solutions

Please note that we do not offer visa sponsorship for this position.

Company Summary

Come join one of America’s fastest growing insurance companies with a stable history of 175 years. At National Life Group (“NLG”), we offer a flexible work environment with opportunity for growth. As a mission-driven business, our promises are as important as the products we sell. We encourage our associates to live our values: Do Good. Be Good. Make Good.

Our mission extends beyond the insurance and annuities policies that we sell. Our cause is also to make the world a better place through grants from our charitable foundation, paid time for our employees to volunteer, environmentally sustainable and healthy work sites, and events that promote the work of nonprofits in our own backyard.

We invite you to explore what we have to offer and to join our cause.

Role Summary

This position sits in L&A Delivery Solutions and reports to the VP and Actuary, Product Portfolio Lead (PPL). This position is responsible for the end-to-end execution of the product development process once a product project moves out of initial viability and into deeper feasibility and execution. There may be several product initiatives in the Product Initiative Lead’s portfolio. This role will mainly focus on Life Insurance products, both bringing new products to market and enhancing existing capabilities as needed.

This position will work closely with the broader L&A Solutions product development team, Operations, Distribution/Field Leaders, IT, and others serving as a key connector between strategic vision and cross-functional delivery teams.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Collaborate with a diverse set of stakeholders in L&A Solutions, operations, IT, project management office, legal, marketing, finance, and distribution. The Product Initiative Lead (PIL) pulls in the right representatives to drive decision-making and resolve questions and issues as they arise.
• Accountable for the end-to-end execution of assigned product initiatives by ensuring clarity of scope, stakeholder alignment, and timely progression through all product development stages.
• The PIL is accountable for ensuring that the deliverable packages for each step in the product development process are prepared for the Decision Gates in a timely fashion and with the quality, completeness, and stakeholder alignment necessary to make the decision. This includes driving the creation and maintenance of the Document of Assumptions (similar to a Business Case) in partnership with L&A Product Development leads and other members of the Product committees.
• Presents content of deliverable packages to the committees to move product initiatives through the various stages of product development.
• Lead the planning and execution of workshops that bring together stakeholders to accelerate the design and definition of products in development. This includes defining workshop objectives, required inputs, key decisions, and expected outputs.
• Prioritize post-launch features and enhancements for initiatives and communicate rationale to key stakeholders.
• Continuously assess and share feedback on what is working well and what can be improved across the product development process; provide insights to the Product Portfolio Lead and Project Management team to support continuous improvement efforts.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree or an equivalent combination of education and experience
• Minimum 10 years of relevant experience with Life Products development
• Strong understanding of Life Insurance product design, development, and implementation
• Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional teams, influence stakeholders, and drive decisions in a matrixed environment.
• Has clear communication skills to be able to explain complex product topics to nontechnical audiences, ability to communicate to senior leaders and individuals at various levels in the organization. Ability to work with multiple stakeholders to understand and describe life insurance products and features.
• Self-motivated and results focused.

• Highly organized and detail-oriented, with the ability to manage multiple initiatives and workstreams against tight deadlines.
• Able to solve unique and complex problems that have an impact on the business. Strategic thinker with a customer focused and business mindset and the ability to balance short-term execution with long-term goals.
• Proficient in Microsoft Office suite
• All other duties as assigned.
• This position currently offers an onsite hybrid work schedule, with the expectation that you are in the office three days per week during onsite core days. Our current onsite core days are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. The work schedule type and core days are subject to change with advance notification and manager discretion.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with life insurance operations, product pricing, or product systems requirements and development.
• Experience working within a structured product development lifecycle or stage-gate process

• Experience with collaborative tools like Confluence, Jira, and/or Teams is a plus.

Benefits

• Your benefits start day one and are flexible and customizable to your and your family’s specific needs. Check out the BENEFITS of a Career at National Life!

The base compensation range represents the low and high end of the range for this position. Actual compensation will vary and may be above or below the range based on various factors including but not limited to qualifications, skills, competencies, location, and experience. The range listed is just one component of our total compensation package for employees.

Other rewards may include an annual bonus, quarterly bonuses, commissions, and other long-term incentive compensation, depending on the position. National Life offers a competitive total rewards package which includes: a 401(k) retirement plan match; medical, dental, and vision insurance; a company funded wellness account for director and below employees; 10 paid holidays; a generous paid time off plan (22 days of combined time-off for non-exempt employees and exempt employees have discretion in managing their time, including scheduling time off in the normal course of business, but in no event will exempt employees receive less sick time than required by state or local law); 6 weeks of paid parental leave; and 6 weeks of paid family leave after a year of full-time employment.

National Life is accepting applications for this role on an ongoing basis and the role remains open until filled.

National Life Group® is a trade name of National Life Insurance Company, Montpelier, VT – founded in 1848, Life Insurance Company of the Southwest, Addison, TX – chartered in 1955, and their affiliates. Each company of National Life Group is solely responsible for its own financial condition and contractual obligations. Life Insurance Company of the Southwest is not an authorized insurer in New York and does not conduct insurance business in New York. Equity Services, Inc., Member FINRA/SIPC, is a Broker/Dealer and Registered Investment Adviser affiliate of National Life Insurance Company. All other entities are independent of the companies of National Life Group.

National Life Group

1 National Life Dr

Montpelier, VT 05604

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