DESCRIPTION: The Commercial Lines Manager is responsible for providing department-wide leadership for workflow improvement, operational efficiency, and underwriting quality governance across Commercial Lines. Reporting to the Vice President of Commercial Lines, this role supports all Commercial Lines Director teams and serves as a key leader in driving process modernization, increasing organizational capacity, and improving the underwriting experience for associates and agency partners.
A primary focus of this position is identifying, prioritizing, developing, and implementing workflow improvement initiatives that enhance efficiency, consistency, quality, and scalability across the Commercial Lines organization. The Manager collaborates with leaders across the department to streamline processes, eliminate inefficiencies, leverage automation opportunities, and improve overall underwriting effectiveness.
In addition, the Commercial Lines Manager is responsible for leading the Small Business Renewal Underwriting Team and providing leadership and direction to the Staff Underwriter position responsible for underwriting audits, compliance reviews, quality assessments, portfolio reviews, and large-loss analysis. The Manager ensures quality assurance findings are translated into meaningful training, coaching, process enhancements, and performance improvement actions across the organization.
RESPONSIBILITIES:- Lead the ideation, development, prioritization, and implementation of workflow improvement initiatives across Commercial Lines
- Partner with business leaders and support areas to improve efficiency, consistency, and underwriting capacity
- Champion process modernization, automation opportunities, and operational best practices
- Measure and communicate the impact of improvement initiatives through operational metrics and performance reporting
- Lead, coach, and develop the Small Business Renewal Underwriting Team
- Establish performance expectations and provide ongoing feedback, development, and accountability
- Monitor team results related to productivity, service, retention, and profitability
- Foster a culture of collaboration, continuous improvement, and customer focus
- Provide leadership and oversight of the Commercial Lines quality assurance program
- Direct the work and priorities of the Staff Underwriter responsible for audits, compliance reviews, and quality assessments
- Review audit findings, quality trends, and compliance observations to identify training, coaching, process improvement, and performance management opportunities
- Communicate results, recommendations, and emerging issues to the Vice President and Commercial Lines Directors while ensuring appropriate follow-up actions are implemented
- Other duties as assigned
QUALIFICATIONS:ESSENTIAL:- Demonstrated Commercial Lines underwriting expertise with a strong understanding of underwriting operations, workflows, and processes.
- Proven leadership experience with the ability to coach, develop, and influence associates and leaders
- Strong analytical, problem-solving, project management, and change management skills
- Ability to lead cross-functional initiatives and drive organizational change through collaboration and influence
- Excellent written, verbal, and presentation communication skills
PREFERRED:- Experience leading workflow redesign, operational excellence, Lean/process improvement, automation, or business transformation initiatives
- Professional insurance designations such as CPCU, AU, CIC, ARM, or equivalent
- Experience utilizing underwriting analytics, operational metrics, and data-driven decision-making to improve business performance
- Demonstrated success implementing process improvements that increased efficiency, quality, capacity, or customer experience
- Experience managing change initiatives across multiple teams or departments
- Advanced knowledge of Commercial Lines products, underwriting guidelines, and agency distribution models
