Rob Smale

Claims & Operations Director, Ageas Insurance

Biography

Married with 3 daughters, living in Hampshire. I started my working life as a mining engineer before joining the insurance industry in 1996.

I joined Fortis in 2003.

The Fortis Claims and Operations team numbers 900fte and looks after the claims, intermediary and partner policy servicing and Age Concern sales and service activities. This year we are working with TescoBank to create a claims department dedicated to the new joint venture between TescoBank and Fortis which starts trading at the end of 2010. We have also recently started a partnership with Aioi to provide motor insurance to Toyota GB customers.As Claims and Operations Director in a company selling insurance products via intermediaries and affinity partners one of my main preoccupations is to how to differentiate Fortis. The teams I lead aspire to, and achieve, ambitious levels of service and efficiency. We seek to do "stuff differently" and have created a distinctive “Fortis Claims and Operations Way.” Customers, intermediaries, affinity partners and suppliers confirm this distinctiveness. The key contributor to our distinctiveness comes from embedding processes that help us understand what it is like for customers to pull value from Fortis. My most admired company is Toyota despite their recent difficulties. The Fortis Claims and Operations Way has it’s roots in the Toyota Production System and we see Toyota’s recent plight as a timely reminder of how important it is to stick to what makes you good and not get distracted.

2011 will see Fortis become “Ageas”.

Tamas Braun

General Manager, IND UK

Biography

Tamas Braun is the general manager of IND (UK), a subsidiary of IND Group, a leading front-office technology provider in Europe. He has been involved in the industry for over 10 years and worked

for blue chip financial institutions in the UK and the Middle East such as JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Allied Irish Banks, Riyad Bank. He worked on numerous banking projects and gained

international experience with various companies. He now spends his time between London and the Middle East conveying IND Group’s philosophy of innovating online channels and turning them

into a popular, easy-to-use, revenue generating way of keeping in touch with customers and at the same time provide them an excellent banking experience.

Rob Smale

Claims & Operations Director, Ageas Insurance

Biography

Married with 3 daughters, living in Hampshire. I started my working life as a mining engineer before joining the insurance industry in 1996.

I joined Fortis in 2003.

The Fortis Claims and Operations team numbers 900fte and looks after the claims, intermediary and partner policy servicing and Age Concern sales and service activities. This year we are working with TescoBank to create a claims department dedicated to the new joint venture between TescoBank and Fortis which starts trading at the end of 2010. We have also recently started a partnership with Aioi to provide motor insurance to Toyota GB customers.As Claims and Operations Director in a company selling insurance products via intermediaries and affinity partners one of my main preoccupations is to how to differentiate Fortis. The teams I lead aspire to, and achieve, ambitious levels of service and efficiency. We seek to do "stuff differently" and have created a distinctive “Fortis Claims and Operations Way.” Customers, intermediaries, affinity partners and suppliers confirm this distinctiveness. The key contributor to our distinctiveness comes from embedding processes that help us understand what it is like for customers to pull value from Fortis. My most admired company is Toyota despite their recent difficulties. The Fortis Claims and Operations Way has it’s roots in the Toyota Production System and we see Toyota’s recent plight as a timely reminder of how important it is to stick to what makes you good and not get distracted.

2011 will see Fortis become “Ageas”.

Stuart Drew

Executive Vice President, Financial Services, HCL

Biography

Stuart is Executive Vice President for HCL Technologies. He is responsible for Financial Services in Europe and has global responsibility for the Insurance sector.

Prior to joining HCL Stuart was with Deloitte as Senior Director-Financial Services, where he was responsible for proposition development including an economic model for the depolarised market and engagements for enterprise cost reduction, revenue enhancement, offshore outsourcing and shared services

Stuart joined Deloitte after seven years at Prudential where he was a member of the Retail Board. Whilst at Prudential, Stuart was European board member and UK Chairman of LIMRA, the worldwide Financial Services trade association. Stuart has also served as non-Executive director with a UK quoted software services company

Following graduation from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne and prior to joining Prudential, he spent 15 years at Unisys where his last role was as UK board member and Divisional General Manager.

Outside of work Stuart is a central committee member of the English Speaking Union (ESU. He is married to Alice and they have two daughters. In his spare time he enjoys boating, playing Jazz guitar and is a keen tennis player.

Katrina Robson

Digital Manager for Social Media, Lloyds Banking Group

Biography

Katrina has developed her social media expertise and experience through roles in both the public and private sectors. Katrina currently works for Lloyds Banking Group and has specialized in developing social media strategy, best-practice and Twitter engagement that supports LBGs efforts to achieve their goals. She holds qualifications in both public relations and international politics, and has previously worked as a social media consultant to United Nations Volunteers, Bonn, Germany.

Pamela Day

Director of Customer Services, Just Retirement

Biography

Pamela Day is the Director at Customer Services at Just Retirement, the largest enhanced annuity provider in the UK. Since joining the Company in 1996, Just Retirement has continued to enjoy a reputation for excellence, achieving the Financial Services 5 Star Service Awards for a record 6 consecutive years and receiving an ‘Exceptional’ rating by Investors In Customers in 2011. Prior to her current role, Pamela spent 3 years as Head of Operations at Openwork Market Solutions, the IFA subsidiary of Zurich, and 3 years as Head of Business Architecture at Zurich Bank in Cheltenham. Her early career was with the Lloyds TSB Group with whom she worked for 8 years and held a number of branch and area management roles.

Tim Becker

Head of Client Solutions, eg Solutions

Biography

eg solutions plc is a back office optimisation software company that specialises in operations management solutions – delivering guaranteed improvements in operational performance and bottom line results.

Tim joined eg in October 2000 bringing with him a range of operational management experience built through 14 years working within the financial services industry.

Within his Banking career before joining eg provided extensive experience in operational management practices within sales, processing and call centre environments.   Tim was also responsible for leading the research, design and delivery of core operational management training and development solutions across a Retail Banking business.

Tim has a strong personal belief that managers within operations should be provided with consistent levels of support to help them understand what ‘good’ looks like in their role.  Since joining eg he has therefore been responsible for the design, launch and maintenance of professionally endorsed training programmes for Senior Managers; Team Leaders and Trainers.

A range of development solutions to help people improve on their overall effectiveness supports any training based requirements of a manager’s role. Tim has extensive experience in delivering a broad range of effective solutions from executive to first line manager level. He is also qualified in the use of a number of psychometric instruments and has experience in the development of role profiles and behavioural competencies together with the design of assessment centres.

Recent client projects include; The Co-operative Financial Services, Capita Life & Pensions, HBOS Financial Services, Legal & General – General Insurance, Wesleyan Assurance, Zurich Financial Services, Aviva, Legal & General – With Profits and Nationwide Building Society.

These clients have all implemented consistent operational management practices using eg operational intelligence^® software solutions across a wide range of business functions including Lending Operations; Collections; Servicing & Claims through structured training & development programmes.

Away from work Tim is a qualified Rugby Union Coach and is married with 3 children.

Rod Butcher

Head of Customer Experience and Insight, Aviva

Biography

Rod joined Commercial Union in 1987. In the early stages of his career he served in various roles in the marketing and product development. More recently he worked in the Group’s Corporate Office in a number of areas such as business development and corporate strategy as well as helping set up two internet ventures for the Group. Rod now leads the Customer Experience and Insight team in the global Head Office. Their focus is on building the differentiated Aviva experience, driven through the use of disciplines such as Net Promoter Score (since 2006) and customer journey mapping. His team is also responsible for embedding customer focus into the rhythm of the Group’s risk management and performance monitoring processes.

Rod Butcher

Head of Customer Experience and Insight, Aviva

Biography

Rod joined Commercial Union in 1987. In the early stages of his career he served in various roles in the marketing and product development. More recently he worked in the Group’s Corporate Office in a number of areas such as business development and corporate strategy as well as helping set up two internet ventures for the Group. Rod now leads the Customer Experience and Insight team in the global Head Office. Their focus is on building the differentiated Aviva experience, driven through the use of disciplines such as Net Promoter Score (since 2006) and customer journey mapping. His team is also responsible for embedding customer focus into the rhythm of the Group’s risk management and performance monitoring processes.

Tim Becker

Head of Client Solutions, eg Solutions

Biography

eg solutions plc is a back office optimisation software company that specialises in operations management solutions – delivering guaranteed improvements in operational performance and bottom line results.

Tim joined eg in October 2000 bringing with him a range of operational management experience built through 14 years working within the financial services industry.

Within his Banking career before joining eg provided extensive experience in operational management practices within sales, processing and call centre environments.   Tim was also responsible for leading the research, design and delivery of core operational management training and development solutions across a Retail Banking business.

Tim has a strong personal belief that managers within operations should be provided with consistent levels of support to help them understand what ‘good’ looks like in their role.  Since joining eg he has therefore been responsible for the design, launch and maintenance of professionally endorsed training programmes for Senior Managers; Team Leaders and Trainers.

A range of development solutions to help people improve on their overall effectiveness supports any training based requirements of a manager’s role. Tim has extensive experience in delivering a broad range of effective solutions from executive to first line manager level. He is also qualified in the use of a number of psychometric instruments and has experience in the development of role profiles and behavioural competencies together with the design of assessment centres.

Recent client projects include; The Co-operative Financial Services, Capita Life & Pensions, HBOS Financial Services, Legal & General – General Insurance, Wesleyan Assurance, Zurich Financial Services, Aviva, Legal & General – With Profits and Nationwide Building Society.

These clients have all implemented consistent operational management practices using eg operational intelligence^® software solutions across a wide range of business functions including Lending Operations; Collections; Servicing & Claims through structured training & development programmes.

Away from work Tim is a qualified Rugby Union Coach and is married with 3 children.

Pamela Day

Director of Customer Services, Just Retirement

Biography

Pamela Day is the Director at Customer Services at Just Retirement, the largest enhanced annuity provider in the UK. Since joining the Company in 1996, Just Retirement has continued to enjoy a reputation for excellence, achieving the Financial Services 5 Star Service Awards for a record 6 consecutive years and receiving an ‘Exceptional’ rating by Investors In Customers in 2011. Prior to her current role, Pamela spent 3 years as Head of Operations at Openwork Market Solutions, the IFA subsidiary of Zurich, and 3 years as Head of Business Architecture at Zurich Bank in Cheltenham. Her early career was with the Lloyds TSB Group with whom she worked for 8 years and held a number of branch and area management roles.

Andy Hendry

Chief Technology Officer, MatsSoft

Biography

Andy co-founded MatsSoft, a highly successful software company specialising in business productivity, workflow and communications. In the early pioneering days of MatsSoft, Andy was responsible for the design and implementation of the UK's first online mortgage application process, a system that was highly acclaimed, winning many awards for customer service. This early version of MATS (Multi Application Tracking Software) has since been adopted by several major financial institutions including RBS, Barclays, Santander and Nationwide Building Society. Andy is proud of the fact that around 40% of all UK mortgage applications go through a process that is driven by MatsSoft.

Under Andy's direction and inspirational leadership, the design team at MatsSoft have now developed variants of MATS that have been widely implemented across multiple sectors including the Insurance market, Local Government and Pharmaceuticals. 

Kirti Srivastava

Head of Operations & Service Delivery, Hiscox

Biography

Kirti joined Hiscox in August 2010 as Head of Operations and Service Delivery, from TalkTalk where she was heading the senior technical support and process excellence teams. She has worked in various roles to deliver superb service along with operational efficiency in various industries, from Telecoms to ISP, Finance and Insurance. In her BPO/KPO/Call centre career of 15 years she has been in various roles leading teams and business units that have been focused on driving excellence in Customer experience coupled with business growth. She has led and delivered influential change programmes as Tiscali acquired 6 ISP between 2007-2009, Outsource Partner selection process and finally Tiscali's sale to TalkTalk. Tiscali teams under her leadership bagged JD Power customer satisfaction survey award 2007.

At Hiscox she has been responsible for transforming Hiscox UK Direct (B2C) operations to deliver a world class service that lives Hiscox's brand value and philosophy. So far a fruitful journey...success is the only option...