Lead Platform Owner , New Business & Underwriting

Lead the planning, prioritization, and execution of platform initiatives, enhancements, and regulatory changes across New Business and Underwriting workflows.

Balance delivery commitments, regulatory requirements, and technical debt while maintaining reliable day-to-day operations.

Apply Agile delivery practices to improve predictability, transparency, collaboration, and continuous improvement.

Monitor platform performance, availability, incidents, and service health, partnering with support teams to address risks and resolve issues.

Establish and track platform key performance indicators, including application-to-issue cycle time, straight-through processing rates, underwriting productivity, quality, resiliency, and operational efficiency.

Drive continuous improvement through automation, observability, proactive monitoring, and the reduction of manual operational activities.

Serve as a strategic technology partner to New Business and Underwriting stakeholders, aligning platform delivery with measurable business outcomes such as cycle-time reduction, improved quality, and cost efficiency.

Collaborate with Product, Distribution, Underwriting, Operations, Compliance, and Risk partners to translate business needs into clear technology priorities and actionable delivery plans.

Provide clear, concise, and executive-ready updates on platform health, delivery progress, risks, priorities, and value realization.

Define and execute the platform’s artificial intelligence strategy, identifying opportunities to improve underwriting efficiency, decision quality, customer experience, and operational effectiveness through responsible adoption.

Partner with business, architecture, data, and risk teams to implement AI-enabled solutions, including underwriting decision support, evidence summarization, document intelligence, case prioritization, agent copilots, workflow automation, and predictive analytics.

Establish appropriate governance, controls, and monitoring for artificial intelligence capabilities, ensuring alignment with regulatory requirements, model-risk management standards, privacy obligations, and responsible AI principles.

Promote the adoption of AI-assisted software engineering practices across the platform team, including code generation, automated testing, documentation, quality assurance, and operational support.

Measure and communicate AI-driven business outcomes, including cycle-time reduction, increased straight-through processing, underwriting productivity, quality improvements, and cost efficiency.

Maintain awareness of emerging artificial intelligence technologies, industry trends, and vendor capabilities, translating relevant opportunities into practical business value.

Lead, support, and develop a team of full-stack and quality engineers responsible for the New Business & Underwriting platform.

Support workforce transformation and responsible adoption of artificial intelligence capabilities.

Manage team capacity and skills to support consistent, high-quality delivery.

Foster an inclusive environment that encourages ownership, accountability, collaboration, knowledge sharing, and continuous learning.

Manage relationships with platform vendors and delivery partners supporting the New Business & Underwriting ecosystem.

Establish clear expectations and hold vendors accountable for delivery quality, operational stability, and alignment with platform priorities.

Contribute to financial planning and investment prioritization for platform operations and change initiatives.

Ensure the platform aligns with internal technology standards, security requirements, data privacy policies, and applicable insurance regulations.

Define and track key performance indicators related to platform health, delivery performance, and business impact.

Partner closely with Architecture to support adherence to design standards, engineering best practices, and the appropriate use of automation.

We’ll empower you to learn and grow the career you want.

We’ll recognize and support you in a flexible environment where well-being and inclusion are more than just words.

As part of our global team, we’ll support you in shaping the future you want to see.

The role being advertised is an existing vacancy.

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 .

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 hr@manulife.com .