Director, Insurance Product Management

Company Description:

Aspida is a tech-driven, nimble insurance carrier. Backed by Ares Management Corporation, a leading global alternative asset manager, we offer simple and secure retirement solutions and annuity products with speed and precision. More than that, we’re in the business of protecting dreams; those of our partners, our producers, and especially our clients. Our suite of products, available through our elegant and intuitive digital platform, focuses on secure, stable retirement solutions with attractive features and downside protection. A subsidiary of Ares Management Corporation (NYSE: ARES) acts as the dedicated investment manager, capital solutions and corporate development partner to Aspida.  For more information, please visit www.aspida.com or follow them on LinkedIn. 

Who We Are:

Sometimes, a group of people come together and create something amazing. They don’t let egos get in the way. They don’t settle for the status quo, and they don’t complain when things get tough. Instead, they see a common vision for the future and each person makes an unspoken commitment to building that future together. That’s the culture, the moxie, and the story of Aspida.

Our business focuses on annuities and life insurance. At first, it might not sound flashy, but that’s why we’re doing things differently than everyone else in our industry. We’re dedicated to developing data-driven tech solutions, providing amazing customer experiences, and applying an entrepreneurial spirit to everything we do. Our work ethic is built on three main tenets: Get $#!+ Done, Do It with Moxie, and Have Fun. If this sounds like the place for you, read on, and then apply at aspida.com/careers. 

What We Are Looking For: 

The Director, Insurance Product Management is responsible for the execution and delivery oversight of internal insurance systems and operational capabilities that support annuity insurance. This role partners with business, technology, operations, actuarial, compliance, data, finance, and vendor teams to help shape insurance systems strategy and vision, and to ensure roadmaps are executed effectively, priorities are managed across teams, and delivery outcomes are achieved.

This role directs execution across the full portfolio of insurance systems areas, including roadmap management, stakeholder coordination, prioritization, requirements oversight, backlog management, delivery partnership, business readiness, and continuous improvement. The role is accountable for the day-to-day management of a team of Product Managers, ensuring consistent execution, timely delivery, and resolution of cross-team dependencies across core administration, servicing, workflow, document, data exchange, and related insurance systems capabilities.

The team supports a range of internal applications, including Policy Administration, Voice, Client Ticketing, Document Generation, and Secure Transfers. This role requires a deep understanding of the insurance industry and how these systems support critical business functions, along with the ability to manage execution across multiple concurrent insurance systems initiatives.

The ideal candidate is a hands-on, execution-focused leader who thrives in a fast-paced environment, can manage a portfolio of concurrent initiatives through their team, and is comfortable navigating complex operational, technical, and organizational challenges. This role requires strong communication skills, a high degree of ownership, and the ability to coordinate and drive alignment across internal and external teams, including partnering with business leaders to inform insurance systems strategy and direction. Experience with policy administration systems, financial services systems, insurance operations, and managing product management teams is strongly preferred. This position reports to the VP of Technology and is required to be onsite 3 days a week at our Durham, NC headquarters.    

What You Will Do:

• Manage execution of the roadmap across all assigned insurance systems and operational capability areas, ensuring priorities are delivered on schedule and issues are resolved quickly. 
• Manage, coach, and hold accountable a team of Product Managers, overseeing their day-to-day work on roadmap execution, stakeholder management, prioritization, and delivery. 
• Partner with stakeholders across Operations, Actuarial, Accounting, Compliance, Distribution, Technology, Finance, Data, and external vendors to coordinate priorities, resolve cross-system dependencies, and keep delivery on track. 
• Work with business teams and leaders to inform insurance systems strategy and vision for assigned areas, ensuring execution stays aligned with evolving business direction. 
• Oversee discovery and requirements-gathering efforts across the portfolio, ensuring teams surface and address operational pain points, exception paths, downstream impacts, and automation opportunities. 
• Review and approve how business needs are translated into product requirements, business rules, workflows, acceptance criteria, and delivery-ready backlog items across teams. 
• Own day-to-day tradeoff decisions across new capabilities, pre-committed servicing needs, operational defects, vendor constraints, technical debt, staffing/resourcing, and business readiness. 
• Provide direct oversight of backlog refinement across insurance systems and capability areas, ensuring consistency and quality in epics, features, stories, acceptance criteria, and release priorities. 
• Represent the product organization in planning, delivery reviews, release readiness, and post-release stabilization discussions with engineering, QA, data, operations, and vendor teams. 
• Manage business readiness execution, including training rollout, UAT/BAT coordination, operational procedure updates, stakeholder sign-off, and adoption tracking across the insurance systems portfolio. 
• Manage triage and escalation of production issues, defects, enhancement requests, and operational escalations based on business impact, risk, urgency, and priority. 
• Track and report on portfolio-level delivery metrics, such as processing efficiency, cycle time, accuracy, automation, quality, compliance readiness, service effectiveness, and system adoption. 
• Manage vendor relationships and coordinate contract/renewal discussions relevant to insurance systems, in partnership with Finance and Procurement. 
• Ensure consistent quality, completeness, and sound judgment across the product management team in a fast-paced environment with shifting business needs and multiple concurrent priorities.

What We Provide:

• Salaried, DOE
• Long-Term Incentive Plan
• Full-Time
• Full Benefits Package Available

What We Believe:

Not sure if you meet every qualification? We still encourage you to apply! We value inclusivity, welcoming candidates from diverse backgrounds, including non-traditional paths. Unique experiences enrich our team, and the willingness to dream big makes you an exceptional candidate!

At Aspida Financial Services, LLC, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment and are proud to be an equal opportunity employer. As such, Aspida does not and will not discriminate in employment and personnel practices on the basis of race, sex, age, handicap, religion, national origin or any other basis prohibited by applicable law. Hiring, transferring and promotion practices are performed without regard to the above listed items.

What We Require:

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Computer Information Technology, Business, a related field, or equivalent professional experience. 
• Minimum of 12-14+ years of experience in product management, product ownership, business analysis, or related enterprise application functions, including experience directly managing a team. 
• Demonstrated experience managing, coaching, and holding accountable Product Managers or similar product/business analysis professionals. 
• Experience working within financial services, insurance, annuities, life insurance, or related highly regulated industries. 
• Experience managing delivery for enterprise applications, operational systems, policy administration, servicing, workflow, document generation, integrations, data exchange, or related insurance business capabilities across multiple teams. 
• Strong understanding of software delivery processes and proven experience managing execution in Agile or iterative development environments. 
• Ability to manage a portfolio of concurrent priorities in a fast-paced environment with shifting business needs, limited capacity, and cross-functional/cross-team dependencies. 
• Demonstrated ability to partner with business leaders on strategy and vision for insurance systems areas, and translate that direction into actionable, executable roadmaps. 
• Experience partnering with and coordinating cross-functional business and technical teams, including Operations, Accounting, Actuarial, Compliance, Data, Finance, Distribution, Engineering, and external vendors. 
• Experience supporting annuity or life insurance products, policy administration systems, insurance operations, or regulated financial services systems strongly preferred.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with the ability to guide investigation of system behavior, operational workflows, financial outputs, data issues, integration failures, and production defects. 
• Experience working with APIs, batch processing, integrations, extracts, enterprise workflows, data validation, or downstream system dependencies. 
• Ability to oversee the definition, refinement, and prioritization of epics, features, user stories, business rules, acceptance criteria, and business readiness needs across a team. 
• Strong verbal and written communication skills with the ability to coordinate across stakeholders and translate between business and technology audiences. 
• Ability to manage competing priorities, exercise sound judgment, and drive team execution to completion with minimal oversight.