Senior Vice President, Operations

LHH Knightsbridge; Toronto; Hybrid; CAD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Securian Canada is hiring a Senior Vice President, Operations to lead a blended operations model across underwriting, claims and customer operations. The role drives shared services, alignment and an enterprise-wide transformation agenda to enable faster growth and stronger client outcomes.

The SVP will partner with executives to formalize a future-state operating model, modernize processes, and build scalable capabilities while preserving distinct business needs and customer focus.

Qualifications

• Experience leading shared services within insurance/financial services.
• Proven track record of improving operational performance and customer experience.
• Experience with enterprise-wide transformation across multiple functions.
• Ability to engage senior leaders and drive accountability.
• Bilingualism is an asset.

Responsibilities

• Build and mature shared services that support product, pricing, underwriting, claims, and customer operations.
• Establish clear service expectations, accountability and performance measures.
• Partner with vertical leaders to translate priorities into enterprise initiatives.
• Lead cross-enterprise transformation programs and realize benefits.

Skills

Senior leadership

Enterprise transformation

Insurance/financial services

M&A and divestitures

Strategic thinking

Job description

Position Title: Senior Vice President, Operations

Reports to: Chief Executive Officer

Location: Hybrid – ideally based in either Toronto or Montreal

Securian Canada is a technology-enabled insurance provider with more than 70 years of experience serving Canadians. Established in 1955 and operating as an independent subsidiary of Securian Financial Group, Inc., Securian Canada combines deep expertise in the Canadian insurance market with the resources and scale of a leading North American insurance organization.

Guided by its purpose – we help build secure tomorrows – Securian Canada is focused on helping Canadians build greater financial security. The organization designs health and dental, life and creditor insurance solutions that enable its partners to provide coverage to more Canadians, supporting its belief that insurance is for everyone.

Securian Canada works alongside leading financial institutions, member and affinity organizations and other strategic distribution partners. Through these partnerships, it brings together intuitive technology, human insight and a flexible, collaborative approach to help make insurance simpler, more accessible and more relevant to the evolving needs of Canadians. Technology, data and digital capabilities play an important role in how Securian Canada serves its clients, partners and customers. The organization has established a strong reputation for customer-focused innovation, leveraging these capabilities to enhance its product offerings and client experiences while creating more ways for Canadians to access financial protection.

In recent years, Securian Canada has experienced significant growth and transformation through strategic investments, business expansion and acquisition activity, further strengthening its market position. Despite its increased scale and sophistication, the organization continues to foster a culture characterized by agility, collaboration, inclusion and an entrepreneurial approach to innovation and continuous improvement.

THE OPPORTUNITY

The SVP, Operations is a key member of the senior leadership team and is responsible for leading the organization’s next stage of growth. With three distinct business verticals; underwriting, claims and customer operations/call centre, and an increasing need to leverage shared capabilities, Securian is seeking an SVP, Operations to strengthen the operating model, enabling the businesses to move faster, scale effectively and deliver for clients and partners.

This role is focused on building a more mature, effective shared service model across capabilities where scale, consistency and expertise are best leveraged across the enterprise, while ensuring the unique needs of each business remains well served. The mandate is not to create a large centralized function, but to build the enterprise capabilities required for success, placing work where it can be delivered most effectively and enabling each business to achieve its strategic priorities.

The successful candidate will help Securian Canada evolve from a collection of functions and businesses into a more integrated enterprise which strengthens shared accountability, execution discipline and an enterprise-wide mindset, and preserves the distinct strengths and capability requirements of each business.

The successful SVP, Operations will position the organization for its next phase of growth through:

• Developing and securing alignment on a Board-ready enterprise operations strategy, with a clear future-state vision and practical roadmap aligned to growth objectives.
• Establishing a transformation strategy to consolidate the organization’s administration systems, including the business case, investment requirements and implementation approach.
• Simplifying and modernizing the operating model by advancing automation, digitization, and AI, while reducing fragmented processes and manual workarounds.
• Building a more integrated and scalable Operations organization, with the leadership capabilities and structure required to support greater growth and complexity.
• Strengthening collaboration across Operations, Technology and other functions to translate enterprise priorities into disciplined operational execution.
• Commercializing Operations as a competitive differentiator and strategic enabler of growth, including support for white-label, affinity programs and other partnership opportunities.
• Enhancing customer segmentation and service delivery models while building the operational capacity to support partnerships, acquisitions, integrations and divestitures.

Advancing in these critical areas will ultimately ensure Securian delivers:

• Consistent and reliable delivery of products and services across all business lines
• Strong integration between product, pricing, marketing, and service delivery functions
• Improved speed and quality of product-to-market execution
• High levels of partner and customer satisfaction across service channels
• Operational efficiency improvements that enable scalable growth
• Clear alignment between strategic intent and execution outcomes

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Build and lead shared business capabilities

• Establish and mature shared services that support the business verticals which include product and pricing, underwriting, claims, customer operations/call centre, policy administration and other common capabilities
• Create clear service expectations, accountability and performance measures between shared services and the business verticals
• Continuously improve how these capabilities operate, balancing enterprise scale and consistency with distinct needs of each business
• Build strong partnerships with the vertical leaders so shared services are viewed as a source of capability and competitive advantage, not simply centralized support
• Partner with executive leaders to translate strategic priorities into enterprise-wide transformation initiatives
• Lead the execution, coordination and realization of benefits from major cross-enterprise initiatives
• Build the organizational discipline and capabilities needed to sustain change beyond individual projects

Contribute to business growth

• Partner with CEO and executive leaders to remove operational barriers that limit growth
• Where appropriate, provide executive sponsorship to selected market-facing businesses or strategic initiatives, helping connect enterprise capabilities to business outcomes
• Bring an enterprise perspective to investment, capacity and capability decisions, ensuring resources are focused on the highest value opportunities

KEY RELATIONSHIPS

• CEO: Strategy alignment, enterprise prioritization, and performance outcomes
• CFO: Pricing governance, risk, finance alignment, and investment discipline
• CTO: Technology enablement, digital delivery, and platform scalability
• CHXO: Workforce capability, organizational design, and talent alignment
• Business Leaders (FI, Affinity, Specialty): commercial priorities and market execution

IDEAL SKILLS & EXPERIENCE

The ideal candidate will possess the following experience, qualifications, knowledge, skills and attributes:

• Senior operational leadership experience, complemented by enterprise transformation expertise and sound commercial judgment
• Demonstrated experience building or transforming shared services within a complex, growing insurance/financial services organization
• A strong track record of improving operational performance, customer experience and organizational scalability
• Experience leading complex, enterprise-wide transformation across multiple functions and business areas
• Experience with M&A, divestitures and/or strategic third-party partnerships
• The ability to work effectively across organizational boundaries and align diverse stakeholders around shared enterprise outcomes
• Strong financial and commercial acumen, with the ability to connect operational decisions to growth and profitability
• The executive presence and influence required to engage senior leaders and foster accountability throughout the organization
• A practical, hands‑on leadership style, with the ability to set direction and engage directly in the work required to drive meaningful change
• Bilingualism, an asset

If you require accommodation to participate as a candidate in the hiring process, please communicate your needs to the LHH Knightsbridge project team.

This is a job posting for an existing role/vacancy. LHH Knightsbridge does not use artificial intelligence (AI) to screen, assess, or select applicants for a position.