Property Specialist, Claims Vendor Management

Definity is the parent company to some of Canada’s most long-standing and innovative insurance brands, including Economical Insurance, Sonnet Insurance, Family Insurance Solutions, and Petline Insurance. Our ambition is to be one of Canada’s leading and most innovative property and casualty insurers. We can’t do that without our people, so we embrace and encourage a culture that’s collaborative, ambitious, rewarding, and empowering.

We offer a flexible, hybrid work experience where employees work from the office and virtually depending on the type of work they are doing and who they are working with. Bring your true self and be a part of our journey. It’s better here.

Summary

The Vendor Specialist is accountable for the oversight and performance management of Claims vendor partners.  The Vendor Specialist will oversee multiple external vendor relationships that are significant in scope, complexity, and criticality, specializing in Property.  

The Vendor Specialist will be intimately familiar with the various Vendor Management domains including vendor evaluation and selection, strategic alignment and value, communication and expectations, performance management, and issue escalation.  They will also be a key input into new contract and renewal negotiation activities, and post-launch, be accountable for monitoring overall contract compliance, SLA monitoring, performance management including financial objectives and penalties.

The vendor management team will be responsible for planning, executing, reporting, and governing the overall vendor portfolio for Claims. The team will work with key claims management in designing critical control reports to enable timely and informed management decisions.  The Vendor Specialist will support strategic vendor management initiatives including a tool and process to manage the vendor portfolio data, and the design and implementation of a formal vendor governance framework.

The Vendor Specialist understands the internal and external landscape for standards and practices for Vendor Management and is involved in the planning and execution of the overall Claims deliverables related to this function.  The Vendor Specialist provides updates to the Manager, Vendor Management and Business leaders for the function and will stay abreast of industry and global trends.

What can you expect in this role?

Vendor Strategy Implementation

• Supports the Vendor Management Team in implementing vendor strategies into the management of partner performance and selection
• Maintaining vendor performance scorecards, dashboards and trend analysis to enhance service excellence and operational effectiveness of his/her function
• Implements vendor management strategies to improve performance, drive customer experience, and create commercial value Querying databases to collect, interpret and analyze data

Vendor Management

• Participates in and supports vendor meetings to facilitate performance management discussions, issue resolution and continuous improvement initiatives.
• Strategically represents the business interests in the partnership. This includes clearly articulating the business performance expectations, as well as the perceived total value proposition of the relationship to vendor partners and key Claims leaders and stakeholders. 
• Accountable for the overall performance and compliance management of a portfolio of vendor partners; ensures crisp and timely feedback to partners and escalates consequential performance deficiencies promptly to both the vendor and Claims Management teams.
• Supports the creation and maintenance of a performance data repository to store key performance data which is searchable and reportable
• Maintains and implements comprehensive and holistic visual scorecards that measure both contractual performance indicators as well as other important and impactful performance factors. This should include stack rank, or industry benchmark comparative performance assessments.
• Stays abreast of market and industry capabilities, and fair market rates for comparable products and services. Ensures Economical remains in a favourable position to achieve benchmark rates and receive market best services and capabilities.  
• Periodically travel to establish and maintain relationships with vendors

Relationship Management

• Develops and maintains effective working relationships with stakeholders including; Claims leadership and staff, training teams, HR, technology and other support teams.   Ability to persuade and influence stakeholders over whom they have no authority.
• Provides guidance to leadership team on partner performance, selection, and strategic partnerships, as well as on how to interpret partner performance reports.
• Collaborates with peers within other Economical functions to share best practices in partner performance management
• Provides input to the operational teams and EP as it pertains to selection, market rate and offering and strategic partnership potential
• Provides input to the Manager, Vendor Management and other internal stakeholders, on continuous improvement opportunities for functional processes and technologies to drive efficiencies in partner performance and other vendor management activities
• Enable Claims leaders to make informed decisions by assisting them in problem solving partner performance challenges through the collection and analysis of partner data

Financial Management

• Contributes to the growth and profitability of Definity by creating value through our vendor partnerships.  
• Supports Claims Operations in developing forecasted resource requirements as part of annual planning for in-scope functions and high-level business case analysis for initiatives which impact resource requirements, utilization, service level agreements and expense ratio
• Adheres to Definity’s financial standards, policies and processes
• Continuously looks for ways to conduct operations in the most cost effective and efficient manner to meet or exceed corporate and Partner needs

What do you bring to the role?

• Minimum of 4 years of progressive experience in a vendor analyst or management capacity.                                                         
• Experience working on/with high performance teams.                                                    
• College Diploma or University Degree.                                                     
• Experience in the Property Insurance Operations or Construction Industry an asset.    
• Strong Interpersonal skills, ability to develop and maintain business relationships
• Proficient in Microsoft Office Suite.                                                           
• Proficiency in data collection, analysis, manipulation and reporting.
• Bilingual in English/French an asset.                                               

We also take potential into consideration. If you don’t have this exact experience, but you know you have what it takes, be sure to give us more insight through your application and cover letter.

Go ahead and expect a lot — you deserve it, and we’ve got it: 

• Hybrid work schedule for most roles
• Company share ownership program
• Pension and savings programs, with company-matched RRSP contributions
• Paid volunteer days and company matching on charitable donations
• Educational resources, tuition assistance, and paid time off to study for exams
• Focus on inclusion with employee groups, support for gender affirmation surgery, access to BIPOC counsellors, access to programs for working parents
• Wellness and recognition programs
• Discounts on products and services

Our inclusive work environment welcomes diversity and supports accessibility. If you require accommodation at any time during the recruitment process, please let us know by contacting: [email protected]

Background checks
This role requires successful clearance of a background check (including criminal checks and leadership references).

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