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Buffalo, New York, United States
Hybrid
*At Securian Financial the internal position title is Engineering Dir.*
Position Summary
The Director of Individual Solutions Distribution and Product Lifecycle Technology plays a critical leadership role in shaping and delivering the technology capabilities that enable our Individual Solutions business. This leader is accountable for ensuring that our channel partner distribution enablement, product development lifecycle, and risk ecosystem platforms are modern, resilient, customer-centric, and strategically aligned to drive measurable business outcomes. This business-focused technology leader will partner to drive commercial success in the individual life and annuity markets, advancing key business and technology strategies.
In this role, you will champion the technology strategy that enhances end-to-end channel partner and customer experiences, accelerates product innovation, and strengthens the risk and actuarial capabilities essential to our future success. You will collaborate closely with product managers, business partners, architects, and engineering leaders to remove impediments, advance enterprise priorities, and ensure our platforms run safely, securely, and efficiently.
This role requires a technology-forward, outcome-driven leader who excels at building high-performing teams, influencing across the organization, and inspiring teams to deliver meaningful value through our people, our partnerships, and our purpose to enable us to win in the Individual Solutions market.
Responsibilities – including but not limited to
Strategic Leadership & Partnership
Collaborates closely with product, engineering, and business leaders to shape business objectives, align on strategic outcomes, and ensure readiness to deliver technology across distribution, product, and risk capabilities.
Advances the Individual Solutions technology strategic plan in close partnership with key technology and product directors and business stakeholders.
Develops holistic approaches to enhancing the end-to-end experiences and supporting capabilities by advocating for capability improvement in alignment with business strategies and bringing innovative and external perspectives in alignment with evolving market, competitive, and internal landscapes.
Creates and continually advances the long-term technical vision and multi-year roadmap for the technology platforms supporting distribution, product development, and risk.
Applies a business-focused mindset—deeply understanding customer, channel partner, and business partner needs to inform decisions and maximize enterprise value.
Actively participates in business planning, budgeting, and portfolio management to ensure strategic alignment and responsible investment of technology resources.
Sponsor and support enterprise projects, initiatives and market-specific business cases that require technical partnership
Platform Ownership & Delivery Excellence
Serves as the senior escalation point for engineering leaders and their teams across multiple capabilities, platforms, and cross-functional areas removing impediments, addressing risks, and ensuring timely issue resolution.
Ensures platforms operate safely, securely, and reliably; oversees the definition of, and upholds, SLAs, SLIs, and SLOs; champions proactive monitoring, resilience, and quality engineering practices in close partnership with Securian’s Reliability Engineering and Operations team.
Leads the design, delivery, and continuous improvement of customer-centric technology solutions that enhance the channel partner/advisor experience, improve ease of doing business, and strengthen Individual Solutions capabilities.
Partners with enterprise architecture and shared services to evaluate technology options, promote reuse, drive simplification, and rationalize redundant applications.
Talent Leadership & Team Development
Builds, inspires, and leads high-performing leaders of people, leaders of leaders, and their engineering teams; attracts top talent, cultivates leadership capability, and fosters an inclusive environment where individuals do their best work.
Coaches and develops team members, engineering managers, and platform leads—maximizing potential, aligning strengths to work, and supporting career growth.
Owns and directs taffing strategies including effective use of global delivery partners, vendors, contingent workers, and managed services to optimize capacity, capability, and cost efficiency.
Innovation, Continuous Improvement & Modern Engineering
Champions the adoption of modern engineering practices—including Agile at scale, DevOps automation, cloud utilization, and CI/CD pipelines—to accelerate delivery and increase reliability.
Encourages experimentation, continuous learning, and the use of emerging technologies to advance business outcomes, technical health, and platform performance.
Creates a vision for secure and privacy-by-design architecture across all platform capabilities, ensuring consistent adherence to enterprise technology principles and standards.
Qualifications
Required
Significant experience leading technology teams or platforms within insurance, financial services, or adjacent regulated industries, particularly those supporting distribution, product development, or risk capabilities.
Demonstrated success developing and executing technical strategy across multiple teams in alignment with business outcomes and enterprise priorities.
Expertise in modern delivery practices including Agile, DevOps automation, cloud engineering, proactive monitoring, and continuous improvement.
Strong interpersonal, communication, and facilitation skills with the ability to influence, negotiate, and build trusting relationships across business and technology teams.
Experience leading through change with a transformational leadership mindset focused on outcomes, innovation, and empowerment.
Strong technical acumen and the ability to guide decisions related to platform selection, integration, security, performance, and scalability.
Track record of modernizing and simplifying technology and data environments with a capability-based view and maximizing reuse.
Experience with both third-party or SaaS platforms and homegrown solutions, with proven understanding of how they integrate into broader ecosystems.
Ability to manage multiple complex priorities and navigate ambiguity.
Commitment to continuous learning and awareness of industry trends, emerging technologies, and evolving delivery practices.
Preferred
Experience partnering with actuarial, underwriting, product innovation, or distribution strategy teams.
Knowledge of strategic planning, value-based delivery, discovery practices, and metrics-driven prioritization.
#LI-hybrid **This position will be in a hybrid working arrangement.**
Securian Financial believes in hybrid work as an integral part of our culture. Associates get the benefit of working both virtually and in our offices. If you’re in a commutable distance (90 minutes) you’ll join us 3 days each week in our offices to collaborate and build relationships. Our policy allows flexibility for the reality of business and personal schedules.
Preferred Skills:
Collaboration, Innovation, Leadership, Strategic IT, Talent Development, Team Development, Technology Strategy DevelopmentThe estimated base pay range for this job is:
Pay may vary depending on job-related factors and individual experience, skills, knowledge, etc. More information on base pay and incentive pay (if applicable) can be discussed with a member of the Securian Financial Talent Acquisition team.
Be you. With us. At Securian Financial, we understand that attracting top talent means offering more than just a job – it means providing a rewarding and fulfilling career. As a valued member of our high-performing team, we want you to connect with your work, your relationships and your community. Enjoy our comprehensive range of benefits designed to enhance your professional growth, well-being and work-life balance, including the advantages listed here:
Paid time off:
We want you to take time off for what matters most to you. Our PTO program provides flexibility for associates to take meaningful time away from work to relax, recharge and spend time doing what’s important to them. And Securian Financial rewards associates for their service by providing additional PTO the longer you stay at Securian.
Leave programs: Securian’s flexible leave programs allow time off from work for parental leave, caregiver leave for family members, bereavement and military leave.
Holidays: Securian provides nine company paid holidays.
Company-funded pension plan and a 401(k) retirement plan: Share in the success of our company. Securian’s 401(k) company contribution is tied to our performance up to 10 percent of eligible earnings, with a target of 5 percent. The amount is based on company results compared to goals related to earnings, sales and service.
Health insurance: From the first day of employment, associates and their eligible family members – including spouses, domestic partners and children – are eligible for medical, dental and vision coverage.
Volunteer time: We know the importance of community. Through company-sponsored events, volunteer paid time off, a dollar-for-dollar matching gift program and more, we encourage you to support organizations important to you.
Associate Resource Groups: Build connections, be yourself and develop meaningful relationships at work through associate-led ARGs. Dedicated groups focus on a variety of interests and affinities, including:
Mental Wellness and Disability
Pride at Securian Financial
Securian Young Professionals Network
Securian Multicultural Network
Securian Women and Allies Network
Servicemember Associate Resource Group
For more information regarding Securian’s benefits, please review our Benefits page.
This information is not intended to explain all the provisions of coverage available under these plans. In all cases, the plan document dictates coverage and provisions.
Securian Financial Group, Inc. does not discriminate based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, marital or familial status, pregnancy, disability, genetic information, political affiliation, veteran status, status in regard to public assistance or any other protected status. If you are a job seeker with a disability and require an accommodation to apply for one of our jobs, please contact us by email at Employment@Securian.com, by telephone 651-655-5522 (voice), or 711 (Relay/TTY).
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