Growing together: A message from Tracey Edgar

Growing Together
TRACEY EDGAR, ONEAMERICA® CARE SOLUTIONS DISTRIBUTION LEADER

As we near the end of 2018, we at OneAmerica have a lot to be grateful for. Your business and continued collaboration have made this a banner year, and we’re proud to call each of you our customer. Together, we’ve given a record number of Americans access to long-term care protection – and the knowledge that, no matter what the future holds, we’ll be there when they need us most.
 
Sustaining this shared success means we must stay committed to excellence and improvement, both for you and for our policyholders. Today, I want to share several key changes we’re making to address challenges you may be experiencing as we continue our growth trajectory.

Aligning our approach to our strategic direction
The changes we’re making are designed to put us in an even stronger position and increase our ability to execute our strategies in the marketplace. This began in January with leadership changes and enterprise-wide organizational effectiveness work, and continues today with an emphasis on operations, producer and customer experiences and customer service.

Investing in people power
In our Care Solutions New Business and Underwriting teams, the focus is on persistently building our culture of service. In addition to cross-training our current staff, we have been actively recruiting to grow these teams based on both our current volumes and projected growth into 2019. The teams’ approach continues to emphasize flexibility and a customer-focused mindset as we prioritize reducing handoffs and streamlining processes.

Moving business forward
In September, we initiated a progressive inventory reduction plan to move all pending business through and sustain workflow efforts for the fourth quarter. Both the New Business and Underwriting teams are dedicated to delivering improved turnaround time on application to placement of policies. The effects of these changes will be felt throughout the month of October and the remainder of the year, as both teams have already begun meeting initial improvement goals.

Dedicating ourselves to excellence
To truly transform our business processes and deliver on our promises, we’ve engaged our Operational Excellence team. Using the Lean Six Sigma approach to review handoffs and wait times will help us reduce overall app to placement lead time for all distribution channels.

Key highlights of this work include:

  • Increasing person-to-person communication from case managers to agents regarding underwriting decisions and next steps
  • Implementing IT enhancements to automate and improve reporting, receiving requirements, data transfers and OneSource Online updates
  • Clarifying, defining and documenting consistent processes across the board
  • Leveraging capacity modeling to improve forecasting and align staffing to demand
  • Evaluating and aligning operating metrics
  • Engaging in root cause analysis and corrective action to address APS ordering challenges

The changes we’re making won’t happen overnight, but we know that sharing our progress and commitment to you is the best way to stay accountable and move toward sustained growth. As we partner internally with our Underwriting and New Business teams along with Individual Life and Financial Services leadership to deliver the excellent service you deserve, we continue to be grateful for the trust you’ve put in us to carry business through from submission to commission.

We look forward to sharing updates as we grow together.

As always, thank you for your ongoing business and support,

Tracey Edgar signature
Tracey Edgar
OneAmerica Care Solutions Distribution Leader
 

Growing together: A message from Tracey Edgar
 

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