Scottsdale's Joe Griffith: Strategic IT Partner

Several years ago, Scottsdale Insurance Company adopted a customer-centric strategy to create loyalty among its customers and better manage market fluctuations--a prescient move considering today's tough economic climate. Joe Griffith, vice president of IT, led the way in creating a similar shift in the company's IT department.

"I've really tried to move the IT organization away from being an order taker and toward being a strategic consulting partner and solution provider to our business partners," Griffith explains. "Over the past five years, we have invested in and improved IT to where our customers now see IT as a differentiator."

Founded in 1982 as a wholly owned subsidiary of Nationwide, Scottsdale is one of the largest excess, surplus, and specialty lines carriers in the country, with more than 1,300 employees and $1.7 billion in net written premiums in 2008. The IT department employs 180 full-time members and up to 60 contractors, depending on need.

Being part of Nationwide allows Griffith to leverage corporatewide systems and capabilities, such as finance, HR, and e-mail, as well as anticipate enterprisewide projects down the road. However, he also needs to factor in more immediate strategic plans at Scottsdale.

"My business partners might identify a new multimillion-dollar book of business tomorrow that suddenly becomes my priority to figure out how to integrate into our current platforms," he says. "One of my priorities is making sure I've positioned IT to respond quickly and our systems are agile enough to be able to anticipate those needs."

To that end, Griffith and his team are creating what he calls Project Programs, a type of playbook to help his department bring new products on board quickly.

"We're looking at our systems to make sure they are architected and designed in a way that can bring on a new program or book of business without it being a multimonth development effort," he says.

As part of a restructuring process to align his IT department more closely with Nationwide's corporate IT organization, Griffith created an IT business consulting group that is aligned with other business units within Scottsdale.

"Adding a business consulting arm really has paid off for us," he contends. "It's helped us identify high-value, business-enabled solutions that are driving Scottsdale's growth and revenue."

In tandem with the company's customer-centric strategy, Griffith also created an agents technology advisory committee, a group of 10 agents who offer "outside-in" advice to Griffith and his IT team regarding upcoming projects at Scottsdale.

"We've been able to course-correct and develop projects that really work for our agents," he explains. "They also offer intelligence about what other carriers are doing so I can be proactive and differentiate our technology in the marketplace."

Griffith's own interest in information technology began when he was a teenager. After graduating from the University of Iowa with a bachelor's degree in management information systems, he joined State Farm as a claims representative. Although the job was not in IT, Griffith hoped he would be able to move to that department in time. When that did not happen after a few years, he joined Heritage Mutual Insurance Company to help build a new claims system.

"With my claims background and technology education, I was perfect for that role," Griffith says. "That was my launch into the IT side of the insurance business."

From there, Griffith went to Perot Systems' insurance consulting division in Chicago, developing claims policy systems and imaging platforms for different accounts across the country.

In 1995, Griffith joined Scottsdale as director of customer support. During the next decade, he moved up the ranks, working in application and software development, infrastructure development, and production, before becoming head of IT in 2006.

Griffith takes pride in the role IT has played in Scottsdale's growth during the last several years as it adopted its customer-centric strategy.

"I've seen IT grow to where it's really involved in all aspects of running the company," he says. "It's part of the business and part of the product now."

Sharon Baker is a freelance business writer based in Charlotte, N.C.