AVP, Corporate Strategy and Enablement

You are as unique as your background, experience and point of view. Here, you’ll be encouraged, empowered and challenged to be your best self. You'll work with dynamic colleagues - experts in their fields - who are eager to share their knowledge with you. Your leaders will inspire and help you reach your potential and soar to new heights. Every day, you'll have new and exciting opportunities to make life brighter for our Clients - who are at the heart of everything we do. Discover how you can make a difference in the lives of individuals, families and communities around the world.

Job Description:

The Corporate Strategy and Enablement Team supports Sun Life in developing and enabling strategies to achieve a position of sustainable strategic advantage and growth in the long term. It has a broad focus of strategy topics that span all businesses, functions, and geographic markets where Sun Life operates. The team provides support on high priority strategic issues and projects for Sun Life’s Executive team, corporate functions, and Business Groups, and is responsible for actively monitoring and analyzing external trends shaping the markets in which Sun Life operates.

The Corporate Strategy and Enablement team works in a dynamic and collaborative team-based environment. Team members work on many of Sun Life’s most interesting and challenging problems, with exposure to senior executives and the opportunity to diversify knowledge of Sun Life’s businesses and markets. Specifically, the team has five main responsibilities:

• Run the annual strategic planning process
• Shape and support strategy design and advancement of strategy execution
• Support facilitation and planning of Board and Executive Team strategy discussions
• Act as an internal consultant by driving and executing projects and working alongside Sun Life’s businesses to drive sustained value creation.
• Monitor external trends and draw linkages to Sun Life’s businesses

What will you do:

Reporting to the Vice-President Corporate Strategy and Enablement, the successful candidate will be responsible for the end-to-end design and delivery of strategy projects, delivery of the annual strategic plan, and identifying, monitoring, and evaluating macro market trends. The AVP, Corporate Strategy and Enablement is expected to apply problem-solving and analytical capabilities, strategic thinking and insight generation, and effective communications and relationship management. They are expected to develop, oversee, and mentor members of a high-performing strategy team, and should be highly independent in their ability to execute strategy projects and manage senior stakeholder relationships.

Responsibilities:

Annual strategic planning

• Manage the planning process and provide support/coordination to Business Groups and functions (e.g., Finance, IT, HR) to develop and deliver their strategic plans
• Facilitate working sessions with senior executives to further strategy development
• Work collaboratively with top executives to develop the Enterprise Strategic Plan, owning analyses, communications, and content development
• Provide perspectives, strategic frameworks, and analysis support to help Business Groups and functions advance thinking on focus topics
• Ensure enterprise alignment of strategic plans across Business Groups by drawing linkages across common themes

Strategy and Enablement Projects

• Translate ambiguous strategic issues into clearly defined problem statements, hypotheses, and corresponding analyses
• Define scope, design approach, and develop work plan for strategy projects
• Execute project plan and manage across multiple work streams, adapting and reprioritizing as necessary to meet project objectives while ensuring timely delivery and achievable scope
• Manage project delivery across multiple team members (from Corporate Strategy team and partners in Business Groups/functions)
• Bring new perspectives, creative ideas, and practical approaches to problems and issues
• Synthesize qualitative and quantitative analytical results to guide recommendations and inform strategic decision making
• Prepare and present both formal and informal updates on analysis/recommendations for senior executives
• Communicate findings and recommendations succinctly in a logical and coherent storyline that facilitates productive discussion and decision making among senior executives
• Manage a diverse set of stakeholders at all levels of the organization to ensure effective collaboration in support for recommendations
• Acts as the executing partner for Sun Life’s businesses to ensure strategic initiatives deliver value.
• Ensure identified initiatives and transformation projects stay on track and on schedule
• Proactively anticipate and address barriers to facilitate successful outcomes
• Oversee and deliver proactive progress reports on strategic initiatives

Competitive and market awareness and intelligence

• Actively build and maintain awareness of market trends and developments through various sources (e.g., secondary research, competitor actions, industry developments, industry network)
• Curate external market information, translate into relevant insights and surface patterns/themes that are relevant for Sun Life
• Identify implications for Sun Life and proactively communicate/share with appropriate stakeholders

Communication and relationship management

• Effectively communicate insights, ideas, and strategies to an executive level audience in a clear, compelling, and concise manner
• Facilitate working sessions with senior executives, including Sun Life’s Executive Team
• Tailor written and verbal communication based on audience and situation to facilitate productive discussions, foster buy-in, and establish productive working relationships
• Proactively maintain relationships with stakeholders in BGs and functions, to maintain an understanding of new developments in their areas and identify needs for strategy support

What do you need to succeed:

• Minimum of 10 years relevant business experience, ideally within insurance, asset management, or financial services; experience in or knowledge of Sun Life's businesses would be an asset
• University degree in business or related discipline; MBA or other relevant advanced degree is an asset
• 3-5 years in top-tier management consulting or equivalent experience in a corporate setting
• Demonstrated experience analyzing and solving complex business problems and conducting in-depth secondary research, including collection and synthesis
• Demonstrated experience in financial analytics, including using modelling tools and techniques, is an asset
• Strong creative and analytical problem solver, with a solid background working with data, conducting and overseeing execution of quantitative and qualitative analysis, interpreting results, and writing reports/presentations
• Resourceful and rapid learner, able to work across many topics and domains
• Inspiring people-leader, able to effectively motivate and coach a team to deliver at their best
• Strong interpersonal skills; able to effectively collaborate with multiple stakeholders at all levels across multiple teams
• Deep understanding of at least one of Sun Life’s business areas (i.e., asset management, individual life insurance, group benefits, group retirement solutions, wealth management, asset management) and geographic markets (i.e., Canada, US, Asia)
• Results-oriented project manager with extensive background in strategy project delivery; well organized, with a high attention to details
• Able to independently manage and deliver on projects with appropriate judgment
• Excellent oral and written communication and presentation skills

The Base Pay range is for the primary location for which the job is posted. It may vary depending on the work location of the successful candidate or other factors. In addition to Base Pay, eligible Sun Life employees participate in various incentive plans, payment under which is discretionary and subject to individual and company performance. Certain sales focused roles have sales incentive plans based on individual or group sales results.

Diversity and inclusion have always been at the core of our values at Sun Life. A diverse workforce with wide perspectives and creative ideas benefits our clients, the communities where we operate and all of us as colleagues. We welcome applications from qualified individuals from all backgrounds.

Persons with disabilities who need accommodation in the application process or those needing job postings in an alternative format may e-mail a request to thebrightside@sunlife.com.

At Sun Life we strive to create a flexible work environment where our employees are empowered to do their best work. Several flexible work options are available and can be discussed throughout the selection process depending on the role requirements and individual needs.

We thank all applicants for showing an interest in this position. Only those selected for an interview will be contacted.

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