Business Analyst Professional Collaborative problem-solver

Ross Whiteford

Ottawa, ON 416-***-****

https://www.linkedin.com/in/rosswhiteford ****.*********@*****.***

PROFILE

Experienced Financial Services and Technology Professional with a passion for solving User problems and bringing ideas to fruition. Works collaboratively and applies the right technology or process to deliver value to organizations and their customers. Driven to facilitate change and reduce friction between business and technology interactions. Previous work with SaaS organizations finding better ways to deliver what customers need, and in Insurance Underwriting (Property & Casualty) and Claims handling. Extensive experience in customer-facing and support roles; professional writer.

Strengths to Leverage:

Business Analysis Agile & Waterfall Methodologies UX Research & Design

HTML & CSS Clear Communication & Documentation Requirements Elicitation

Project Management Leadership Influences without Direct Authority Collaboration

EXPERIENCE

Willis Towers Watson, Toronto, ON 2016 - 2020

WTW is a leading global advisory, broking and solutions company that helps clients around the world turn risk into a path for growth. Employed within the Brovada Technologies sub-division of the company, which specialized in developing software solutions for FinTech companies.

IT Business Analyst

Accountable for collaborating with Business and Technical stakeholders. Led the requirements elicitation and documentation effort. Acted as a primary point of client contact throughout the project lifecycle, coached and delegated to team members, and provided e-mail and telephone support for technical issues and product queries.

Key Accomplishments:

•Developed an improved process for migration of customer data to an Azure cloud-hosted environment that dramatically improved the efficiency and visibility of the data migration process in response to stakeholder complaints over lack of clarity on the existing process of migrating data, and issues where Clients lost access to their services altogether. This resulted in faster completion of the end-to-end migration, zero critical errors, and easier time-tracking and billing.

•Facilitated requirements gathering sessions to accurately capture business and functional requirements through effective collaboration. Groomed the backlog, responding to rapidly changing priorities and resource availability and used root-cause analysis and other problem-solving techniques to resolve issues encountered by clients and end-users. Management came to rely on my support or ownership of a number of project activities in order for the proposed solution to be delivered successfully

•Acted as both primary contact and Level 2 support (handling technical issues that had been escalated by colleagues in L1 Technical Support) for support tickets logged by Clients and Users. These included feature requests, bugs, and issues with access to software applications. Triaged, investigated and resolved these issues using own expertise, access to knowledge base (Confluence), and through collaborative problem solving with technical teams. As a result, I was regularly praised by Clients and colleagues for my proactive, thorough and empathetic approach to troubleshooting issues.

•Developed and introduced a standardized requirements elicitation and documentation approach (the BA team’s first). Coached colleagues on how to capture more detailed business and functional requirements by asking better questions. Encouraged the sharing of best practices and skills within the BA team. As a result, client requirements were captured more accurately, first time, resulting in a more efficient project delivery.

•Cultivated a strong working relationship with Clients at a number of National insurance companies and other vendors, building trust and sharing knowledge to lead effectively without authority. Persuaded Clients to invest in software upgrades worth thousands of dollars through identifying needs and proposing solutions.

•Participated in both Waterfall and Agile software delivery projects; including creation and communication of User Stories and Acceptance requirements and backlog grooming. Assigned work to team members and monitored progress on multiple projects, while performing own job role. De facto manager on multiple initiatives. Regularly praised by colleagues for my collaborative and empathetic management approach.

Kanetix Ltd, Toronto, ON 2012 - 2016

Kanetix is a trusted partner to hundreds of insurance companies and financial services providers looking for digital solutions to drive their customer acquisition programs, creating market-leading insuretech solutions.

Business Analyst/Product Owner

Led the delivery effort for multiple SDLC projects. Worked with a diverse team of developers, SME’s, and UX/UI professionals to deliver web and cloud-based software solutions to internal and external clients.

Key Accomplishments:

•Utilized Agile Scrum methodology throughout projects to successfully deliver software solutions that helped Clients transact digitally with customers. Drove the requirements elicitation and validation effort, which then translated into actionable tasks for the development team to complete. Responsible for UAT testing of completed code.

•Acted as the primary point of contact for business and technical stakeholders, including elicitation and documentation of detailed requirements for Software as a Service projects

Customer Care Associate

Handled incoming calls from Users of Kanetix’s online insurance comparison quote system. Confirmed that information entered was accurate and then transferred the caller to a partner insurance company to complete the purchase of an insurance policy.

•Throughout tenure, maintained the highest number of conversions from warm transfer to sales out of all CCA’s on the team by supporting customers through the decision-making process.

•Created documented and led a job shadowing process that dramatically improved career progression of junior/newer employees through encouraging them to participate in the activities other departments and potentially take on more challenging roles. This resulted in a higher level of satisfaction in career progression being reported by participants in successive year-end employee surveys.

Aviva UK plc 2009 - 2012

Aviva is a leading international Savings, Retirement and Insurance business serving 33 million customers.

Insurance Underwriter, Property and Casualty

Tracked and reviewed insurance policies which were due for renewal, investigating the policy history (claims activity, appropriateness of coverage) and the business activities and negotiated pricing and coverage with the broker.

•Conducted detailed investigations on the nature of the business, it’s activities and claims history and the existing policy coverage. This included pressing the broker for further information, reviewing publicly available and insurer-specific data and engaging third-party risk inspectors.

•Tailored renewal coverage and pricing according to the particulars of the risk.

•Sought sign-off on coverage and pricing from senior colleagues where it exceeded signing limits; negotiated final price and policy details with the broker holding the insurance contract.

Household Claims Advisor

First point of contact for policyholders notifying Aviva of a household insurance claim. This role required showing empathy for the insured’s situation, while eliciting details of the claim and probing for signs of fraud or a subrogation (recovery of funds due to third-party negligence) opportunity.

•Worked closely with colleagues in the fraud and recovery units of the business. Led all other Claims Advisors in the identification of third-party negligence that might lead to a subrogation to reduce claim total paid.

EDUCATION

BA Arts and Humanities, Politics and Journalism & Creative Writing. 2002-2006

University of Strathclyde, Glasgow.

News Editor of the University Newspaper

Led a small team of volunteer reporters in preparing and writing news stories for publication according to strict deadlines.

CERTIFICATIONS

Brainstation Toronto 2020

User Experience Design Certificate

Juno College, Toronto 2018

Web Development (HTML & CSS)

VOLUNTEER EXPERIENCE

Ottawa Food Bank 2020

Donation sorting and repackaging for distribution

Medecins Sans Frontières (MSF) 2019

Using Open Street Maps to create digital maps from satellite imagery that

would assist MSF teams locate those in need of humanitarian support.

Vancouver Jazz Festival 2007

Equipment set up and teardown at venues across the city.

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