Above All: Leadership

In an information-driven industry, the successful IT executive exercises a distinctive influence on his or her company, and bears a unique burden for that privilege.

Life hasn't gotten any easier for senior insurance technology executives. In fact, the top jobs require an increasingly demanding set of skills. Expert knowledge of the possibilities of technology continues to be a central factor in success and failure-especially as it relates to the synergies and clashes of solutions on the enterprise level. But the proportionate importance of that expertise diminishes as expectations of other competencies rise. Along with improved governance structures has come the need for greater financial acumen, as technology executives face greater scrutiny and more explicit accountability. An operational understanding of the drivers of business performance, once considered a distinction, is now de rigeur. And as insurance companies' business leadership has bought into the central role of technology, technology chiefs are expected to do more, but with more limited resources. To avoid failure requires the ability to synthesize all the above-mentioned qualities and unite them with an ability to drive forward a technology vision for the business. In short, a technology executive needs technology, business, financial, negotiation and leadership capabilities, but the greatest of these is leadership. This year's Elite 8 honorees demonstrate all this, and more.

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ELITE 8 2003 Consultants Advisory Board

John Johnsen, managing director, TCi (Cresskill, N.J.)
Paul McDonnell, managing director & insurance segment leader, BearingPoint (New York)
Peter Gibson, managing partner, BusinessEdge Solutions (New York)
Jamie Bisker, director of research, insurance practice, TowerGroup (Needham, Mass.)
Michael Bernaski, partner, insurance industry group, Accenture (New York)
Kimberly Harris, research director, Gartner (Stamford, Conn.)
Mike Adler, partner, IBM Business Consulting Services (Armonk, N.Y.)

Anthony O'Donnell has covered technology in the insurance industry since 2000, when he joined the editorial staff of Insurance & Technology. As an editor and reporter for I&T and the InformationWeek Financial Services of TechWeb he has written on all areas of information ... View Full Bio