Forecast 2010: Genworth Financial Expecting Volatility in 2010

Genworth will prepare for a complex financial environment, and look to increase velocity of informed business decision making.

Genworth Financial is anticipating another challenging economic environment in 2010, and we are preparing to meet the challenges. We believe the economy and financial markets will continue to be volatile and unpredictable. We also believe that the velocity that has characterized economic change -- the accelerated speed at which events happened and markets reacted from fall 2008 to the present -- will continue. As a result we expect 2010 to present a complex environment in which businesses must operate, and success in an uncertain environment requires businesses to stay close to their customers, act with urgency and agility, and focus on their strengths.

At Genworth (approximately $10 billion in annual revenue), we're focused on dynamically managing all of our resources and staying financially strong. We have refined our focus on core product lines of life insurance, long-term care insurance, wealth management, mortgage insurance and lifestyle protection insurance. Our operating approach is to create as many business opportunity levers as possible, knowing that at any time a window of opportunity may open. Compared to three years ago, we are maintaining more levers in the ready-to-pull position. This has direct implications for technology. We continue to focus on technologies that support the development of new products, deliver great customer experiences and connect us with our distribution partners.

We'll see increased activity in analytic technologies. We prioritize analytic capabilities that drive marketing, risk management and profitability. Our goal is to build an analytics layer within the business that allows us to operate with speed without compromising our ability to make deeply informed business decisions required by the economic reality.

Our customers have expressed appreciation for the service experience we've been able to provide through the tumultuous times of 2009, and we will continue evolving our customer experience. We've focused on delivering service consistently across all of our customer interactions. In all of our service interactions, our mantra has been finding ways to make the complex seem easy to our customers -- we'll do the complex part and let our customers experience the ease. We are also focusing on ways to help our distribution partners grow their businesses -- which has become more important as many producers struggle to maintain their income levels.

As 2010 approaches, we're focusing on deepening our relationships with customers and distribution partners and driving an integrated service and technology strategy that both catalyzes growth and increases our capability to manage risk and maximize profitability.

Scott McKay is the Senior Vice President and CIO at Genworth Financial (Richmond, Va.).