Issues

End of year 2010 the Aviva group was in a transition phase when a major restructuring of management lines was making progress. Although the credit risk implementation project had delivered satisfactory results, upcoming demands for reduced reporting times, extended asset coverage and improve risk models required a new approach. In addition the current project manager had taken advantage of a new job challenge, leaving the project headless in a critical situation.

Deliverables

The interim manager’s tasks were first to stabilize the ongoing implementation project work, introduce a person independent project management style and transfer the results to the ITIL based production services while including and in some cases anticipating new and upcoming requirements. Among those requirements were a radical reduction of the reporting times, a refactoring of the involved processes and the underlying technical architecture, repositioning the portfolio management tool UBS Delta as a standard tool and insourcing its bespoke parts, completing the coverage of worldwide business units reporting to the group centre, broadening the asset coverage, refining the risk modelling for certain asset classes and finally including policy holder asset risks. As a complementing task a permanent successor had to be searched for and selected and a decent handover of the ongoing tasks accomplished. Key to success was an open and unbiased yet structured and well documented communication to all relevant stakeholders.

Objectives

After completing handover to the permanent project manager the project had been given a formal yet lightweight formal structure, removing dependencies on the personal style and knowledge of the project manager. Achieved results had been delivered to operational IT after passing acceptance procedures. Support contracts with contributing software vendors and service providers had been implemented, regular issue handling meetings established and a professional and productive working relationship and culture with all contributing and depending parties (re-) established and the reputation of project and tools restored. A mid-term detailed implementation plan was in place and widely agreed giving the new management the chance to a quick and successful start.