Director – Technical Underwriting - Property

Job Summary

As Director, Technical Underwriting - Property, you will serve as Farmers' senior technical authority for commercial property underwriting. You will establish underwriting frameworks, drive portfolio performance, oversee authority management and quality initiatives, and provide expert guidance on complex property risks. This is a rare opportunity to build a newly formed technical underwriting function as part of a significant modernization of our Business Insurance organization.

This role combines deep underwriting expertise, strategic leadership, and organizational influence. The Director will help shape underwriting appetite, governance frameworks, authority structures, quality programs, and portfolio performance while building technical capabilities across the broader underwriting organization. We are particularly interested in experienced external underwriting leaders who can bring specialized expertise and innovative thinking to help advance Farmers' underwriting capabilities.

The Director will play a pivotal role in building technical excellence, enhancing underwriting quality, improving profitability, and developing the next generation of underwriting talent.

Essential Job Functions

• Lead authority management strategy and underwriting governance framework, including corporate authority templates, referral triggers, and decision rules.
• Define and enforce how underwriting decisions are made to ensure consistency with underwriting strategy and risk appetite.
• Exercise elevated underwriting authority and provide guidance on complex or high-exposure risks.
• Own underwriting performance and profitability for assigned lines of business, including accountability for loss ratio, combined ratio, growth, and retention.
• Monitor performance and take action to achieve financial and business objectives.
• Own underwriting quality program and control environment, including quality standards, leakage monitoring, audits, and compliance frameworks.
• Identify control gaps and implement corrective actions to ensure adherence to underwriting guidelines, regulatory requirements, and internal policies. 
• Translate underwriting strategy and risk appetite into technical frameworks, including guidelines, authority structures, and operational rules. 
• Ensure consistent execution across lines of business through clear standards and governance mechanisms.
• Partner with actuarial and data and analytics to develop and deploy portfolio analytics, underwriting models, and decision-support tools. 
• Establish and lead emerging risk identification and governance processes.
• Collaborate cross-functionally to assess impacts and drive updates to underwriting guidelines, authority frameworks, and control structures.
• Provide direct technical guidance and support to underwriting centers, ensuring responsiveness, effective decision-making, and alignment with underwriting standards.
• Lead, develop, and retain talent in either quality or loss control functions.
• Build deep technical expertise and governance discipline within the organization.
• Implement feedback loops to continuously improve underwriting decision quality, pricing discipline, and overall performance, including coordination and portfolio management of individual account reinsurance placements and collaboration with the reinsurance team on annual facility placements
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Experience Requirements

• Large commercial property underwriting expertise.
• Minimum ten years of insurance underwriting or insurance compliance required.
• Minimum five years experience leading people required.

Education Requirements

• Bachelors degree required. Preferably in mathematics, business, or finance.
• CPCU or CIC designation preferred.

Additional Qualifications

• Ability to drive multiple projects to successful completion.
• Ability to lead cross-functional work, drive decisions, and build alignment across underwriting, product, pricing/actuarial, IT, data/analytics, and operations.
• Effective leadership skills.
• Demonstrated change leadership, including adoption planning, training enablement, measurement, and continuous improvement.
• Instills commitment to organizational goals.
• Ability to understand the vision and direction of the business to develop and execute a plan to achieve business results.

Physical Actions

Job is performed in-person at a Farmers office or virtually at an approved alternative work location. The physical work environment is indoors and climate-controlled with adequate lighting and ventilation. Normal and customary distractions include background noise produced by office equipment and chatter among people, as well as interruptions. Frequently sits for prolonged periods of time, up to a full shift. Occasionally moves about the workplace including, navigating stairs, ramps, and level or uneven surfaces. Occasionally moves, pushes, pulls, lifts, carries, and/or places objects or materials weighing up to 25 pounds without assistance. Frequently uses shoulders, arms, hands, and fingers to manipulate equipment, tools, and objects necessary to perform job duties. Frequently performs fine motor tasks such as typing, mousing, or writing, up to a full shift. Rarely performs movements such as bending, stooping, crouching, kneeling, twisting, and reaching overhead or below the knees. Possesses clear vision, with or without correction, to visually read and verify information. Relies on depth perception and peripheral vision to navigate the work environment visually by identifying barriers, changes in terrain and locating objects. Possesses adequate hearing, with or without correction, to communicate with co-workers, respond promptly to auditory signals or alarms, and discern sounds essential for maintaining safety and productivity in the workplace. Jobs in this category require rare, if any, travel.