1. MIKE BLOGG
ABOUT ME
I am 26 years old, I live with my partner and we have a young daughter. I enjoy watching
and playing football, I am a Norwich City season ticket holder. I am a good communicator,
very quick learner and have strong analytical skills, as well confident working under pressure
to meet strict timescales. However my biggest achievement would be unexpectedly having
to deliver my daughter at our home. This was both the scariest and wonderful moment of
my life.
I currently work for Countrywide Legal Indemnities as an Underwriter. I am responsible for
assessing new enquiries, considering the good and bad aspects of the risk, carrying out my
on research and coming to an informed decision as to whether my company should provide
cover for the individual property. I am one of two people in the company who handle the
company's block policies. This involves extensive use of Excel, as well as producing monthly
reports for my line manager. I also answer telephone queries from solicitors and members
of the public.
I have previously worked in the Annuity New Business area, where I was responsible for
vetting applications, requesting funds from other companies, chasing these companies for
the funds, and finally producing a final quotation and setting up a clients annuity policy. I
was fully competent in all of the tasks. I have good knowledge of the less frequent tasks
such as understanding and processing Defined Benefit/GMP applications. Throughout this
process, keeping the clients financial adviser informed of the progress, also identifying the
clients nominal value, to better understand how we can best adapt to putting the customer
at the heart of everything we do.
I have been responsible for training two new entrants in my team, training them how to
fully complete each of our processes. I had worked closely with one of the managers in the
department; constructing, revamping and then delivering the induction plan for new
starters. This involved liaising with other key area’s, such as our risk area, to ensure all
necessary requirements were met. I also identified and arranged for input and involvement
from key people, with the relevant skill set of what we wanted to cover. It now covers more
of what they need to know, and has removed the irrelevant and confusing elements of
previous induction plans. This had added more value to what they learn early on and starts
the initial training of the annuity process, to give them the very best chance of succeeding in
the area.
I was originally heavily involved in my teams system thinking initiative. Capturing data on
other companies turn around times on the options systems, and our own turn around times
between in each task, so we could better inform our financial advisers to when we could
realistically expect to receive funds and complete their annuity application. This would then
lead to removing waste from our daily processes of taking unnecessary chaser phone calls

2. from financial advisers. Which has become a big failure demand across the area. I also
captured data on our multi OMO process when setting up policies; how long it took to
complete the task (depending on how many different funds we had to complete), also
looking for trends into why and where we were receiving the most multi OMO applications.
I often and competently deputised for my manager when they were absent, attending daily
resource meetings, assessing the teams and individuals work volumes to see where we are
best placed to assist others or asking for help if needed. I was also looked to as a point of
contact within my team, when the manager is not available, from colleagues inside and
outside of the team. Having previously worked within Aviva’s Equity Release department,
and strong working knowledge of ACRC processes and demands, I feel I have a good
understanding of the whole At Retirement area and how we can work together to provide
great retirement experience for customers.
I was involved in a working group which is looking at the area’s system conditions, what can
we improve, add or remove to our current working processes, taking ownership of
particular system condition which we can resolve ourselves with the correct
people/departments. I have also, with others, reviewed our Immediate Life Annuity
application form, removing the confusing wording/boxes which we had found the financial
advisers were having difficulty with, and making them simpler and easier to understand to
remove failure demand at the application stage and as such helped increase capability.