Leading the Product Team Behind esure Flex
The Challenge
After its acquisition by Bain Capital, esure began a multi-year digital transformation: respond to incoming rules on price walking, cut the cost to serve, and replace legacy systems with one platform for sales, service and claims. The programme’s stated goal was to win back 500,000 customers.
My Approach
I was Head of Product at HYD, esure’s digital partner, and led a team of around fifteen designers, user researchers and product people on the account, reporting weekly to esure’s Head of Product and COO.
We ran qualitative interviews and usability testing to understand what customers expected from a modern insurer, and that research shaped esure Flex, a personalised, competitively priced motor product. Rapid prototyping let us refine it with real users before anything was built. Once the proposition was defined, I worked with esure’s teams and EY, their technology partner, to turn it into requirements for the new cloud-native platform.
Alongside the product work I supported the executive team’s shift to agile delivery, helped hire permanent staff into the new digital teams, and set up a centre of excellence for design and communications. Content designers on my team ran a weekly drop-in where marketing leads brought copy to review and improve, which is how the new way of working reached teams outside product.
Results
esure Flex launched as a budget-friendly option that did not compromise on experience. EY reported over 330,000 Flex policies issued by 2023 and more than 90% of claims able to start online. Those are programme results achieved after my time; my part was the proposition, the requirements and the team that produced them.
Key Outcomes
- Led a fifteen-person design, research and product team in a regulated sector
- esure Flex proposition defined through research and prototyping
- Requirements for the cloud-native platform built with EY
- Centre of excellence and weekly copy drop-in adopted by marketing teams
- Over 330,000 Flex policies by 2023 (EY)
