In this podcast Shields talks about how this roadmap closed the gap between a project's initial budget and its real cost. Now let's join Gerald Shield, senior vice president and CIO of Alfac.
Who would think that TV commercial featuring the antics of a wisecracking duck could improve a company's brand recognition by 90 percent? That's what a few quacks did for Aflac, a Fortune 500 disability insurance company. Now, Aflac associates have no trouble getting accepted into new business accounts. The payoff has meant a double digit annual growth rate since 2003, and there's no end in sight. For 2008, Aflac had revenue of about $16.5 billion and more than 8,000 employees. The company insured more than40 million people in North American and Japan.
Of course, Aflac isn't resting on Nielsen ratings from the TV commercials to stay competitive. Accelerating growth continue to drive IT to find ways key departments can provide better value and services to external customers. In fact, in 2008, Gerald Shields, Aflac's senior vice president and CIO, received an InfoWorld CTO 25 for adding a future IT projects roadmap into the company's existing IT governance process. Shields says that this roadmap has helped to close the gap between a project's initial budget and its real cost.” During Shield's tenure, both Computerworld and InformationWeek 500 have consistently named Aflac as one of the Best Places to Work in IT. Meanwhile, he was also selected as one of Computerworld's 100 Premier CIOs for 2006.
In this podcast, Shields talks about the following:
- How the future IT projects roadmap has helped to improve IT's relationship with the CIO,
- What payoffs the company has received from doing this type of roadmap,
- How the future IT projects roadmap has changed the governance process,
- What other CIOs can learn from the Aflac experience,
- How Shield's measures and communicates the business impact of IT to Aflac's constituents.
Bio
Gerald Shields joined Aflac Inc. in 2002 as vice president, IT enterprise services. He was promoted to senior vice president, CIO in 2004. Before joining Aflac, Shields served as CTO, and director of information services for LifeWay Christian Resources and held senior IT positions at Electronic Data Systems (EDS). He holds bachelors degrees from Baylor University in accounting and computer science. He also holds a Fellow Life Management Institute certification from the Life Office Management Association.
Resources
2008 InfoWorld CTO 25: Gerald Shields, Aflac, Infoworld
http://www.infoworld.com/d/adventures-in-it/2008-infoworld-cto-25-gerald-shields-aflac-838
Symantec Podcast with Gerald Shields, Aflac
http://www.symantec.com/podcasts/detail.jsp?podid=ent_aflac
Balancing Act - How Aflac keeps the lights on while finding time—and funding—for IT innovation, Smart Enterprise
http://www.smartenterprisemag.com/articles/2007spring/casestudy.jhtml
Production Credits
Elizabeth Ferrarini, Executive Producer
Tom Parish, Host and Audio Producer
Audio Editing by Doug Marcis
