FWD GROUP
“ The talk was about consumer experience, not just customer experience,” he notes.“ Understanding how consumers interact with products comes naturally to me, which helps when addressing customer experience in insurance.”
Sandeep’ s time at an insurance company during the global financial crisis proved particularly formative, teaching him valuable lessons about leadership during challenging times. The experience reinforced his belief in what he calls the three essentials of leadership.
“ You’ ve got to be clear as a leader, you’ ve got to be courageous as a leader, but you cannot forget the humanity side of it,” Sandeep explains.“ That’ s what drives me every day.”
When Sandeep joined FWD in September 2020, he identified significant opportunities to enhance the company’ s technological capabilities.
He quickly developed a strategic framework that would guide the transformation efforts.
“ I created a three-six-twelve strategy – three strategic pillars, six objectives and twelve goals,” he says.“ The three strategic pillars were protecting FWD for our customers and colleagues, delivering change faster and putting technology at the heart of decision-making.”
Cloud transformation provides foundation for innovation Central to this strategy was an ambitious cloud transformation. As of 31 December 2024, 98 % of FWD’ s applications were migrated to the cloud.
“ It has been a tremendous journey. Cloud technology has positively impacted our software development and deployment, expediting time-to-market and enhancing customer experiences.”
This wasn’ t a simple‘ lift and shift’ operation, but a comprehensive rationalisation of the company’ s application architecture. The approach has earned FWD numerous awards and established a foundation for further innovation.
The FWD three-six-twelve strategy
6 fwd. com