1. Tell us about your background and how your role at Allstate fits into your career story
I joined Allstate almost 22 years ago as a 'Data entry analyst.' The company has certainly transformed and evolved significantly throughout my tenure. My career has been built around leading large-scale service operations and continuously improving customer and employee experience. Over time, I've evolved from managing frontline delivery into leading more complex, strategic service functions, where the focus is on end-to-end performance and long-term outcomes.
In my current role as a Lead Service Manager, I lead several technology support and operational service functions that help agents and business users interact effectively with technology every day. These roles sit at the intersection of operational excellence and strategic influence, ensuring we deliver high-quality, reliable support while also helping shape how services and digital experiences evolve.
2. What digital product or service are you helping to shape, and why does it matter?
Our primary focus is on shaping the service experience that underpins key digital products, particularly within the Agency channel.
While we don't own products directly, we play a critical role in enabling their success by providing the service layer that supports users when they need assistance.
Within the Agency support channel, this includes driving improvements across:
- Chat and contact channels
- Automation and self-service capabilities
- Knowledge and resolution pathways
The impact is meaningful. This is often the first and most frequent interaction agents have when they encounter friction. By making that experience faster, more intuitive, and increasingly proactive, we directly influence agent productivity, satisfaction, and ultimately customer outcomes.
From a leadership perspective, it's about ensuring our service not only resolves issues, but actively contributes to reducing them at source. Our vision is: "The best tech support is not needing tech support."
3. What's different about working in a product-led model versus traditional IT?
The shift to a product-led model fundamentally changes the role of service management.
Traditionally, service teams were measured on how effectively they responded to demand — resolving incidents and maintaining stability. In a product-led model, we are now embedded within a broader digital ecosystem, working in close partnership with product, engineering, and UX teams.
At a leadership level, this means:
- Moving from reactive demand management to proactive experience improvement
- Using service insights and customer feedback to help shape future improvements
- Driving accountability for both service performance and overall user outcomes
For the Agency channel specifically, it means we're not just managing volume, we're shaping how agents experience our systems and influencing where investment is needed to improve that experience.
4. How has this model helped you grow personally or professionally?
This model has significantly broadened my perspective as a leader.
It has required me to shift from an operational mindset to a more strategic, systems-led approach, understanding how service performance connects to product design, user behaviour, and overall business outcomes.
Key areas of growth for me have included:
- Strengthening my ability to influence across organisational boundaries
- Leveraging data and insights to drive decision-making at a product level
- Leading through change in a more dynamic, cross-functional environment
It's also reinforced the importance of aligning teams around shared goals, particularly in a model where service and product must operate as one to deliver meaningful outcomes.
5. What's one piece of advice you'd give to someone entering tech today?
Focus on developing a strong understanding of how technology and products deliver customer and business value — not just how it works.
In today's environment, success in technology is less about expertise in a single tool and more about understanding systems, user experience, and how to solve problems collaboratively from end to end.
I'd also encourage people to build strong collaboration and communication skills early. The most impactful work now happens in cross-functional teams, where the ability to influence, align, and lead without authority is just as important as technical capability.
Finally, stay adaptable. The pace of change in a product-led environment is significant, and those who are curious, open to learning, and willing to challenge traditional ways of working will have the greatest opportunity to grow.
