Lauren Dieterich, chief operating officer at Arch Insurance North America, holds over 20 years of specialty insurance experience and leadership.
After earning her degree in electrical engineering and computer science from Duke University, Dieterich began her career in information technology at AIG. For over fifteen years, she held several roles in commercial underwriting and management at American International Group (AIG) Insurance.
While she enjoyed her work in underwriting, Dieterich had an affinity for problem solving and wanted to apply her skills and expertise in new ways.
"I found that what I was really passionate about is how to use best practices and technology to make my teams more efficient, and I was looking for opportunities to improve capabilities across the enterprise," Dieterich explained, "I made what was a very hard decision for me, at the time, to leave underwriting and move into operations."
Prior to her current role, Dieterich was head of operations and digital of surplus and specialty lines at Crum & Forster Insurance. In Jan. 2023, she joined Arch at a pivotal time for the insurer. Dieterich explained that Arch had recognized a crucial need to build scalable operations within the company and created a new role, COO, to focus on optimizing its underwriting operations.
"It was a fantastic match with my background and my interests, and I continue to feel that now. This role allows me to bring my technology, underwriting and operations experience together to define a strategic vision to propel us into the future and deliver value to the organization," said Dieterich.
As head of Arch's operations, she is responsible for leading efforts to improve underwriter productivity and capability, optimize strategic projects and IT projects, and ensure both customer and employee satisfaction. In her role as chief operating officer, Dieterich has already made a significant impact on Arch's digital transformation strategy, developing the company's operational model and organizational structure. She created four key verticals–people, process, technology and data–each with specialized focus and capabilities.
She is also focused on improving Arch's underwriting service quality and efficiency by standardizing and automating processes across underwriting groups. Under her leadership, Arch implemented new modular tech solutions and tools that enable scalability and flexibility.
Dieterich started by defining Arch's Underwriting Technology Ecosystem North Star, which is a united future vision of the architecture needed to drive scalable technology across the underwriting enterprise.. Dieterich then established a focused portfolio of prioritized initiatives for executing the organization's strategies in underwriting and technology which simultaneously advances the enterprise toward the North Star.
"Defining that vision has been very helpful in identifying where we were gapped and what we needed to build that we didn't have, as well as where we had multiple systems doing the same thing that we could instead consolidate to a more enterprise platform. Setting that North Star has been incredibly valuable for all our teams to align our efforts."
Learning from personal experience, Dieterich would advise other insurance professionals to embrace taking career risks and pursuing your passions.
"You really have to own your career and seek out opportunities for change when you feel like you're ready for change. It was very important to be honest with myself about what challenges were most exciting," she said.
"Have those gut checks with yourself about what you are most interested in pursuing, and don't just stay on a track because you think that's just the path ahead of you," explained Dieterich. "All careers can take twists and turns, and lateral moves can be equally interesting and potentially provide more growth than something that might look like the next step in the track that you're on. Know what your interests are, take action towards those and don't be afraid of it."
Beyond her role with Arch, Dieterich also demonstrates an avid commitment to mentorship and women empowerment within the insurance industry. She is a committee member for the New Jersey chapter of the
Dieterich is also a member of the
