Peter B. Nichol, Director IT | Head of IT at Connecticut Health Insurance Exchange (CTHIX) supports a vision of increasing the number of insured Connecticut residents, Nichol oversees the CTHIX Application & System Portfolio. Achieving business and technology excellence Connecticut was the first state in the country to not only meet but to surpass the enrollment goal established by the Congressional Budget Office for ACA, today proudly with 134,000 residents enrolled.
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Health insurance Market News: What path did you take to your present position? Was it the career path you envisioned when you started?
Peter B. Nichol: In the mid 1990’s I started out working directly for the CEO of Arthur D. Little. This provided me excellent exposure early in my career to understand how a truly customer centric model operates at a leadership level. As I grew my responsibility and accountability over the next years a common theme was and has always been that I only work with employers where I felt I could make a huge difference.
The Connecticut Health Insurance Exchange has been very rewarding. I joined in late 2012, brought onboard by the Chief Information Officer and together we have done amazing things for Connecticut. For me it’s all about making a difference. I don’t mean just putting in cool technology, I’m talking about leading a team on Saturday to build functionality that will help a mother and daughter get insurance coverage on Monday and have that doctor appointment they desperately need. Real value that is changing people’s lives: powerful stuff.
Was this the career path I envisioned? Absolutely! I’m very proud to be part of a great visionary leadership team with a proven ability to execute on that vision.
Health insurance Market News: What occupies a typical day or week for you? What functions, activities and workload are you typically engaged in?
Peter B. Nichol: A typical day is only consistent by the high degree of change that occurs daily.
It could look like this:
- On the ride into the office I call 2-3 engagement directors get status. Before stepping into the office, I understand all key issues and new fire drills impacting business operations.
- I connect with CIO first and tie off regarding any critical topics. Then I focus alone quietly for one hour of strategic planning anticipating challenges 1-3 months out while white boarding and verbally defining solid footing to help the team advance.
- Then spend an hour to true up the enterprise IT Capital Budget and reaching out to agencies to ensure funding boundaries and service levels are clearly defined.
- By 11am, I’m on my second cup of coffee and doing a walk-n-talk meeting, with business or technology leaders on the top 3 priorities of the week. IT PMO and Operations PMO meetings consume my time late into the afternoon.
- When I finally free up it is 5:30pm, and I hold a meeting with the systems integrator to tie out on status and the direction I provided in the morning. The last schedule discussion wraps at 7pm, and I do 1 hour of close out by planning the next day’s critical items.
- As this repeats through Sunday I tie out with the CIO, going into the next Monday in sync and my week wraps up with 70hrs invested ensuring our customers have the best experience possible!