IDG’s CIO
has announced that both TIAA and Nuveen, the investment manager of TIAA,
are recipients of 2019 CIO 100 awards. The 32nd Annual Awards Program
recognizes 100 organizations around the world that exemplify the highest
level of operational and strategic excellence in information technology
(IT).
TIAA was recognized for Refactor, an innovative approach to how the firm
designs, builds and delivers software. By leveraging emerging concepts,
a team of developers created virtual product interfaces that enable
straight-through processing for operational teams, reducing time to
market and resulting in cost savings for the firm’s institutional
clients. TIAA was also recognized in 2018
for its industry-leading use of predictive technologies.
Nuveen was recognized for its proprietary Responsible Investment (RI)
platform, which enables portfolio managers and analysts to seamlessly include
the environmental, social and governance (ESG) aspects of target
securities in their investment decision-making. This pioneering platform
centralizes, standardizes and manages Nuveen’s RI intellectual property.
“We are extremely pleased to receive two CIO 100 Awards for innovative
technologies that positively impact customers across the enterprise,”
said Rahul Merchant, Senior EVP, Head of Client Services & Technology at
TIAA. “This is a great testament to the progress our teams have made to
drive innovation and continually enhance our tools, processes and
capabilities.”
“Across the business landscape, companies everywhere recognize the vital
role that an innovative, value-driven approach to information technology
plays in their success,” said Maryfran Johnson, IDG’s Executive Director
of CIO Programs. “This year’s CIO 100 winning companies are inspiring
examples of how IT leadership, business collaboration and digital
transformation will drive future growth.”
More on Refactor
The Refactor strategy was executed by small, cross-functional and
cross-organizational teams following a Scaled Agile Framework
methodology. They worked alongside their business counterparts to define
35 success metrics across seven dimensions to ensure the solution would
scale all aspects of the business’ needs. More than 70 fundamental
changes affected how the teams built their digital solutions, which
enabled the delivery of this solution swiftly, while meeting their
quantified goals.
“Through the Refactor project, the TIAA team made significant strides in
improving operating efficiency and the overall customer experience,
while implementing scalable concepts that are now being applied
enterprise-wide to reduce time and radically increase performance and
quality,” said Alex Pecoraro, Managing Director and Head of Retirement
Services Technology at TIAA.
Refactor has enhanced TIAA’s development methods, with a 50 percent
improvement in cycle-time for onboarding new products and services.
Other benefits include:
- Time to onboard the first 25 clients: 5x faster
- Deployments: 50x faster
- Quality validation: 50,000x faster
- Typical onboarding time: 2.5x faster
- Processing time: 200x faster
More on the Responsible Investment Platform
Nuveen’s flagship RI platform delivers on TIAA’s promise of making an
impact on society by integrating environmental, social and governance
(ESG) factors into Nuveen’s investment decisions. It provides a
centralized repository of ESG knowledge, data, risk metrics, indices and
analytics. This information is used by portfolio managers and analysts
to drive positive environmental and social impacts through investing
practices.
“The RI platform brings big data technology together with Nuveen’s
nearly 50 years of experience in ESG investing,” said Santanu Sengupta,
Managing Director, Innovation and Decision Sciences Technology at
Nuveen. “It helps influence corporate governance and operational
decisions, while solving complex workflow challenges that include
consolidating multiple user interfaces and data access channels to
reduce research time and develop new investment management and financial
insights.”
The platform’s research and analytics function can assess asset classes
including public equity, fixed income, municipal bonds, and real assets
like timber, agriculture and real estate, and alternatives like private
equity. It enables Nuveen to identify potential ESG risks and
opportunities to achieve competitive investment results for clients. The
platform accelerates Nuveen’s long-time commitment to responsible
investing by applying RI principles across the full scope of assets
under management. It helps the firm seek better outcomes for investors,
communities and our planet.
About the CIO 100 Awards
The annual CIO 100 Awards celebrate 100 organizations and the teams
within them that are using IT in innovative ways to deliver business
value, whether by creating competitive advantage, optimizing business
processes, enabling growth or improving relationships with customers.
The award is an acknowledged mark of enterprise excellence. Recipients
are selected through a three-step process. First, companies fill out an
online application form detailing an innovative IT and business
initiative. Next, a team of external judges (many of them former CIOs)
reviews the applications in depth, looking for leading-edge IT practices
and measurable results. Finally, CIO editors review the judges’
recommendations and select the final 100.
About TIAA
With an award-winning1 track record for consistent investment
performance, TIAA (TIAA.org) is the leading provider of financial
services in the academic, research, medical, cultural and government
fields. TIAA has nearly $1 trillion in assets under management (as of
12/31/20182) and offers a wide range of financial solutions,
including investing, banking, advice and education, and retirement
services.
About Nuveen
Nuveen, the investment manager of TIAA, offers a comprehensive range of
outcome-focused investment solutions designed to secure the long-term
financial goals of institutional and individual investors. Nuveen has
$989 billion in assets under management as of 31 March 2019 and
operations in 23 countries. Its affiliates offer deep expertise across a
comprehensive range of traditional and alternative investments through a
wide array of vehicles and customized strategies. For more information,
please visit www.nuveen.com.
About CIO
CIO focuses on attracting the highest concentration of enterprise CIOs
and business technology executives with unparalleled peer insight and
expertise on business strategy, innovation, and leadership. As
organizations grow with digital transformation, CIO provides its readers
with key insights on career development, including certifications,
hiring practices and skills development. The award-winning CIO portfolio
— CIO.com, CIO Events, CIO Strategic Marketing Services, CIO Forum on
LinkedIn, CIO Executive Council and CIO primary research — provides
business technology leaders with analysis and insight on information
technology trends and a keen understanding of IT’s role in achieving
business goals. CIO is published by IDG Communications, Inc. Company
information is available at www.idg.com.
1 The Lipper Mixed-Assets Large Fund Award is given to the group with
the lowest average decile ranking of three years’ Consistent Return for
eligible funds over the three-year period ended 11/30/15 (against 39
fund families), 11/30/16 (36), 11/30/17 (35) and 11/30/18 (35). Note
this award pertains to mixed-assets mutual funds within the TIAA-CREF
group of mutual funds; other funds distributed by Nuveen Securities were
not included. From Thomson Reuters Lipper Awards, © 2019 Thomson
Reuters. All rights reserved. Used by permission and protected by the
Copyright Laws of the United States. The printing, copying,
redistribution, or retransmission of this Content without express
written permission is prohibited. Certain funds have fee waivers in
effect. Without such waivers ratings could be lower. Past performance
does not guarantee future results. For current performance, rankings and
prospectuses, please visit the Research and Performance section on
TIAA.org. The investment advisory services, strategies and expertise of
TIAA Investments, a division of Nuveen, are provided by Teachers
Advisors, LLC and TIAA-CREF Investment Management, LLC. TIAA-CREF
Individual & Institutional Services, LLC, Teachers Personal Investors
Services, Inc., and Nuveen Securities, LLC, Members FINRA and SIPC,
distribute securities products.
2 Based on
$970 billion of assets under management across Nuveen Investments
affiliates and TIAA investment management teams as of 12/31/18.
836302
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