Director, Business Development - Surety (Large Commercial)

If you’re passionate about helping people protect what matters most to them at a Fortune 100 company with nearly $70 billion in annual sales, as well as innovating and simplifying processes and operations to provide the best customer value, then Nationwide’s Property and Casualty team could be the place for you! At Nationwide®, “on your side” goes beyond just words. Our customers and partners are at the center of everything we do and we’re looking for associates who are passionate about delivering extraordinary care.

Areas of focus for this role:

• Identifying expansion opportunities within the territory by partnering with brokers on new business development, producer planning, and target account strategies.
• Contributing to territory-level business planning by tracking production, visibility, and marketing trends and activities
• Supporting the negotiation and execution of indemnity, collateral, and other risk-mitigation arrangements on larger or more complex accounts
• Providing consultative underwriting guidance and training to newer underwriters on more complex risks, including financial analysis, contract review, backlog/WIP trends, and liquidity considerations
• Monitoring portfolio trends across the territory to identify concentration risk, emerging credit concerns, and close-out strategies
• Coordinating with internal business partners such as Claims, Legal, Finance, Compliance, and Operations on complex account matters and operational processing opportunities
• Maintaining awareness of regional market conditions, industry developments, and competitive dynamics that may affect underwriting strategy within the territory
• Assisting with remediation strategies for stressed or deteriorating accounts, including action planning, communication strategy, and monitoring requirements

The ideal candidate will have experience in the following areas:

• Significant experience in large commercial surety underwriting, including both new business and portfolio management of complex or high-exposure accounts.
• Demonstrated success in territory development and broker distribution management, with the ability to identify expansion opportunities, build producer plans, and develop target account strategies.
• Advanced ability to analyze complex financial statements, including interpretation of profitability, leverage, cash flow, working capital, liquidity, backlog, and work-in-progress trends.
• Experience evaluating credit quality and capacity of privately held and publicly traded companies, including identification of emerging deterioration and concentration risk.
• A CPA designation or experience in financial or credit underwriting is highly transferable to this role.
• Expertise in reviewing bond forms, indemnity agreements, collateral arrangements, and other risk-mitigation structures for larger or more complex accounts.
• Proven ability to structure, negotiate, and recommend underwriting terms that appropriately balance growth objectives with risk discipline.
• Experience monitoring and managing a territory or portfolio of surety business, including trend analysis, close-out strategies, and proactive identification of adverse developments.
• Strong marketing and relationship-management skills, with the ability to serve as a trusted partner to brokers and to influence new business opportunities in a competitive market.

Preferred work location for this role is the Chicagoland area but also open to considering a Minneapolis metropolitan area location.

This role does not qualify for employer-sponsored work authorization. Nationwide does not participate in the Stem OPT Extension program.

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Job Description Summary

Do you thrive in an environment where you can put your critical thinking and communication skills to work every day? Do you appreciate being able to contribute individually as well as collaboratively? Our Surety Underwriting team values initiative, the ambition to grow and learn, a broad skill set that includes everything from marketing to finance to risk analysis and a solutions focused approach. We’re technology savvy and highly motivated to grow our business with excellent career advancement opportunities. If you can see yourself as a member of our team, in a company that wants to grow in this space, then we want to know more about you!
Leads an underwriting team that includes surety territory managers and field underwriters that own the sales and underwriting relationships for a surety book of business. Establishes and main