Last year, GoHealth made a decision that would ultimately shape the future of the organization.
The company decided to build out a fresh leadership team; one with the foresight and enthusiasm needed to support the organization during its latest transformative phase.
Chief People Officer Alison Moriarty was among the executives chosen to lead this new phase of GoHealth. When she joined the team in March of 2023, she was tasked with helping the company embrace its identity while acclimating to the evolving health insurance industry.
“We’re staying true to our roots in putting our members at the center of everything we do, but we’re elevating our technology and enhancing how we differentiate ourselves from our competitors,” Moriarty said.
In other words, the mission is the same, yet the way in which it will be accomplished has changed.
CTO Jay Sreedharan, who joined the executive team last fall, said his department is developing ways to make the user experience of GoHealth’s digital platform more customer-friendly, building upon the technical foundation that has powered the organization for the past 20 years.
However, it’s one thing to reimagine a decades-old platform — the company must also embrace the latest marketing trends to ensure its enhancements are visible to consumers.
According to CMO Steve Moffat, the company will continuously meet its customers where they are, whether that involves traditional communication tactics or modern strategies. Since joining the company three months ago, he has been eager to see the organization rise up to the challenges presented by an evolving consumer landscape.
“We will innovate and push forward as the world continues to change,” he said.
“We will innovate and push forward as the world continues to change.”
An Enhanced Consumer Experience
GoHealth has been centered in technology since its founding in 2001. Now, Sreedharan said, the company is redefining its foundation by leveraging machine learning models and algorithms to create even better matches between consumers and insurance plans.
Earlier this year, his team also launched an initiative to leverage customer data more effectively. Ultimately, this will allow agents to have more intelligent, personalized conversations with consumers.
Sreedharan added that the company is also improving its Encompass solution, which is intended to help the organization bring other insurance providers onto the platform. The solution, which was launched in 2020, also provides tools and communication resources grounded in values-based care principles.
All of these efforts to amplify GoHealth’s technological capabilities reflect the company’s position in the industry. Moffat compares GoHealths platform to other marketplaces, such as Expedia and Amazon, which aggregate large quantities of high-quality products and serve them up to the right audience at the right time.
“That’s effectively what we’re doing, with an added layer of expert agents who help guide the consumer through the process,” he said.
JOSTLE WITH INDUSTRY GIANTS
Sreedharan considers GoHealth a top destination for tech talent for one main reason: the opportunity to do more. From a marketplace perspective, the company is developing capabilities and technology that rival those of industry leaders, such as Airbnb and Uber. “The problems we’re solving here are very close to what they’re doing in their own marketplaces, whether that’s related to data or machine learning,” Sreedharan explained. This means those who join the team will have the exciting opportunity to work on some of the most cutting-edge advancements in the sector.
‘People Who Simply Care’
When Moriarty asks employees why they joined GoHealth, they often share a story about a loved one who suffered either medically or financially because they couldn’t access the right care.
“People are motivated to fix that problem here,” she said. “That drives a lot of what we do.”
According to Moriarty, the company is filled with “people who simply care,” united by a common desire to solve problems that plague the insurance industry. Employing these types of individuals is critical, she added, given how quickly the company is growing from a technical and marketplace perspective.
“It takes people who can get their hands dirty,” Moriarty said. “There’s no shortage of people who have their sleeves rolled up to their shoulders in terms of managing day-to-day shifts.”
Given the organization’s ongoing change, its leadership team prioritizes transparency and trust, ensuring everyone is aligned through frequent town halls and meetings. Moffat believes this focus on honest communication goes hand in hand with leaders’ eagerness to drive change while embracing the company’s core identity.
“There’s a healthy balance of fresh thinking and an appetite for innovation as well as a reverence and appreciation for all that came before us, which brought the company to where it is today,” he said.
Becoming an Industry Standard
While the consumer marketplace landscape has transformed significantly over the past two decades, there are still gaps in the ways in which consumers access products and services. Sreedharan believes GoHealth can fill them — and become an undisputed leader in its field.
“Nobody has created that frictionless experience for customers yet, and I think that’s our opportunity,” he said “If we do that, our competitors will look at us as an industry standard.”
“Nobody has created that frictionless experience for customers yet — that’s our opportunity.”
This aim to shape the industry is grounded in the company’s commitment to its customers, which is cultivated across every organizational touchpoint, from sales to software development. Given the part every team member plays in accomplishing this, Moriarty considers employee engagement a top priority that the company will focus on moving forward.
“We’re trying to figure out what we can do to make sure that people have what they need to do their jobs in a way that’s most efficient to them, engage with others and really enjoy what they do on a day-to-day basis,” she said.
As the company grows, its leaders are expecting to continuously adapt, whether that involves redefining employee connection or embracing a new marketing strategy. Moffat anticipates that the company’s approach to consumers will look entirely different 10 years from now — and that’s a good thing.
He considers himself lucky to be a part of a generation that gets to witness dynamic growth and is eager to see GoHealth keep up with the times.
“You can’t rest on your laurels,” Moffat said. “You need to be constantly looking around the corner for what’s coming next, and that’s really exciting for me.”
