The MassTLC Tech Top 50 celebrates tech companies and leaders across the region who have made a significant impact in the community during the past 12 month. This year, we are excited to recognize winners across 11 categories: Business Accomplishment, Environmental Impact, Leadership, Mosaic (for DEI leadership), Social Responsibility Impact, and the Technology of the Year categories: Advanced Manufacturing, Clean Tech, Consumer Tech, Cybersecurity, Healthcare Tech, and Robotics.
Forty-nine honorees were chosen across these categories, with the final recognition, the Commonwealth Award, given to industry pioneer and co-creator of the spreadsheet, Dan Bricklin. View the full list of Tech Top 50 winners, here.
Over the course of the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing more about each of the recipients to spotlight their accomplishments and their impact on customers, partners, employees, and the broader community.
Today, meet MassMutural’s Luis Alvarez and Patrice Saviano, two of this year’s Mosaic Award honorees.
At MassMutual, Alvarez is Digital Lead for MM.Com & Distribution and Saviana is the Digital Lead for Strategy and Planning
MassMutual is a leading mutual life insurance company that is run for the benefit of its members and participating policyowners. Founded in 1851, the company has been continually guided by one consistent purpose: we help people secure their future and protect the ones they love. With a focus on delivering long-term value, MassMutual offers a wide range of protection, accumulation, wealth management and retirement products and services.
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What programs or policies have these individuals created in the past year that have made a meaningful impact in their company’s development of a more equitable, inclusive, and diverse tech workforce?
The competitive and evolving nature of the recruiting market over the past year means we employ multiple innovative approaches to identify and recruit a diverse talent pool, especially when it comes to software engineers. While our team implemented tactics to not only attract but also retain engineers, Luis Alvarez and Patrice Saviano developed a concept for us to hire talented candidates who are early in their career and/or exhibit the right approaches and foundational experiences needed to succeed but had less formal work experience. The intent of the program they helped create is to hire a cohort of engineers who work on concentrated technical training and onboarding for their first six weeks of employment followed by ongoing training and development during the first year.
The program is a sustainable training vehicle that can be leveraged to nurture software engineers in their first year at MassMutual by equipping them with the skills to produce quality applications through accelerated training. The result is a learning community that welcomes new developers into our culture and teaches them to engage software engineering best practices. The program also provides senior engineers the opportunity to coach and develop participants.
The first cohort launched late this spring, including six participants from different backgrounds and an array of past experiences. Luis and Patrice were instrumental in taking this concept from idea to reality, from developing a proposal to engaging key stakeholders and launching the pilot. Feedback from the participants of the program is widely positive so far and our senior engineers value the chance to be involved as coaches. Most recently, program participants were able to present their work to members of the broader team. Overall, the program offers experience, exposure, and education across a variety of forums to set participants up for success in their roles at MassMutual.
What impact did these accomplishments have on your company?
There are several outcomes of the program’s first cohort launch:
- MassMutual hired a cohort of six exceptional employees who may otherwise not have had the employment opportunity due to less formal work experience.
- Participants of the program were afforded an inclusive, enriched, experiential onboarding experience along with exposure to individuals on the broader team.
- Participants got the chance to present their work through project demos to the broader team resulting in exposure and learning opportunities.
- Several senior engineers were provided with the opportunity to mentor and coach the six participants, creating a 360-degree experience.
- Participants are positioned to add value to their team within their first three months of hire; within one year, they will be qualified to advance to the applicable next level based on their performance.
- The program will contribute to elevating performance and expectations for entry level engineers.
- This program has contributed to the unity, collaboration, and inclusion that are key elements of our tech teams’ culture.
What does it mean to be recognized with the other Tech Top 50 honorees?
Patrice Saviano: “I am honored to be recognized in this group of leaders. At MassMutual, our efforts for a more equitable, inclusive, and diverse organization are truly a team effort. I am proud to be a part of these efforts and witness the organization rallying around progress. I share this honor with a group of great individuals who make this an important part of their work.”
Luis Alvarez: “It means that I have been given the gift of representing a team that has as its modus operandi inclusion, striving toward our mission of helping people secure their future and protect the ones they love. In our case, this is via digital experience. The work we did in this program was absolutely a group effort. I am appreciative of the team as well as Head of Experience Keia Cole for her excellent support and encouragement to launch the project at a critical time.”
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Congraulations to Luis Alvarez and Patrice Saviano!
