Top IT executives are cherished by their companies today. Over the years, they've been forced to demonstrate their value. Many have risen to the occasion; others did not.

It is easy to find the companies with good IT leaders—they are the successful companies.

Successful IT leaders have grown hand-in-hand with the technology solutions that enable insurance carriers to achieve success in their market. It is possible for companies to have success with good technology in place and less than adequate leadership, but success is even more likely when you have good IT leaders in place.

That's because good IT leaders prove every day that they can bring value to carriers even while working with antiquated systems. The right combination of leadership and technology sets companies apart, though, and that's what the five executives we are featuring as the 2011 Insurance IT All-Stars have in common.

2011 Insurance IT All-Star: Judith Haddad

Judith Haddad knows there is a specific goal in mind for Patriot National Insurance Group, a workers' comp carrier located in Florida. 

“We want to think of premier solutions and be creative when it comes to our industry”, she says.

2011 Insurance IT All-Star: Larry Fortin

Larry Fortin believes many changes are in store for IT leaders over the next five years, but given the insurance industry's market cycle and the normal domestic economic cycle, speculation on those changes amounts to simply guesswork.

2011 Insurance IT All-Star: John Campbell

The pace of change in technology is faster than at any time in John Campbell's 35-year career as an IT leader. To address the brave new world of insurance IT, Campbell, senior vice president and CIO of American Modern Insurance Group, feels it is important to have what he calls “vision-inspired leadership.”

2011 Insurance IT All-Star: Joan Falcetta

Joan Falcetta has held a variety of positions within the IT operations of MetLife over her 23-year career with the financial services leader—both on the technical side and in leadership positions—but of the technical roles the one she loved the most was that of a data architect.

2011 Insurance IT All-Stars: Carlos Correa

Carlos Correa may not be the first person who asked the question, but in a varied career that has crossed from finance to operations and finally to IT, he says he still wonders, “Do people really pick insurance or do you kind of just go there?”

For a look pack at previous Insurance IT All stars here are the features from 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010.