THE INSURANCE SECTOR IS BEING DIGITALLY DISRUPTED: BUT IS IT READY?

Nick Taylor, Senior Key Account Manager at Jamf

 

The insurance sector is being disrupted by innovative technologies that are helping to drive digital transformation within the industry. The global Covid-19 pandemic forced the sector to temporarily let go of traditional working models and implement remote working approaches so that employees continued supporting customers while at home.

The move to remote working has encouraged legacy insurance companies to rethink and digitise services to keep up with challenger Insurtech brands. As they continue to pick up pace, traditional insurance businesses are keeping their eyes firmly on the prize, using technology trends such as IT consumerisation, AI and IoT, to spur new creative offerings. But are they ready for a permanent change?

 

Facing up to challenges

While insurers tapped into innovative emerging technology trends to create new services for customers and improve employee experience, there continues to be residual pushback. In a recent risk management study by Deloitte, more than two-thirds of individuals believed the use of emerging technologies, such as big data and analytics, could dramatically increase performance in their organisations. Yet just 29% of organisations are deploying these tools.

To remain agile, the insurance industry will need to find ways to address this gap in 2021. According to Gartner, barriers ‘often have little to do with how different a technology is.’ They stem from low employee utilisation, a lack of visibility into technology investments and regulatory red tape.

 

Improving technology adoption 

A common challenge to adopting emerging technologies is the lack of skill and familiarity in using new tools – not the tool itself. As insurers look to change their working approaches following the pandemic, they should give employees the devices they are most familiar with to remain productive in their new working environments. According to PWC, 78% of millennials believe having access to the technology they like at work makes them more effective. Not only does this save on time but employee-choice programs will also create new benefits such as increased employee engagement, retention and recruitment.

IT consumerisation has enabled the most loved technology providers, such as Apple, to support employees as well as businesses. The influx of Apple’s iPhone, Mac and iPad is directly influencing business productivity as there are now more than 235,000 business apps available in Apple’s App Store, according to Strategy Analytics.

IT teams will save precious time and effort by utilising the existing built-in native apps that support businesses. For example, Apple Business Manager provides zero-touch deployment and configuration for thousands of employee devices. Teamed with an Apple Enterprise Management platform,  IT can remotely personalise each device with the tools that employees need to deliver work more efficiently such as claims and data-entry processing.

The insurance sector should also utilise existing advice channels and resources to get best practice advice. Apple is one of the few providers to have created a hand-picked task force of partners in mobile strategy, app development and back-end system integration, that businesses can call upon to maximise their Apple hardware, software and service investments.

 

It’s all about balance

The need for improved underwriting efficiency and data quality within the insurance world has meant insurers must find ways to be both operationally fast and water-tight in managing confidential customer information in 2021. Errors result in breaches, heavy fines, loss of customer trust, reputational damage and even jail sentences.

IT must have a single-pane view of all devices to reduce the risk of a breach and manage hundreds of devices, each with its own personalised inventory of apps. An enterprise management solution enables IT to manage data access by delivering specific permissions to apps, files and tools for the employee to remain productive.

 

Cut the red tape

Regulatory red tape is a barrier to the adoption of emerging technology. Businesses do not want to lose valuable time and effort in introducing new technologies that need to be assessed and measured against the latest compliance requirements. To encourage businesses to find new ways of working and remain secure, the Centre for Internet Security (CIS) has created a set of 20 security controls to follow. Commonly known as the CIS 20 standard, the controls help businesses walk through recommended steps such as updating software, logging and auditing, managing user environments and system access.

Since employee experience is paramount to the successful adoption of emerging technology, Apple Enterprise Management platform solutions make the roll-out of comprehensive compliance and benchmark requirements simple and less intrusive. With a few clicks, the IT team can confirm each device adheres to the security standards and remains compliant at any time. Dated software can be updated by employees and the IT team can ensure the most sensitive information is protected with the latest versions and updates. When regulations change, insurers can add in and deploy new requirements through the platform without wasting time.

 

Long-term benefits

Insurers around the world experienced a surge in motor, home and consumer goods claims during the first wave of the pandemic as more people relied on and invested in personal transportation and online shopping.  According to KPMG, UK insurers also offered free motor and enhanced home cover for National Health Service (NHS) workers, and extended business cover to support employees working from home. As customer support lines collapsed under the sheer volume of calls, the insurance sector went online to reserve phone communication for the most urgent.

Consumer demand for accessible innovative new services will continue to be a key focus for many in the sector who need to make up for the lost time. This is where remaining agile will be imperative or insurers will find themselves losing out to the competition.

Digital services, made possible through AI, IoT and data analytics, deliver instantaneous, richer, and more meaningful insights for insurers to create unique and personalised covers. They enable employees to produce results quickly and draw in new revenue streams, without the need to rip-and-replace existing technology.

Through the provisioning of local user accounts and simple password synchronisation of cloud services, insurers will help employees achieve multi-factor authentication and single sign-on. A single set of cloud identity credentials reduces disruption in creating new passwords requests and empowers employees to tap into new tools more quickly.

 

Looking into the future

The 2020 world health crisis drove many businesses, including the insurance sector, to work remotely to survive. And while the road to recovery will take time, it has encouraged them to re-evaluate their long-term working environments and investments to remain agile. Despite uncertainties, businesses are now looking to create hybrid working environments where they can occasionally untether from the office as a way to continue improved experience and productivity levels. A recent report by PwC suggests that splitting time between the office and home is expected to become the new normal.

Why go back to the way things were when there are more benefits to be had in this new normal? Through an enterprise management platform and native productivity apps, it’ll be a win-win situation where employees remain positive, IT ensures its technology investments are fully utilised, and the business remains protected, reaping the benefits of new services and improved engagement with employees and customers alike.

 

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