Know the ultimate goal

It can be difficult to take a top-down, cross-functional view of operations transformation with the insurance business being so highly matrixed. The structure of how things are done—from the day-to-day to the strategic—perpetuates silos between functions and business lines. And legal, compliance and security requirements complicate the picture. As such, insurers tend toward an incremental approach to improving operations, which leads to fragmentation of processes and prevents meaningful productivity and business improvements.

But leading insurers are recognizing that incrementalism is holding them back. Those that use scale and intelligent operations can take a much more holistic approach. Not only can they improve experiences and outcomes in the process, they can also transform the cost curve.

Insurers need a “North Star” that defines their goal for reaching future-ready operations. This should be stakeholder experience strategy. It is something that future-ready insurers have in wide use or at scale, and something other insurers need to improve.

Why stakeholder experience? With the risk of insurance products becoming commodities—and with experience dynamos disrupting the industry—traditional players have to improve experience to compete. This is experience broadly defined. It is customer experience that cultivates loyalty. It is employee experience that drives retention and acquisition. And it is partner and supplier experience that fuels a strong ecosystem.

Technology naturally has a key role in operations transformation. Advancing the operating model through technology is about more than the technology itself. Technology is an enabler for insurers—a means to change.

Progress happens when business and technology come together through developing joint governance models, by aligning and integrating ecosystem partners, and by co-creating the strategic roadmap so that technology investments align with the business strategy. This is how insurers know that they are investing in technology that is truly useful to the business. It is why they need to scale business-technology collaboration.