Navigating the digital transition: Empowering new hires

In the rapidly evolving landscape of the insurance industry, keeping pace with technological advancements poses a significant challenge, especially when it comes to onboarding new employees. As companies grapple with the daunting task of training staff without a standard operating procedure manual, this question arises: How can organizations ensure that newly hired individuals, from receptionists to seasoned professionals, swiftly adapt to complex tech ecosystems?

I had the opportunity to reach out to Angie Hughes, who is a managing partner at Producers XL.

Leibow: How does a brokerage general agency keep staff and, more importantly, newly hired staff, up on all the tech going on in the insurance industry?

Hughes: This can certainly pose a challenge, as who would want to apply for a position that simply states. ‘We can’t train you fast enough or give you a standard operating procedure manual, but come join our team as it’s sure to be one heck of a ride!’

We recently hired someone to be our receptionist after the employee who had that job for almost 30 years decided to retire. (How many agencies see that kind of tenure?)  Replacing our long-term receptionist is no easy task because, as we like to say, she has all the keys and knows where all the skeletons are! Meaning, how do you take 30 years of experience with life insurance case management, policyholder service work and many other duties and bring a new employee up to speed in a couple of months? Technology, that’s how.

Leibow: How often does technology come into play?

Hughes: We use tech daily, if not by the minute, from vendors like Ipipeline and  Stratecision for quoting and forms, and we also use some proprietary tech for drop ticket term life, and search and save tech for Medicare sales. We also have tech for licensing and contracting for the purpose of getting the correct contracting to various insurance companies to get agents and advisors appointed.

Leibow: What’s the most effective way to teach a new hire?

Hughes: Tech is fantastic but takes time to learn. The best way to get success for new hires is the “wash, rinse, repeat” method, which simply means do it often and you’ll create muscle memory on the steps to achieve the goal. That’s not so easy when having to engage with all the various product lines such as life insurance, Medicare, long-term care and so on. Some of this requires going into each carrier’s website and using their site resources. Quite frankly, the agents must learn those as well because most carriers are no longer supplying paper commission statements, but instead, you go grab them from your respective carrier as you are paid.

Tech is key but also a pain point. Start slow but run the race fast with efficiency and accuracy and you will finish the race a success!

AI must be in an organization’s DNA

I recently read the book “DNAI: Enable Sustained AI Success by Splicing AI Into Your Organization’s DNA,”  written by my good friend Kartik Sakthivel, who is the chief information officer at LIMRA. He told me that success among carriers around technology and skills needed for their teams with their trading partners across the ecosystem is usually predicated on organizational culture and underlying business processes, and then secondarily around an organization’s technology footprint. 

Here are more of his insights.

The People / Process / Technology Framework is highly popular across industries to maximize efficiency of their processes, ensuring the right tools are available for enabling organizational processes and that the people enabling this work can seamlessly interact with these tools, operating within the bounds of these defined processes. The reason that these best practices are developed around the PPT framework is simply because this framework is ubiquitous and commonplace across organizations regardless of industry. Firms look at most strategic programs through the lens of people, process and technology, a practice that has yielded success over many decades. Especially important in the AI age, the PPT framework can greatly assist in ensuring organizational success regardless of what type of digital transformations organizations are undertaking. 

There are few key things carriers should consider in implementing the PPT, writes Sakthivel.

1. Industry domain knowledge (people): Several mature and established industries struggle with attracting and retaining talent. With an aging existing workforce, companies seek to attract employees from different industries and sectors into their industry. 

Not having been exposed to the new industries that they are entering, new employees enter these organizations with fresh ideas and innovative thinking but lack the industry technical knowledge to put these innovative ideas into practice. This causes these individuals to drop out of that industry, leading to retention challenges. These retention challenges, in turn, result in companies seeking to bring in talent from outside the industry, in an infinitely repeating closed loop. Industry education via LOMA educational programs is a wonderful opportunity for the industry to invest in developing industry domain knowledge.

2. Knowledge sharing across the enterprise (people): Most companies across established industries have traditionally been operating in digital silos. Even within a specific line of business, opportunities to share and apply best practices have historically been limited. These limitations are often self-imposed, exacerbated by disparate systems, distinct processes and a general reluctance to change when dealing with cross-functional departments. 

A fundamental facet of enabling an enterprise technology strategy is to effectively traverse horizontally across your organizational value chain. It will therefore be important to share information and best practices within a line of business, and just as important to share across lines of business. Within large organizations with multiple lines of business, one line of business could greatly benefit in learning from another line of business. One line of business in an organization might have experienced challenges and growing pains that could inform strategies for the departmental digital strategy of another line of business. 

Groups that are further ahead in their implementations might have developed a robust set of best practices that can be effectively applied in a turnkey manner within the same organization due to enterprise-level similarities. Without an intentional approach to facilitate knowledge sharing across an organization or be these opportunities might go unnoticed, underleveraged and undercapitalized. Taken in aggregate, not being able to freely disseminate information across a company can be detrimental to the company’s operational efficiencies and mitigate achievement of scope and scale economies.

3. Documented, repeatable technology provider selection processes (process): There often is no standard and repeatable process on how firms select technology providers. Regardless of whether a company chooses to pursue the “build” model and simply use a technology provider, or if they pursue a partnership with a full-service technology provider, the choice of selecting a specific provider is not a repeatable process that an organization can follow. 

Although firms tend to heed the guidance of their external consultants, reinsurers or technology partners, understanding what makes a specific technology provider stand out versus others, will be important going forward.

4. Standard IT-supported technology stack (technology): Most organizations, regardless of size, could have an onerous number of platforms and technologies. Not only do companies struggle with managing technical debt and legacy systems, but most companies’ IT providers also contend with a measurable number of non-IT-owned, -built, -supported or -governed platforms that business users have developed and maintain. 

These “IT cottage industries” not only pose an operational and potential cybersecurity risk, but they also stand contrary to the cause of standardization and establishment of repeatable processes with predictable outcomes. 

Departments such as data analytics and data science seek to prove the efficacy of their hypotheses and models by building tools and by experimentation. This experimentation often leads to these groups developing niche products, sometimes using unsupported platforms and technology, and institutionalizing these platforms within their departments. As organizations develop their enterprise technology road maps, it will be incumbent upon the chief information officer, the chief technology officer, the chief information security officer and the chief enterprise architect of these firms to publish and govern the technology stack that is supported by the firm’s IT group.

It’s a symbiotic relationship

In summing up, navigating the digital transformation within the insurance sector requires a nuanced understanding of the symbiotic relationship between people, processes and technology. The journey toward technological adaptability and efficiency isn’t only about implementing the latest tools but also about cultivating an environment where continuous learning, knowledge sharing and process optimization thrive.

By embracing the people/process/technology framework, organizations can not only enhance their operational effectiveness but also create a dynamic workspace that attracts and retains the best talent. The future of insurance is undeniably digital, and those who invest in empowering their workforce through these three pivotal pillars will lead the charge toward a more resilient, innovative and successful industry.

Ken Leibow is CEO of InsurTech Express. He has more than 30 years of insurance industry experience, with an extensive background in insurance technology for distribution and back office systems. Before founding InsurTech Express, Leibow worked for Genworth Financial, Mutual of Omaha, and as vice president of operations at Diversified Underwriters Services. Ken is a leader for industry technology standards, working with ACORD, LBTC, LIDMA, NAILBA, LIMRA, LOMA and IRI. He can be reached at [email protected].