One of technology’s best promises is democratization–taking specialized capabilities meant for a few people and then making them cheaper, simpler and more accessible to everyone. We’ve seen many examples in modern consumer products, such as computers, cars or even the internet itself. We’re starting to see examples of this in business, as well, such as in healthcare and logistics, and I believe we are on the cusp of a big change in insurance, too.

Although the insurance industry has always been about serving people, both individuals and groups, I think technology hasn’t always made insurance easier and more accessible for everybody. In fact, sometimes it seems to do the opposite. We are an analytics-driven industry, and analytics tools are still very hard to deploy and often harder for ordinary people to use. Most companies still rely on IT or business intelligence (BI) specialists to make sense of data so others can make smarter decisions.

But I think analytics and BI technology are finally catching up to our vision, allowing us to let everyday business users harness the power of data through easier-to-use tools and advanced automation. This is a huge opportunity for our industry, and I think embracing data analytics for all will pave the way for us to make insurance even more transparent and delightful (well, certainly less painful) for all of our customers.

The dream of democratized data in insurance

We have all dreamt of an insurance agency where every employee uses insights from data to make decisions and C-suite executives have on-demand dashboards with updated key performance indicators (KPIs). Line-of-business leaders use weather data to identify geographies potentially exposed to coming storms. Marketing teams combine U.S. Census Bureau data with internal data to discover business opportunities based on demographics and claims information.

At Hastings Mutual, we have finally been able to make this dream a reality, and I know that we aren’t alone.

For us, the key to making this possible has been to rethink how we use analytics in the first place. Like most organizations, we began using analytics by relying on static mainframe reports that had a refresh cycle of 30 to 45 days. Even when we centralized our data into a data warehouse, only IT specialists had the skills to query it. This led to a constant, growing backlog of requests from business users, which was frustrating for everybody involved. IT was exhausted, business users were using data that was already out of date and, of course, our customers and policyholders suffered as a result. No matter how much we tried to streamline the analytics delivery process, we always struggled with that last mile—actually getting the data insights into the hands of the people who needed them.

The revolution has been to take the opposite approach: Use new technology, such as self-service dashboarding tools, embedding and AI, to put the business users first—let them analyze data on their own, wherever they are, in whatever applications they’re already using, without having to first turn to IT, BI specialists or other experts.

In practice, this looks like employees who build their own dashboards, partners who discover opportunities using visualizations embedded into existing portals and policyholders who receive data-driven alerts via email or phone. In short, we put the end user first and bring the data to them, not the other way around.

See also: Setting Goals for Analytics Leaders

Creating insurance opportunities with analytics

It’s understandable that many people wonder if relying on analytics even more will turn insurance into an automated, robotic industry that simply does whatever the data decides is best, but the truth is precisely the opposite. As with computers or the internet, when we put analytics and insights from data into the hands of everyone, we all benefit.

Take something simple like weather data. By combining weather forecasts with maps and policy data, our internal business teams have been able to understand the effects of damaging weather conditions and, importantly, what to do about it. This combination has led to an improved bottom line through better data reporting and subsequent cost savings, but more importantly lays the foundation for a more positive customer experience through weather-related alerts to policyholders.

I’m excited to see how new technologies will continue to take insurance to the next level. AI can help automate much of the slow, manual processing of policy changes. Machine learning can increase the speed and accuracy of the underwriting process. Deeper app integrations lead to more data for business partners to see a complete financial picture, including premiums, plans and claims.

These are only a few of the possible ideas.  Many more become possible as we democratize data analytics and provide everyone with intuitive access to factual information upon which they can make smart decisions on their own and in their own time.

Elon Musk has a habit of using Twitter and interviews to make big statements. For instance, Musk told Jack Dorsey via tweet that AGI-artificial general intelligence, or AI with the power and flexibility of human intelligence--would most likely be here by 2029.

And when Elon talks, people listen. But should they?

He has a history of making bold predictions, not always correct; those self-driving taxis he promised still aren't here, for example. In this particular instance, the idea that some quantum jump in AI is imminent might actually cause some people to panic, especially given that Musk himself once famously told a crowd at MIT that, "with artificial intelligence, we are summoning the demon." At the same time, suggesting that humanlike intelligence is not far away might distract from all the current flaws in AI that so desperately need fixing.

The truth is, there is a giant gap between today's AI, which is largely pattern recognition, and the kind of Star Trek-computer-level AI that Musk is dreaming about. Yes, AI can already do some amazing things, such as speech recognition, with the ability to hold surrealistic but entertaining conversations about virtually any topic. But when it comes to reliability, dependability and coherence, current AI is nowhere near what it needs to be. Despite years of promises, AI continues to regularly make bizarre and unexpected errors of "discomprehension." It also perpetuates stereotypes; spreads misinformation; and still fails even at everyday tasks like human-level driving, especially in unexpected circumstances. Recently, a "summoned" Tesla crashed into a $3 million jet that was parked at a mostly empty airport. Inside the field, these kinds of challenges are well-known, but there are no firm fixes at hand.

Remedying AI's current flaws (and using the AI we actually have now wisely) must start with realism. Building an AI that is genuinely trustworthy is one of the most important but also challenging engineering missions of our time. But being glib about it isn't helping. In painting a rosy and likely unrealistic picture, Musk has, in our view, misled the public about how far we still have to go.

With so much at stake, we decided to call BS.

It began when one of us, Gary Marcus, drafted a $100,000 bet. In essence, the bet highlights the disconnection between Musk's latest claims about the future of AI and current reality. In the spirit of serious betting, Marcus laid out five very specific conditions.

To really say that AGI had been achieved, it would have to clear at least three of the following five benchmarks of intelligence, compiled in collaboration with NYU computer scientist Ernest Davis. To be considered artificial general intelligence, AI would need to be able to accomplish some of the following:

1. Watch movies and tell us accurately what is going on. Who are the characters? What are their conflicts and motivations? Et cetera.
2. Read novels and reliably answer questions about plot, character, conflicts, motivations, etc. The key is to go beyond the literal text and show a real understanding of the material.
3. Work as a competent cook in any old random kitchen (a tip of the hat to Steve Wozniak's cup-of-coffee benchmark).
4. Reliably construct bug-free code of more than 10,000 lines from natural language specification, or by interactions with a nonexpert user. (Gluing together code from existing libraries doesn't count.)
5. Take arbitrary proofs from the mathematical literature, written in natural language, and convert them into a symbolic form suitable for symbolic verification.

The other of us, Vivek Wadhwa, thought the bet was terrific, fair and provocative, and something that could move the field of AI forward. So Wadhwa decided to match Marcus's wager. Within a couple hours, there was a flurry on Twitter, and Marcus's Substack had close to 10,000 views; soon, other experts in the field also offered their support to $500,000. But not a word from Musk.

See also: The Real Disruption From Robotics, AI

Then writer and futurist Kevin Kelly, who co-founded the Long Now Foundation, offered to host the bet on his website side by side with an earlier and related bet that Ray Kurzweil made with Mitch Kapor. Ben Goertzel, for decades one of the leaders in trying to make AGI into something real, rather than just a fantasy, tweeted that he thought the tests would signify real progress. World Summit AI, the world's leading AI conference, offered to host a debate. Others wondered aloud which benchmarks might fall first, and in what order.

Despite all that excitement in the AI community, there has still been no word from Musk.

Half a million bucks is chump change, of course, for someone who is perhaps the richest person in the world. But it is real money to us, and it symbolizes something important: the value of getting public voices who hype AI's near-term prospects to stand by their claims.

Spreading misinformation about the potential of AI and its likely progress may serve Tesla by diverting attention from the many problems it has with its self-driving software, but it doesn't serve the public. If Musk believes what he says, he should stand up and take the bet; if not, he should own up to the reality that his pronouncements are little more than off-the-cuff hunches that even Musk himself realizes aren't worth the virtual paper he's printed them on.

This article was written by Vivek Wadhwa and Gary Marcus.

​​Heading into 2021, projections for U.S. inflation were mixed. At least two economists were on record saying “2021 will be a year plagued by numerous unwarranted inflation scares.” For the first three months of 2021, this outlook seemed reasonable, with consumer price index inflation averaging approximately 1.9%. Then, in April 2021, CPI inflation jumped to 4.2% and climbed steadily for the rest of the year. In December, inflation eventually reached a high for the year of 7%.

The last time CPI inflation exceeded 6% was back in the late 1970s/early 1980s. Inflation during that period was partly due to surges in the price of oil, while measures taken to curtail inflation included wage and price freezes, surcharges on imports and a break with the gold standard. At the time, the Federal Reserve implemented tight monetary policies that raised the federal funds rate from 10% to 20%. While these actions resulted in a recession, the policy proved effective, and in 1982 the trend of high inflation subsided. 

Various reasons are given for the current spike in inflation, including supply bottlenecks, government policy, pent-up consumer demand for goods, imbalances in supply and demand and a lack of competition among corporations. Government stimulus spending since the pandemic has exceeded $5 trillion. Congress and the White House are still discussing additional stimulus spending. Continued availability of disposable income and hampered supply chains are expected to contribute to inflationary pressures well into 2022.

Not All Inflation Is Created Equal

If the price changes for a particular CPI component occur less often, on average, than every 4.3 months, that component is called a “sticky-price” good. Goods that change prices more frequently are labeled “flexible-price” goods. Examples of sticky-price goods are medical care services, education, public transportation and motor vehicle maintenance. Examples of flexible-price goods are lumber, fuel oil, used cars/trucks and food at home. 

As shown in Figures 1 and 2, most of the headline inflation during 2021 has come from price increases for flexible goods. Sticky-price goods—many of which underlie liability claim costs—have seen lower than headline inflation.

What Does This Mean for the MPL Industry?

As with most financial institutions, higher-than-expected inflation has adverse effects on the operations and results of property-casualty insurers. 

Reserves — Insurers carry liabilities in the form of loss reserves that are intended to pay claims in the future. If inflation is higher than the rate built into the loss reserves, then future payments will be greater than expected. The impact of inflation varies by line of business, but an increase of one percentage point in inflation can raise the P/C industry combined ratio by two to three points. For personal lines of business, where liabilities are short in duration, a one-point increase in inflation may boost the combined ratio by less than one point. For a long-tailed line of business such as medical professional liability, the same one-point rise in inflation may increase the combined ratio by more than five points. 

Rates — Insurers charge prices today that will pay for future claims. For some lines of business such as MPL, claims might not be paid for 10 years or more. If inflation proves to be greater than the inflation rate anticipated in the prices charged, then insurers may not have sufficient funds to pay claims. The dynamics of underestimating the inflation rate built into prices is like that of liabilities—i.e., a one-point increase in inflation will result in overall price inadequacies of 2% to 3%. These increases tend to vary by line of business. 

Small differences between assumptions and actual inflation can have meaningful effects on the adequacy of prices. In a recent filing, a company assumed annual trend in pure premium--the combination of frequency and severity--of 0% and used a discount rate that assumed an annual return of 4% on its funds. If the assumptions were changed so the pure premium trend and the annual return on funds were both set at 2%, the company’s indicated rate change goes from an initial estimate of +34% to a revised +43%.

See also: https://www.insurancethoughtleadership.com/six-things-commentary/how-bad-will-inflation-get

Reinsurance — Inflation affects losses in excess layers differently than losses in primary layers. Figure 3 shows a scenario where 3% inflation has 0% impact on a ceding company’s net losses but has an 18% impact on its reinsurer’s losses. Under the same conditions, an inflation rate of 5% would raise the reinsurer’s losses by 30%. The example helps demonstrate that, even in an environment where inflation is rising by low- to mid-single digits, the effect on losses ceded to reinsurers increases by multiples of the ground-up inflation rate.

Investments — Approximately 80% of the assets held by the P/C industry are in fixed income instruments such as Treasury, municipal and other bonds. These assets are structured to match the payments--cash flows--of the loss reserve liabilities they support. If companies sell current bonds so they can invest in newer, higher-yielding bonds, they will have to book losses upon the sale because higher interest rates drive down bond prices. However, if they hold onto current assets while the ultimate values of the underlying loss liabilities are increasing, there will be a mismatch between their assets and liabilities. This mismatch would have to be accounted for by a reduction in the company’s surplus. There is no efficient way for companies to hedge inflation risk, but they can try to dampen the risk through holding assets such as stocks and real estate, which bring their own inherent risks to a balance sheet.

And We Haven’t Even Mentioned Social Inflation

Another item affecting the insurance industry that is not included in any of the indices is potentially the largest inflation factor of all: social inflation. Broadly defined, social inflation refers to all ways in which insurers’ claims costs increase over and above economic inflation. While there is a clear trend in rising claim costs for liability lines of business, the overall increase in costs has been higher than the inflation in underlying costs such as medical care and wages.

Because the factors that drive social inflation are not quantitative, measurement of social inflation is difficult, if not impossible. These factors include anti-corporate sentiment, behaviors of the plaintiff bar, changing societal views and desensitization to large verdicts. However, to the extent social inflation is contributing to claim costs, insurers and reinsurers must attempt to quantify its impact so liabilities and prices are adequate. In an attempt to quantify the impact of social inflation on commercial auto losses, the Insurance Information Institute recently performed a joint study with the Casualty Actuarial Society. The study concluded that, from 2010 to 2019, approximately $21 billion, or 14%, of commercial auto losses could not be explained by regular increases in the CPI. The authors of the study stated that they found evidence of social inflation in other liability (occurrence) and medical professional liability (claims-made), but they did not provide measurements for these lines of business.

See also: Insurers' Social Inflation Problem

Inflation’s Bottom Line 

The CPI and other economic indices such as the Producer Price Index are valuable resources, but arguments have been made that these indices have inherent flaws that can distort their measures of inflation. For example, the CPI is heavily weighted toward urban consumption and may not be an accurate measure of the price of goods for suburban and rural areas, where prices may be higher due to distance from production centers. The CPI is also criticized for not representing the innovation of products that could be years away from inclusion in the calculation of the CPI. 

The 7% increase in inflation in 2021 has captured many headlines, and market expectations suggest inflation rates are likely to remain higher over the near term. January 2022 CPI increase was 7.5% and February 2022 increase was 7.9%. According to the February edition of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia Survey of Professional Forecasters, headline CPI in 2022 and 2023 will be 3.8% and 2.4%, respectively. While insurers have been raising prices in response to rising costs, it remains to be seen if increases in loss reserves will follow. For the past 15 years, the industry’s carried liabilities for MPL have been above average in terms of redundancies. However, if inflation is greater than anticipated in the reserves, these redundancies can turn into deficiencies. As such, property-casualty insurers should be stress testing their operations and considering strategies to counter concern about inflation and potential impacts on both sides of their balance sheets.

This article previously appeared in Inside Medical Liability magazine.

During a 2017 first quarter earnings call, FedEx founder and CEO Fred Smith famously doubted that we would ever do most of our shopping online, saying of e-commerce’s share of retail sales, “It’s about 10% now. It’s certainly going to grow as a percentage. But will it be half? I doubt it.” It took fewer than two years for the U.S. Department of Commerce to issue a report proving him wrong. 

Smith was hardly the first to underestimate consumers’ voracious appetite for convenience, and he’s unlikely to be the last. But a growing body of empirical evidence across sectors paints a picture that shouldn’t come as much of a surprise: Many of us lead impossibly busy lives, and convenience is not just a “nice to have”; it supersedes brand loyalty -- and even cost -- as a deciding factor for a growing majority of modern consumers. 

This desire for convenience translates into a massive opportunity within the insurance sector, and not just for insurance companies. A study conducted by Bindable in 2021 showed that 65% of consumers would be willing to purchase insurance through a non-insurance brand, and, of those respondents, a large majority would actually prefer to do so if they already trusted the brand in question. Placing a complementary insurance product in front of prospective customers at precisely the time and place they need it, and while they’re interacting with a brand they already trust, is not only how insurers will stay relevant but also how brands can improve customer loyalty and retention in a competitive market.

Get Strategic About Selling

Potential insureds generally want to think about insurance as little as possible, which is one of the reasons why customer acquisition costs (CAC) are disproportionately high. This is also why insurers and their distribution partners must evolve and convert new customers where they already choose to spend their money, no matter where that is. To do so, they must strategically cultivate alternative distribution channels, optimize digital environments and provide superior technology and tools to agents, which is exactly where Insurance-as-a-Service (IaaS) offerings come into play. 

What Is IaaS? 

IaaS combines software, a digital marketplace and a full suite of support services to create flexible, market-ready solutions that connect insurance providers, trusted brands and consumers for the benefit of all. 

It’s a mechanism by which insurers can increase visibility and distribution (and potentially reduce CAC) by enabling partners to leverage an established network of insurance companies and introduce fully branded digital insurance propositions into their existing ecosystem -- all while staying in control of their brand story, expanding their value proposition and driving monetization with minimal to no friction, lead time, infrastructural investment or guesswork. IaaS enables carriers and brands to increase their digital delivery capabilities, streamline sales processes and optimize insurance offerings through sponsored channels.

See also: Why SaaS Is Key in Core Systems

Insurance Distribution, Redefined

With some earnings reports looking ominously grim, corporate budgets could potentially be tightening across the country in response to the anticipated downturn, and marketing budgets are often the first to be slashed. As mentioned, customer conversions within the insurance space are already notoriously expensive, but a product you can’t market, no matter how artfully designed, dies an ignoble death – so how can carriers stretch those dollars and minimize financial risk?

Simple: Partner with brands consumers already trust and embed the offer where they’re already shopping, at the moment of peak relevance. This could mean partnering with an employer, a financial institution, a consumer brand or even another insurance carrier; every industry is trying to improve customer acquisition and retention, so there is opportunity everywhere. 

For example, mortgage companies will find that many customers value homeowners insurance offers incorporated into the preexisting purchase flow, especially during what is likely to be a busy time for the homebuyer. Similarly, how many drivers would welcome the opportunity to drive off the lot by getting auto insurance coverage on the spot without having to start a separate process? Insurance might not be a brand’s main product, but, if it’s an adjacent offering, it’s never bad business to create added value for customers (as long as you keep their convenience in mind). 

What’s in It for Insurers?

As any insurance provider can tell you, one carrier does not want every risk, especially in a hardening market. By having a choice environment, even if the customer usually shops with one provider, when the provider doesn’t have an option for that consumer or doesn’t want to take on the risk they can offer an alternative solution through another provider; this is what we like to call “coopetition.” Such an arrangement also gives carriers the ability to present other relevant ancillary products that they might not currently offer. Instead of always trying to say “yes and…”, a provider can do what’s best for their business yet still provide an elevated experience for their customer by saying “no, but…” and still meet their needs through other options while owning the relationship with the customer. 

Leveraging an IaaS-powered marketplace or implementing an embedded insurance offer also enables a provider to control their customer experience. Contrary to using lead generation partnerships or aggregators (which can often be quite expensive), using an IaaS approach enables a brand to not only provide a better branded experience -- from the front end to agent service experience -- the brand can also gather data on their customers, understanding what they’re buying and when. If there is an opportunity to sell differentiated products, that provider can make an informed decision before committing to the heavy lift that entails.

Through IaaS, you can create a seamless online-to-offline experience that leverages your brand to sell insurance through digital channels (including embedded insurance offers) or via licensed agents over the phone, giving customers the choice of products they need, delivered in the manner they prefer, under a name they trust: yours. Enrich relationships with current customers and convert new ones, all while saving time and money and gathering invaluable data; there are no losers in this story. 

A Win-Win-Win

Today, we know one thing to be unequivocally true: Convenience is king. If providers want to stay relevant, they must adapt quickly and think innovatively, especially when it comes to distribution channels and technology, to meet consumers’ evolving needs. Working with brands that consumers already trust can build brand equity and minimize CAC, creating a mutually beneficial, omni-channel solution for insurers, distribution partners and potential insureds. Everyone wants a win – and, with IaaS, everyone gets one. 

My columns for Insurance Thought Leadership share best practices from outside insurance. For example, Amazon in digital customer experience, and AWS in large program management. Sticking with the A's, this piece on talent is from outside tech altogether: Alabama Crimson Tide football. 

For readers unaware, Nick Saban is arguably the most successful college football coach in the history of the sport. Mr. Saban owns a 269-67-1 career record, and his seven national championships--one at LSU and six at Alabama--are the most all-time. 

Winning, Saban would be the first to tell you, requires talent. Alabama has landed the top recruiting class in eight of the past 13 years and was top three in the other five. Success breeding success, today Alabama practically sells itself to top recruits, players interested in practicing against, and playing with, the best, toward winning championships and a lucrative career in the NFL.

But it wasn’t always that way. Saban inherited a Crimson Tide program that went 6-7 in 2006. “We’re going to build a winning culture here,” he said in his introductory press conference. “A culture that winners will want to be a part of.” Saban rightly put the horse before the cart: culture draws talent.

Here are three aspects of Alabama’s winning culture that can help you build and shape yours.

1. Think process, not outcomes.

“We don’t think or talk about winning the SEC Championship. We don’t think or talk about winning the National Championship. We don’t think or talk about the result, but what needs to be done to get the result,” Saban said in a recent speech. “What do you need to do in this workout? This drill? This play? In this moment? Let’s think about what we can do today. The task at hand.” 

Controllable inputs, in other words, over desired outputs. Right action; detachment from result. 

2. Alabama’s process in three steps:

1. What’s the vision?
2. What’s the plan to achieve #1
3. Do we have the discipline to follow #2?

This is where leadership comes in. It’s on you as a CxO, LOB head or Program Owner, to spell out the vision for your players. It’s on you to map the plan for getting there. And it’s on you to define roles and responsibilities and manage to them. Remember, winning culture is formed from high standards, firmly enforced. 

Saban’s vision of football excellence is a lot easier to articulate than yours. It’s for the most part implied. Everyone knows why they’re there. But finding the right “why narrative” is a must for attracting top talent, and in insurance the “why” is not implied. Here’s what we’re doing. Here’s why it matters. Here’s how we’re going to do it. And here’s where you fit in. You must define it, spell it out. 

See also: 3 Keys to Leading a Team in a Crisis

3. After process, people.

Alabama doesn’t recruit every five-star player who can run a 4.3 40-yard dash. Nor do they automatically pass on three-star players. Mac Jones, who led Alabama to a 13-0 record and National Championship in 2020 and is now starting quarterback for the New England Patriots, was a three-star recruit. 

The tangibles matter. In football, speed, height, athletic agility can’t be coached. Likewise, five-star business and especially digital talent just jumps off the page of the CV. Elite developers can do things mortal developers cannot; a ninja coder can often do the work of 10, and in half the time, creating a cleaner, more elegant solution. 

But the intangibles can’t be overlooked, either. On a team level, respect and trust are key--to the organization, the structure, the standard, each other. Beware chemistry wreckers. 

On a personal level, look for players with character, who work to get better and have a proven track record of working through adversity to get the job done. A favorite Sabanism: “It takes no ability to be mentally tough and finish.” Look for players who are mentally tough and finish. Mac Jones, while biding his time, waiting his turn to start, not only mastered the playbook but earned his degree in three years, masters in four, with a 4.0 GPA. 

In the three-step process that Saban drives at a program level, he looks for players to define for themselves on a personal level. What’s your vision for yourself? What’s your plan for getting there? Are you following that plan--or are you just talk? He develops players by holding them accountable to their own words. 

And he develops teams one player at a time. Alabama carries 85 scholarship athletes on their roster. That’s a lot of talent, a lot of egos, to manage. Whatever else is going on, Saban makes it a point to meet one-on-one with at least three players a day. “It’s about them--always. Not you,” he says. “People gotta know you care; that you’re a leader, not a manipulator. That you’re here to help them get what they want--which you know because you talk to them.

“There’s a misconception out there that the culture is somehow going to magically make players better. But that’s wrong. It’s the players and their daily behaviors that make the culture. There is no ‘i’ in 'team,' but there is an ‘i’ in 'win.'”

In 2007, Saban’s first season with Alabama, the Crimson Tide went 7-6. In 2008, they went 12-2. In 2009, they went 14-0, winning their first championship under Saban. Winning championships takes time. Building a championship culture, which attracts championship talent, starts today.

According to Google, 90% of owners of multiple devices switch between screens to complete tasks. So, the importance of being able to accurately identify consumers across devices and marketing channels – or identity resolution – cannot be overstated. This is especially true in industries like insurance, where shopping journeys typically involve extensive research and comparison shopping over time.  

There’s a high cost to unidentified consumers. Failing to invest in identity resolution leads to canned messaging, wasted marketing spending and lost opportunity to cross-sell and up-sell existing customers.

Today’s shoppers demand personalization. The logical next step to identity resolution, then, is using the additional data that comes with it to improve the customer experience in a process called identity management. 

Identity and Experience

Identity management involves reconciling what you know about an individual – static demographic information, such as income, as well as personal attributes like existing vehicle and homeownership – with real-time behavioral data, specifically actions that signal purchasing intent and tell marketers and agents it’s the right time to engage. 

This sort of data is useful for nurturing both prospective and existing customers. Consider an auto policyholder. Are they homeowners? Do they have children in the household who will be driving soon? Do they also own boats, motorcycles or second homes? Does their recent online shopping behavior indicate any of these attributes have recently changed?  

In essence, identity management centers on knowing who a consumer is as well as what they’re in search of and putting that knowledge to work. While this may seem obvious, for every $92 spent on acquiring customers, on average, only $1 is spent on converting them. Investing resources in lead nurturing and personalized messaging can be a significant differentiator. 

See also: 10 (Lame) Excuses for Not Marketing

Identity and Optimization 

Reliable data is the first requirement of effective personalization. Automated identity resolution solutions layer identity markers, or information like an email or IP address, with third-party data to fill in the holes, so to speak, on a given customer profile. Third-party data can include demographic details and personal attributes as well as real-time shopping behavior. In either case, third-party data extends a company’s view of a customer beyond the data it already has. 

Though most insurance providers have mountains of data at their fingertips, that data is often spread out among internal systems and tools, leaving providers without a singular 360-degree view of the contacts in their CRM systems. It can be time- and resource-intensive to disrupt these data silos, but getting your own first-party data in order is essential to making the most of identity resolution tools and leveraging additional data for identity management. 

In addition to lead nurturing, identity management also supports lead scoring. Take property and casualty. Our collective return to work (and thus return to commuting), recent supply chain challenges, even an uptick in catastrophic events due to climate change are all driving up the frequency of and severity associated with P&C claims. In return, P&C insurers are dialing back customer acquisition efforts until they’re able to increase rates to be commensurate with today’s risk. Concerns about risk only strengthen the case for identity management, as it allows marketing and sales teams to dedicate the limited resources they have to identifying and working the most profitable leads, while they pass on targets that do not meet the profile of ideal customers.

Identity and Privacy 

Any discussion on consumer data should also include a note on consumer privacy. Insurers must confirm each and every customer has given their consent to be contacted, to remain compliant with consumer privacy regulation like TCPA (the Telephone Consumer Protection Act). When purchasing lead data from a third party, marketers must verify that their lead partners have also complied on their behalf, as the courts have made it clear both parties are ultimately responsible. Marketers and agents should be prepared to demonstrate compliance in the event of a consumer complaint. 

All that said, compliance is the bare minimum. With great data comes great responsibility. Consumer data must be managed with great care. Not only because it’s good for business but because it’s the right thing to do. Retail giant Target offers us a cautionary tale – years ago, it detected a 16-year-old’s pregnancy based on her shopping behavior and mailed her maternity-related marketing materials before she shared the news with her parents, creating a PR nightmare for the company and an unfortunate breach in privacy for the young woman. 

To be effective, identity management strategies must balance what’s technically possible with what’s feasible and optimal from a business perspective. A thoughtful approach and reliable partners will empower insurers with more accurate, comprehensive customer data and the ability to communicate with the right customers at the right time and with the right message.

Recent events have highlighted the impact of violent, traumatic events on our daily lives. Trauma refers to an event, series of events or set of circumstances that are experienced by an individual as physically or emotionally harmful or life-threatening and that have lasting effects. Exposure to traumatic experiences creates emotional challenges for children of all ages. 

Parents and caregivers have the added worry of how to support their children in the aftermath of traumatic experiences. It is important for parents and caregivers to restore a sense of safety to their children even when the world does not feel safe. Adults can support the children in their lives by understanding the impact of traumatic events and knowing specific actions that can bring a sense of comfort and safety. 

Children respond to violence and trauma in a variety of ways; however, there are several typical responses. These responses vary, depending on numerous factors, including the following: 

• the child’s age
• whether the child knew the individuals involved
• whether the child directly witnessed or indirectly heard about the incident
• how “graphic” the violence was
• how extensively the media covered the event 
• if the child has previously experienced exposure to trauma. 

Representative Common Responses to Trauma Include: 

• Concerns about fearing that the affected person or people suffered
• Repeatedly visualizing the crime or incident in their minds 
• Constant attempts to tell and retell the story of the crime or incident 
• Need to reenact the crime or incident through play 
• Feelings of guilt for not having intervened or prevented the crime
• A desire to seek revenge [for those who knew the victim(s)] 

Signs of Grief in Children Parents Should Watch for After Traumatic Exposure

For parents and caregivers, it is important to observe children exposed to trauma for signals of grief after a violent crime or incident. For some children, particularly those who knew the victim(s), these grief signals may include:

• Fear of death 
• Fear of being left alone or sleeping alone 
• A need to be with people who have been through the same experience
• Difficulty concentrating 
• Drop in grades (during the school year) 
• Physical complaints, such as headaches or stomachaches
• Bedwetting 
• Fear of sleep 
• Nightmares 
• Clingy behavior and wanting to be with and around parents more often

How to Support Children When They’ve Experienced a Traumatic Event

Ask what they think happened: Let them tell you in their own words, and answer their questions. Do not assume you know what they are feeling or what their questions will be. The easiest way to have this conversation might be while they are engaged in an activity, such as drawing, sitting on a swing or driving with you in the car. Details that may be obvious to adults may not be apparent to children. Be truthful, but don’t tell them more information than they can handle for their age. 

Focus on their safety: Once you understand their perception of the traumatic event, be clear that you will keep them safe and let them know other adults (school, police, etc.) are working hard to make sure they will stay safe. 

Pay attention to your reactions: Your children will be watching you carefully and taking their cues from you. If you can manage your anxiety about the traumatic event, your children will be more easily reassured. 

Monitor your child’s access to media: It will help if young children do not watch news reports or see the front page of the newspaper. Young children who watch a traumatic event on the TV news may think the event is still going on or happening again. 

Watch for behavior changes: Your children may show you through their behavior that they are still struggling with what they have heard or seen. They may have physical complaints or regressive behaviors, often including nightmares, insomnia or bedwetting. They may feel guilty that they are responsible for the event and need to be reassured that they are not responsible. 

Maintain your routines: Sticking to your daily structure of activities -- mealtimes, bedtime rituals, etc.-- reduces anxiety and helps children feel more in control. 

Keep the door open: Encourage your children to come to you with any questions or concerns and do not assume the questions will stop after a few days or up to several weeks. Let them know their fears and questions are normal and you will always be available for them. Remind them that all questions are welcome. 

Consider this a teachable moment: For older children, this traumatic event may lead to a discussion about ways they can help others who have experienced a tragedy. You can also ask them if they know how to keep themselves safe when they are away from home. Traumatic events make us feel like we have lost control, so any constructive activities we engage in make us feel less vulnerable.

See also: Workplaces Coping With Suicide Trauma

Tips for Talking to Children Witnessing or Hearing About Traumatic Events

For children who have witnessed violence, either directly or through media exposure, talking with them in an informed, age-appropriate manner can help them process what they’ve seen. Below are representative pointers to consider for these conversations: 

• Allow your child to talk about what he/she experienced or heard about 
• Know that younger children may prefer to “draw” about their experiences 
• Ask them what they saw and heard and what they think about the experience 
• Help them to label feelings and normalize their reactions (“That must have been pretty scary. It wouldn’t surprise me if you keep thinking about it.”) 
• Keep routines as much the same as possible in the aftermath -- children count on routines and structure
• Spend extra time with your child: have dinner together, make sure to keep bedtime routines, share playtime or take walks together
• Remind your child of things he/she likes to do to help feel better when upset (playing, reading, drawing, singing, etc.) 

Steps for Employers to Help Employees Understand the Effects of Trauma on Children

The growing frequency of traumatic incidents has necessitated the expansion of crisis management and emergency response plans for organizations of all sizes. The importance of instituting Critical Incident Response protocols cannot be overstated, including stress debriefing and grief counseling. Often, community-wide services are coordinated in the aftermath of violent, traumatic events. Employers are encouraged to promote these services to their employees and ensure they feel supported to be able to attend these events. 

Employers increasingly are adopting trauma-informed approaches to wellbeing and understand the importance of addressing the harmful effects of trauma on affected stakeholders. Employers are encouraged to share information with workers about how to communicate with children in their lives about traumatic incidents. Parents and caregivers are encouraged to seek professional support from licensed practitioners when children do not respond to their intentional efforts to address the effects of trauma.

Demand for voluntary benefits is soaring, with 94% of employers expecting such benefits to hold greater importance in their organizations over the next three years. 

The days of voluntary benefits being sold in blocks where one product size fits all should be over. However, only 51% of employers believe their benefit programs address the individual needs of their workforce, and only 39% say their programs offer significant flexibility and choice.

Employee benefits carriers have an opportunity to increase their revenues by up-selling voluntary benefits that meet the evolving needs of today's workforce. Research from Agentero says insurance companies can increase their profitability by 60% to 70% through selling products to existing policyholders. 

Let's take a look at some in-demand voluntary benefits that carriers are offering to seize these new revenue opportunities, along with some analysis of why these offerings are now so popular.

Trend #1: Personalized Wellness Offerings 

Wellness benefits are in high demand as 90% of consumers opted for mental health support in 2022, increasing by 24% from 2020. However, 49% of employers have not yet formally articulated a wellbeing strategy for their employees despite the need. Carriers can help them fill the gap.

The core function of a wellness program is to motivate employees to adopt healthier habits to prevent illnesses and injuries typically covered by healthcare coverage. 

While traditional voluntary benefits like topped-up dental care, vision care and wellness-expense reimbursements will continue to be in demand, employee benefits carriers should acknowledge the shift toward personalized wellness packages that support all aspects of an employee's physical and mental health. 

Today, personalized voluntary wellness programs might offer a broader array of services and resources such as access to medical tests, work/life balance programs, smoking cessation, nutrition, stress-management classes and mental health resources at preferred group rates. 

Recent research finds that 38% of employees say they have at least one family member who suffers from severe stress, anxiety or depression. The same study finds that 45% of employees who suffer from mental health illnesses and extreme stress are not getting the help they need. Additionally, those same employees are 50% less likely to be highly engaged and often miss four more workdays a year than the average employee. 

According to Mayo Clinic, “Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of conditions that increase your risk of heart disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes. These conditions include increased blood pressure, high blood sugar, excess body fat around the waist and abnormal cholesterol or triglyceride levels.” Up to one-third of adults have it. Wellness programs promoting extensive lifestyle changes can prevent major health problems. 

Gartner's research indicates organizations can boost employee discretionary effort by 21% by providing holistic well-being support. That’s twice as much impact as companies that offer only traditional programs. 

As the wellness crisis continues, voluntary wellness benefits will be a cost-effective way for employers to assist employees in living healthier lives while improving employee retention.

Trend #2: Pet Insurance

Pet insurance is a popular voluntary benefit many employees are eager to obtain. In fact, in 2022, 56% of consumers opted for pet insurance as a voluntary benefit, an increase of 22% from 2020.

One survey found that 76% of millennials own a pet, with about 42% saying they think of their pets as they would their own children. Another recent survey shows nearly 50% of pet owners would not be able to cover a $5,000 pet expense out-of-pocket. Owners of sick pets have higher rates of depression and anxiety, potentially resulting in poor performance and disengagement from work.

There is an opportunity for employers and voluntary benefits providers to appeal to millions of people with pet insurance. 

Pet insurance may even be the difference between keeping and losing employees. 30% of respondents in a Nationwide survey said pet-related benefits would influence them to stay with their current employer or leave their company for one that offers pet insurance. 

See also: The New Mandate: 'Video or Vanish'

Trend #3: Identity Theft Protection

Identity theft is a growing problem responsible for serious financial headaches, including stolen funds, out-of-pocket costs, legal fees, record request fees, childcare costs, tax challenges, etc.

Allstate Identity Protection says a good identity theft protection benefit should cover all of the costs mentioned above to make an employee's financial recovery as complete and straightforward as possible. 

In a Gallup survey about what crimes Americans fear the most, 71% of respondents said they worry about their data being hacked, and 67% are worried about identity theft. 

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) received 1.4 million identity theft complaints in 2020, an increase of 113% from 2019. In 2020, identity theft cost Americans about $56 billion, with about 49 million consumers falling victim. 

As a result, more employers are offering voluntary benefits that help protect their employees from identity theft. In fact, 60% of consumers opted for identity theft protection as a voluntary benefit this year, increasing by 18% from 2020. 

Trend #4: Hospital Indemnity Insurance

Unexpected lengthy hospital stays are a growing concern in the U.S., causing many Americans to fall into serious debt. There were nearly 33 million hospital admissions in the U.S. alone this past year. Sixty-one percent of Americans say they would not be able to cover an unexpected $1,000 out-of-pocket expense from their savings. 

As a result, hospital indemnity insurance has become an increasingly popular voluntary benefit, as 47% of employees opted for hospital indemnity coverage this year, increasing by 30% from 2020. 

A typical hospital indemnity insurance plan provides employees with additional financial support beyond usual health insurance. Every hospital indemnity plan is different. For example, some programs may offer fixed benefits for admission to a hospital, an overnight stay, treatment in an emergency room, outpatient procedures or overnight stays in an intensive care unit. 

Carriers should emphasize customizable hospital indemnity plans that can best meet their clients’ coverage needs.

Trend #5: Voluntary Childcare Benefits

A survey by Care.com finds that nearly half (47%) of families are more concerned about the cost of childcare than they were before the pandemic. 

Rising childcare costs put intense pressure on working parents. In 2020, 79% of working parents reported having symptoms of workplace stress and burnout, and over 55% say they are dealing with mental health issues. 

Nearly 44% of consumers opted for childcare benefits this year, increasing by 26% from 2020. However, while supporting working parents is a top priority for 74% of employers, only 39% feel their programs are effective. 

Childcare benefits provide working parents of young and school-aged children with resources, childcare services and financial support so they can afford to take care of their kids.

Such benefits can come in many different forms. For example, Willis Towers Watson finds that 30% of employers offer access to backup childcare services, 27% offer discounts for childcare centers and tutoring resources, 26% offer subsidies to employee dependent care spending accounts for childcare expenses and 97% offer parents flexible work hours. 

This presents employee benefits carriers and employers with an opportunity to help working parents alleviate financial stresses and anxieties with additional childcare offerings.

See also: What to Understand About Gen Z

Technology Makes Personalizing Voluntary Benefits Feasible

The number of companies offering voluntary benefits will continue to rise, as will the number of options in a benefits package. The Society of Human Resource Management says 92% of employees say that benefits are essential to their overall job satisfaction. 

Employee benefits carriers have an opportunity to increase their revenues by up-selling increasingly important voluntary benefits like pet insurance, identity theft protection, childcare benefits, hospital indemnity insurance and personalized wellness programs as well as traditional life, disability and critical illness coverage.

Fortunately, modern technology makes it much more feasible for carriers to craft personalized benefit programs for employers and their employees. Thanks to advances in AI and big data analytics, insurance carriers can recommend optimal voluntary benefits selections based on an individual employee’s unique customer profile with a digital sales and underwriting platform built specifically for the group insurance industry.

Revenue management is arguably the most important job a company leader has. Without insight into the pipeline for future revenue, leaders cannot make projections and decisions. And without a technology solution for tracking and monitoring the pipeline, leaders are left, at best, with guesses for what their future revenue holds. 

We've seen everything for pipeline tracking, and, let me tell you, it's frightening how some companies manage their pipelines. Everything from legal pads to index cards to whiteboards to spreadsheets to "in my head!" It leaves us shaking our heads at the potential revenue that business owners are willing to leave up to chance. How can leadership find any confidence in making investments if they have no idea what revenue will follow? How can salespeople be confident they are on top of whatever opportunities they have? It becomes impossible to accumulate intelligence on a prospect if you're not leveraging technology throughout both the prospecting and marketing cycle to collect information and build a prospective client profile. 

No doubt, this lack of tracking and data collection is a contributing factor to low conversion and close ratios. If you don't have insight into your buyers' interests and needs, you're moving at a much slower pace. Conversely, the more clearly you understand the buyer, the better chance they become a client. 

Leveraging technology across the organization

Using technology to manage client accounts has become a standard practice for business operations. Companies are highly motivated to track existing client data so the service team can follow up consistently and retain clients and, therefore, revenue.

We need to bring this same level of commitment to the pre-sale process to generate new revenue. Making confident decisions for your business requires data rather than relying on gut feelings. Technology can provide the means to gather data. Businesses that engage a company-wide system have access to more data, make decisions and moves faster and run more efficient operations.

What’s the motivation?

As enticing as the promise of tracking and making data-driven decisions is, committing to revenue management technology is a whole other discussion. Tracking sales activity is a strange love-hate relationship with as much psychology as practical application.

Leadership wants the data, the tracking and the accountability. Too often, they want it without doing the set-up and enforcement work to make it happen or even use it themselves. And they often don’t understand how much time and energy it’s going to take to create a successful structure for their team.

Salespeople often don’t want the technology and, more often, don’t want the tracking and accountability that goes with it. And they certainly don’t want the “hard work” of it. Sales team complaints are the No. 1 issue we see holding agencies back from committing to data tracking.

Companies find themselves at a crossroads with this disconnect between what the company wants and what the team wants. What do they do? Forgo the technology and allow salespeople to “track” their pipeline on a whiteboard, in emails or on their “mental checklist”?

See also: 3 Common Mistakes When Verifying COIs

Revenue management technology

 Technology doesn’t need to be an extensive, overwhelming system that is difficult to learn.

• It can be as simple as using shared spreadsheets to track the pipeline and marketing activities.
• Or it could be tracking prospects within your client management system and marketing through an email platform.
• Or it could be a complete revenue management system, often referred to as a CRM (customer relationship manager), that integrates both the prospecting and marketing activities into a single platform.

Starting basic and building up your skills and processes is a great way to go. When you are ready to commit to a revenue management platform, you’ll have the habits and processes already established, and you’ll be able to create comprehensive nurturing campaigns for your prospects.

Time and accountability

Regardless of who wants what, before jumping in and committing to writing a check for a new system, be sure you are also willing to make the time investment to overcome the objections and make the technology an expectation in the company. The check is the easy part. The time and accountability commitment typically hangs companies up from having a successful roll-out and adoption of the technology.

You must first have a purpose for the new revenue management system, establish processes for how it gets used and then introduce the technology to help improve efficiency and automation.

If you start with technology, you’ll introduce confusion by trying to create a process while you’re learning the technology. The result is too often a sense of being overwhelmed, and people give up on both the process and technology.

How do you make the decision to commit?

We’ve worked with many companies to establish their sales and marketing platforms, and there is a one-to-one correlation between the leader’s commitment and the team’s use of the platform. If the leader is all-in and sets the example and sets the expectation that everyone else will use it, then the company uses it. If the leader isn’t committed, neither is the team.

It’s that simple.

The value of the data

Salespeople may not want to be open and share notes about their prospect interactions, but, as the business owner, you need to decide who owns these relationships. The salesperson or the company?

The data you have can make or break an opportunity, as we saw from a sales rep who had been working on a big opportunity for an extended time, and who went out on maternity leave before the deal closed. Another rep managed her book while she was out and the prospective client was ready to decide. Unfortunately, the new rep had no notes to reference and told the prospect they would need to go through the analysis again. The prospect wasn’t willing to re-do the exploration and took their business elsewhere. What a shame. Both the company and the rep lost out on this opportunity due to a lack of data.

A platform with accurately updated data can provide salespeople and business owners with much-needed insight into individual opportunities and company performance. If it’s a priority to have the data, you’ll make it a priority for your team to input the data.

See also: UBI Needs a Technology Leap

Making a commitment: paralysis or motivation?

The requirements to successfully install a revenue management system may stir up some fear of failure. But it shouldn’t stop leaders from choosing to move ahead. Instead, use it as motivation to find the gaps and friction in your process and bring everything within your sales and marketing team into alignment. It should inspire you to see the smooth-running future you want to have.

Is it going to take work? Absolutely. But is it worth it? You bet! After the initial learning curve, having your systems automated is significantly easier. You’ll find it doesn’t take long to get a return on the time or financial investment, assuming leadership holds the team to the new rules of the game.

The global reinsurance market is a complex beast. In the past, the tail has often wagged the proverbial dog, with pressure from reinsurers forcing hard insurance markets via increased pricing. More recently, however, insurance markets have hardened due to other issues, such as increased flood losses, social changes, regulatory issues and major Covid-19 business interruption losses.

With higher pricing, many insurers, including Lloyd’s, have turned the corner and last year reported a return to profit. At the same time, reinsurers have struggled to increase rates to their desired level, in the face of increased cat losses, claim inflation and now pending Ukraine losses.

Reinsurers' views on rating adequacy varies, territorially and across business lines, which means that there are opportunities for smart reinsurance brokers and canny cedents to profit, especially those that use modern technology to swing results in their favor.

Recent renewals have been varied

Reinsurers have long voiced their frustrations about continued inadequate market conditions and the difficulty that they’ve had trying to recoup their losses following above-average natural catastrophe losses and significant casualty claims caused by COVID-19. Despite this, many reinsurers reported profits for 2021, after four years of successive rate increases.

Previous efforts by reinsurers to usher in a truly hard market have been thwarted by excess capacity that continued to flow into the market through insurance-linked securities (ILS), which kept rate changes at bay in most classes. However, a reduction in ILS capacity at 1/1 made the Retro renewal cycle especially difficult and saw firms that went into the market late forced to retain large swaths of risk on their balance sheet or accept sizeable rate increases. 

As Gallagher Re pointed out in their 1/1 renewal report, much of the reduction in ILS capacity could be attributed to this investment being redeployed to CatBond, ILWs and primary reinsurance. Still, as market conditions continue to be in flux, it isn’t clear whether investors could look to take their capacity elsewhere. We could see difficulty and rate increases in the Retro market trickle through to the primary reinsurance market throughout the remainder of the year.

The April renewal was deemed “balanced” by Gallagher Re but highlighted the concern of inflation across all lines of business. If inflation was a concern at Jan. 1 and April 1, it will certainly be a point of difficulty in the forthcoming July 1 renewals, as the U.S. market has experienced inflation of 8.5% in the last year – the largest jump in 40 years. 

The performance of summer renewals rises and falls with the performance of the Florida market, and the 1/1 Retro market has had a significant impact on expectations for the coming Florida renewals. So much so, in fact, that the renewals are even being called a “flashpoint.”

If expectations of a problematic renewal become a reality and ILS capacity continues to decrease – even slightly – it could signal a change toward more challenging market conditions for cedents and brokers. However, as we have seen this year, these rate changes won’t affect everyone evenly, and best-in-class cedents will continue to outperform their peers.

See also: Reinsurance: Dying... or in a Golden Age?

How to be a best-in-class cedent in an uncertain market?

There are certainly lessons to be learned from the most recent renewal cycles that can guide cedents looking to get the best result from their reinsurance placements:

1. Be faster, to get to market early: If there was one key takeaway from recent renewal seasons, it was that going to the market late hurt the ability of a firm to secure sufficient capacity for their placement. None more so than the recent Florida renewals, when, according to boutique investment bank/broking firm Stonybrook, most domestic insurers – which placed more than $40 billion of limit for the 2021 hurricane season – had placed less than 80% of their required external placements, including one carrier, which had no reinsurance in place as of May 27.

Bringing reinsurance placements to the market sooner can help ensure that an insurer is at the top of a reinsurance underwriter’s pile and that the capacity needed can be secured upfront. Of course, that’s much easier said than done. 

For most cedents, the process of gathering, cleansing, preparing and finalizing their data takes them (and their brokers) months to complete. Cedents using tools such as Supercede’s platform have a sizeable advantage as their data preparation process is reduced from months to only a couple of weeks

2. Present cleaner, clearer data: Data inconsistency and uncertainty continue to present a significant challenge. Reinsurers are often required to rerun all of the data and exhibits provided to them to ensure that they agree with the numbers presented. This painstaking process is made worse because each submission is organized and presented differently, making it difficult for underwriters to find the critical information they need. A lack of confidence in the data has always resulted in underwriters adding uncertainty loading to their price. As market conditions change, it will be more important than ever for cedents to provide their partners with clean, clear and consistent data to ensure that their portfolio is priced accurately and fairly. 

Again, cedents that use the latest tech have an advantage over their peers as they have the tools to instantly find and correct any anomalies in their data before sending it to market. This presents a clear and consistent view of their data year-over-year and makes it easier for their partners to review the high-level submission information as well as extract the raw underlying data used to prepare the exhibits. Reinsurers want to remove uncertainty loading from their pricing, but until the data is consistent and clear they are forced to keep the hedge. AXA XL’s chief underwriting officer, Jon Gale, commented: “We want to be in a position to reward cedents for providing us with good data in our pricing. Unfortunately, at the moment, we often have to include uncertainty loads for poor or incomplete data.”

3. Cede smarter: Most cedents have spent significant time assessing and evaluating their reinsurance purchasing strategy to determine what, and how much, they should purchase. However, because much of the valuable data that is shared with the market is siloed from their other treaty data, it is nearly impossible (or far too time-consuming) for ceded re teams to evaluate how the submission would look if different products, lines of business, etc. were combined into a single purchase or broken into different purchases. This is another challenge associated with the current way data is collected and prepared. Once again, tech can support cedents.

Necessity may be the mother of invention, but until recently the technology has just not been available to drive digital transformation in the reinsurance sector. And in current turbulent times that change is badly needed, particularly as we look to the future with rising nat cat losses, claims inflation and falling investment markets. 

Now is the time when market leaders will take the opportunity to use technology to win the reinsurance race, by being smart, cleaner and faster.