For 50 years, insurers have seen technology
as a route to greater efficiency,
a way to reduce costs.
They haven't used technology
to directly improve the customer experience.
For the things that touch the customers directly,
like claims and new product offers,
insurers have relied on manual processes and people.
The equation, though, is changing.
Digital technology is transforming
the way companies do business.
But combining people and technology in the right way
will mean that insurers tap
the full value of digital at scale.
Take the example of commercial property insurance.
Landlords used to rely on manual processes.
Now buildings are putting in sensors
to anticipate problems before they become claims.
There is no reason why building's external surfaces,
including their roofs, can't be subject
to digital scans of their own, perhaps by drones.
The same theme of claim prevention
is taking hold in health insurance.
By sharing data with their health care providers,
consumers with chronic medical conditions
are staying healthier.
Doctors are tracking patients' prescription drug compliance.
Before long pharmacogenetics
may play a role in fine-tuning patients' treatment.
When a claim is needed,
digital technology will make the experience
much less onerous.
In some parts of the world,
a person whose car has been in an accident
can already call his insurer
and have the claim automatically approved
by an artificial intelligence voice system.
Now imagine if that insurer also arranged
for an immediate dispatch of a tow truck
and for a rental car to be waiting
when the policy holder arrived at the rental location.
That customer would be an advocate forever.
Insurance customers don't want to have to talk
to a service person to change their address or
obtain a certificate.
In many cases, they no longer have to.
By automating processes and using technologies
like artificial intelligence,
insurers will be able to speed up their decision-making,
lower their claims rate,
and increase back-office productivity.
That will allow them to focus their human talent
on things that humans are uniquely good at:
innovation and solving nonstandard customer problems.
The question is how to be a leader in these areas.
The shorthand way we put it is
that insurers must become bionic:
attracting new types of talent,
moving to new organizational structures,
adopting new ways of working.
Rather than people operating processes,
they will design processes
and unleash their human creativity.
We'll be sharing more on what a bionic insurer looks like-
the benefits and the how.