When I speak with insurance claim professionals about the customer experience, inevitably I hear comments about claim payments and the impact those payments (or denials) have on satisfaction. Fortunately, after working within claim operations for more than 20 years, I have come to understand the challenges of balancing quality technical claim handling with customer service and can therefore speak to it with some credibility.

My dad used to say "your reputation is all you have," and so this goes in business, especially in the competitive insurance market. When claim personnel slip up, word gets around. When claims does a good job, customers are quiet because a good job is what they expect. When you do great, they might write a note to your boss and tell a friend or two. How a company goes about doing "great" on a regular basis is the stuff of which organizational legacies are made. Remember that great encompasses good. It's a good plus. You don't need to abandon good for great. You just need to continuously work to improve it. Better is not the opposite of best.

A Look at Technical Skills