The past year may not have been as good for the insurance industry as it wasfor the insurance IT field. Plans—and some progress—were made fortransformative projects, which is a good sign that insurers areheaded in the right direction.

The recent case study with XL Global is a good point. Companies havemanaged to get by with legacy systems for a long while, but legacyis simply not the answer if a company wishes to groworganically.

Growth through acquisition has been part of the problem in thepast. Carriers merging with or acquiring new companies were addingto the bottomline with new sales figures, but they also werestaring down the rabbit hole.

For the most part, M&A activity has meant adjusting to thesystems that came with the target companies. Carriers weresometimes able to merge the new business into their own systems,but by and large M&A meant adding more systems, whichcomplicated the already expensive problem of maintenance.

XL Global, like many companies today, is looking to expand bothits borders and its product lines, but it's a difficult—almostimpossible—prospect without modern systems that give insurers theability to capitalize on efficiencies in their operations—and theirdata—that come with modern systems.

The past year also has been an exciting one for those who havebeen waiting for mobile technology to finally reach a level ofimportance befitting the hype that has surrounded it. It's hard tobelieve laptops sometimes have the word "bulky" attached to themtoday when it wasn't long ago that the insurance world was tied toa PC in an office building.

The strides in technology—both with software and hardware—haveopened many eyes to the possibilities that exist both for businessusers and consumers through tablets and smartphones.

There is much work still to bedone by insurers with mobiletechnology. Many carriers were in a race to get their appsavailable for the various mobile operating systems, but as welearned throughout the year, mobile strategy means more than justan app.

The important point about mobile technology for insurers is thatmany began the initial steps needed to turn strategy into action.After years of waiting for the "killer app," we are at last seeingprogress in a field that could transform the way we buy and sellinsurance products.

Another important step that made 2011 a great year for insuranceIT was the emergence of social media. The good news for everyone isthat social media strategies are relativelyinexpensive—particularly when compared to software acquisition.

Social media likely will be handed off to the business side ofthe industry as we learn more about what it can do for thebusiness, which is all well and good for IT shops.

There will be even more challenges ahead in 2012, but we'llworry about them in a couple of weeks when the calendar changesonce again. Until then, have a wonderful holiday season.