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

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

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

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

XL Global, like many companies today, is looking to expand both its borders and its product lines, but it's a difficult—almost impossible—prospect without modern systems that give insurers the ability to capitalize on efficiencies in their operations—and their data—that come with modern systems.

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

The strides in technology—both with software and hardware—have opened many eyes to the possibilities that exist both for business users and consumers through tablets and smartphones.

There is much work still to bedone by insurers with mobile technology. Many carriers were in a race to get their apps available for the various mobile operating systems, but as we learned throughout the year, mobile strategy means more than just an app.

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

Another important step that made 2011 a great year for insurance IT was the emergence of social media. The good news for everyone is that social media strategies are relatively inexpensive—particularly when compared to software acquisition.

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

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