Greg Maciag, president and CEO of ACORD and a long-time expert on technology in the insurance industry, believes the industry must quickly adjust to successfully capitalize on the expanding and changing demands of employees and customers. Open standards, interconnectivity, and mobility are coming to the forefront and posing challenges to those within the industry, according to Maciag. Successful companies need to think about how to differentiate themselves to the customer base, he believes.

“The next generation of tech-savvy and social media-driven consumers and workers will look at insurance in a different way,” Maciag predicts. “And it will behoove firms to prepare for this very open and mobile marketplace by investing in assets that differentiate them and provide a real competitive advantage. They will no longer be able to pass along the cost of bulky proprietary systems that do not easily connect to whatever devices people are going to use.”

Maciag adds that ACORD will continue to improve industry standards as technology itself changes. “ACORD's standards are constantly evolving because the business and the technology evolve,” he explains. “That's not going to stop. We are streamlining the standards development and maintenance process so we can channel more resources into working with members on adoption and implementation.”