New Year, New Opportunities for Insurers

We're three days into the new business year and like many of you I'm still trying to dig my way out of the stack of work I let pile up during my time off for the holidays.

I hope you got a few tech toys for gifts this year. I wrote iPad on my letter to Santa and somehow it came out as an iPod, which was needed, but when you ask for a new car you don't want a motor scooter.

I hope to get another present shortly. My cell phone contract expires in another month and I'm trying to figure out two things:

• Which smartphone do I want?
• How can I convince my wife this is something we desperately need.

In an article that Karen Furtado of Strategy Meets Action wrote for our January issue of Tech Decisions she describes a friend who is in quite similar to me. He uses his cellphone almost exclusively for making calls with the occasional text. He told Karen he didn't feel he needed anything else.

Karen explained to him the many things smartphones can do for him in addition to calling and how quickly the world of mobile communications has changed.

Many insurance companies find themselves in the same situation with their software. It's working so why bother to upgrade or replace it. Too often they fail to look at the possibilities that exist beyond their little corner of the world and instead embrace an old rule: If it ain't broke don't fix it.

There is certainly a fine line for all of us to examine when we make changes. Sometimes people tinker with perfectly good products and manage to screw things up. This was best exemplified by Coca-Cola some 26 years ago (my, doesn't time fly?) when they reformulated the most popular soft drink in the world.

But we can't be put off by spectacular failures. There is a difference between remaking your product and how you go about putting that product together and distributing it.

Don't be put off by the possibility of failure, particularly with insurance software. Failure rates have dropped sharply over the years as the technology has improved and matured.

Embrace the opportunities that lie ahead, don't be fearful. And any help you can give me to convince my wife about the need for a smartphone would be greatly appreciated.

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I'm not sure where you are accessing this blog, but beginning next week it will be a part of our new Web site: www.propertyCasualty360.com. You'll find all your insurance tech news there (and me) along with industry news that covers the gamut. Don't fret, though. Tech Decisions magazine will continue publication, although there is a regularly scheduled pause in February.