Graham Newman, Product Marketing Manager, EMEA, FINEOS
In my previous blog I looked at the drivers for change in the levels and quality of communications in the claims sphere. Today I’ll take a brief look at what the characteristics of good communications are.
Appropriate
What should characterise good communication within the claims sphere? Communication must be appropriate
- Must add value – they are not just a filler, making noise for the sake of it
- Be beneficial to all
- Be timely.
Simply doing more of it is not sufficient. What does a Risk Manager need when his or her board questions them on the state of a large, outstanding claim? I would suggest they need:
- Clarity
- Transparency
- Honesty
- To know about decisions as soon as they happen.
The levels of e-commerce enjoyed in Britain makes a wonderful platform for fast, personalised, appropriate communication – to anywhere the recipient happens to be. The London Market should be looking to use this position to gain competitive advantage over other global centres; and if it doesn’t then the danger is always that someone else will.
Access
Communication is a two-way process. It can never be about just pushing information out there – that’s the radio model, and however well-intentioned and slick – is just broadcasting.
We can see that the rapid adoption of new technologies – and therefore new – radically new – ways of doing things is driven by consumer behaviours as it is Consumerism that leads the way and commerce that will follow. The digital world will fundamentally influence the way customers interact with their insurers – AND how all stakeholders interact with each other – brokers, salvage experts, loss adjusters, coverholders etc..
Open up access. You don’t always know when communication is required – open up access so that it can be driven by any party that has a need. This is all about needs and meeting them.
The solution – in our view of the global markets we see some real innovation – lies in collaboration.
Collaboration
Successful collaboration will:
- Remove the barriers to interaction
- Eliminate the bottlenecks inherent in processes flow
- Embrace the non-linear – this can be a difficult concept but, like ‘fuzzy logic’ allows communication to occur in a natural way.
Perhaps for the first time – certainly as never before, the tool is also a toy. People expect their on-line interactivity to flow easily from one aspect of their lives to the next – no difference between work and leisure, between hard purchases and mere curiosity. They want a seamless experience woven into everyday life – blended interaction.
This is not just the under 30s generation growing up used to this stuff, this acceptance of newer ways of doing things is catching.
Personalisation
To make the best use of the newly emerging communications models commercial insurers will have to learn from the best of the consumer services. They will soon have access to more than they’ve ever dreamed of and will have to create suitable ways of marshalling that data, making decisions on what to do with it – on how to improve the service for each individual in the process. The simple lesson from the consumer world is to think in terms of millions of markets of one – using technology and to create the communication each participant in the value chain will benefit from.
Good luck.
