Insurance
NETWORKING NEWS
Connecting the Business & Technology Communities
March 2010 www.insurancenetworking.com
Who Said It?
If there are carriers
still doubting they need
standards, they’ve been
living in a cave.
Story on page 18
4
Getting BPM Buy-in
Picking the correct place to
start and managing stakeholder
expectations are key.
6
The Components
of Quality Data
Exclusive INN research reveals
that business requirements are
driving ad hoc data quality
initiatives.
MAKING CONNECTIONS Data standards initiatives promise to smooth information flows. PAGE 18
Time to Get ‘Smart’
13Carriers need to account for the rise of smartphones in their communications
strategies.
>>IT WORKFORCE
THOUGH MORE MARATHON
than sprint, insurers are indeed
in a race to glean as much as
they can from a graying IT
workforce possessing increas-
ingly rare skill sets and a vast
amount of institutional and sys-
tem-specific knowledge.
Considering the stakes, carri-
ers need to make tactical consid-
erations, including shifting
internal staff and outsourcing
certain functions, in order to
By Bill Kenealy
Much Work to be Done
Before the Boomers Bolt
maximize the effectiveness of
these workers.
Concurrently, many insurers
view this generational shift as a
strategic opportunity to refresh
their technology stacks. With
the industry competing for a
new generation of technology
workers eager to work with the
latest technologies, the impor-
tance of these efforts is hard to
overstate.
>>IT GOVERNANCE
COMPETITIVE PRESSURE AND
tight budgets are compelling
more insurers to explore the use
of software-as-a-service and
managed-service providers. But
as carriers turn to these third-parties, experts say that close
attention to detail is critical.
Many hosted IT services
agreements are still very much
a work in progress and it’s vital
for IT decision makers and
their legal departments to
By Thomas Hoffman
Managing Managed
Services Agreements
comb through vendor-generated contracts for inconsistencies, vagueness and language
that could be detrimental to
customers.
Indeed, to successfully navigate the process, IT leaders and
their teams need to carefully
review service-level agreements, definitions of availability and uptime, exit clauses, and
other contract details.
Story on page 14
Insurance-Specific
Accounting?
17
72%
12%
11%
3%
2%
Say in line with
unwinding of risk
Say in line with
premiums less claims
Say straight line over
the period of coverage
Say in line with claims
payments
Say other
Analysts share opinions
on how profit should be
recognized over the life
of a policy:
Story on page 8
INN Online
InsuranceNetworking.com
• Allstate Denies Plans to
Terminate 3,000 Existing Agents
• Distracted Driving
Admonitions Gather Speed
• AIG Takes Heat for
Further Retention Bonuses
