How Much Do We Need to Worry?
In a rather random Google search, we came across a paper published last year by the global IT consulting firm, Coforge. The title of the paper is “8 Challenges Threatening the Insurance Industry in 2020”. Since threatening sounded rather ominous (we might have gone with facing), we decided to give it a read. Lo and behold, we found almost all of the challenges listed by Coforge to be interrelated.
Here they are, in order, in bold, followed by our own thoughts on the matters:
- The increasing demand gap between the multi-generation customer bases. This point is well taken. But there are gaps between all generations — social, cultural, intellectual, musical, expectational, etc. That’s life. Some of those gaps, particularly as they pertain to dashed expectations about job security and the desire to be one’s own boss, led to …
- The untapped gig economy. No generation thinks the preceding generation got it right. It’s no wonder the gig economy blossomed.
- The fast changing digital space, systems, and technologies. The reality of this point is attributable to changes in technological capabilities, of course. But it’s also attributable to #1 and #2 — bridging the demand gap and tapping the untapped gig economy. The decentralization wrought by #1, #2, and #3, makes #4 inevitable.
- The growing concern over the privacy of customer data. Well, yeah. Decentralization and broader distribution of work, transactions, and the data associated with them yield liabilities in security. And them comes …
- The added strain of COVID-19. Add the decentralized, distributed chaos of COVID-19 into the challenges posed by #1, #2, #3, and #4, and Coforge’s notion of threatening might be correct after all.
- The risks associated with the ever-evolving socio-political and economic landscape. And while the concerns of our customers aren’t necessarily socio-political, we’re certain the ever-evolving economic landscape is a direct contributor to #1, #2, #3, #4, and #5.
- The competitor threats. We don’t mean to be dismissive. But competitor threats are like generational gaps. They’re a part of life in 2020, 2021, and every other year.
- The effect of global-level changes on the insurance sector. The biggest concerns for our customers are the constantly changing regulation policies. And we agree with Coforge here:
The only way to be prepared and cope with such issues is to have an agile team with a robust digital infrastructure and a standardized code of conduct.
While we surely have to be aware of all the changing conditions in our environments, our first priority should be the work at hand. Whether you’re in the insurance industry or any other industry, we might all be better off following the advice of Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881).
Know what thou canst work at, and work at it like a Hercules.
It still pertains. So, don’t worry so much.
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