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Technological innovation in insurance is a good thing, so long as that advancement is actually offering something to a company and its clients. No good can come from rushing headlong into buying new technology if it doesn’t improve processes and create broker and customer satisfaction.
Amanda Ketelaars, operations manager at Mitchell and Whale, said the brokerage is always seeking to better its offerings. But any changes need to be well considered.
“I think probably one of the most important things for us is not getting stuck in the trap of using innovation for the sake of using innovation,” she said. “Everything that we do has to come back and prove to us, with metrics, that it’s good for us, our clients, it’s good for the industry, it’s good for our team, and it’s good going forward.
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‘I think that, sometimes, that’s one of the things we get trapped in – that we have to try everything and do everything. Our approach is really look for the tools and take advantage of the tools that will improve all of those things.”
Ketelaars will be speaking on this topic, generally, in a panel discussion entitled “Broker 2.0: The Transformation Of The Modern Broker” at InsurTechTO, a Toronto insurtech conference on November 6.
The panel will discuss “how the role of the modern broker is evolving to fit customer expectations to stay competitive with the increase in insurtechs … [and] the challenges brokers face, and the ways they can overcome them.”
Ketelaars said Canadian brokers, and this is happening at Mitchell and Whale, should be looking at what is available – often in the United States – and assessing whether it could work in the local marketplace.
“Insurance in Canada is still very traditional,” she explained. “It’s about paying attention to what is happening in some of the other countries out there, seeing what they’re doing, and seeing if we can make it happen. We’re not going to put an app in just for the sake of putting in an app.
“Really, for us, it’s about trying it. And if it doesn’t work, it’s moving on … and not being stuck with it. You make smart decisions … and, yeah, there are some financial consequences to it, but you have to be willing to make those choices.”
And the brokerages clients have, ultimately, been happy with the tech advancements, Ketelaars said. That is largely down to the firm being open and honest with them. Like the firm trialling things AI chatbots - if you are open with your clients about what you’re doing and why you’re doing it, they will generally be okay with it, she said.
“For clients, as long as you’re transparent … they’re quite open to it,” she noted. “[They] are quite a bit more understanding when they see that the technology that’s going in is for improvement.”
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