Automation that enhances the agent experience and ultimately their selling and service capabilities is fundamental to enabling their success. But with so many potential areas to focus on, from portals to licensing and contracting to mobile, it can be challenging to know what to prioritize. Here are some best practices to help CIOs and business partners focus attention on the most value-added elements of agent automation:
Know your agent: A successful agent is someone who puts the needs of their clients first, has a positive impact on the people and community in which they serve, and takes pride in being counted on by their clients. Knowing the motivations of an agent provides a good base for understanding where you can get the most value from your investments.
Create an inventory of opportunity: Given the complex array of systems that provide support for the agent, a significant step is creating an inventory. There are a mountain of touch points that leave a lasting impression for an agent.To fully realize areas of opportunity, CIOs and their teams should develop a process map covering the agent interactions with all the touch points during the course of a business day.
Define metrics for success: The measures of success are likely to be a combination of things like improving the efficiency of submission to commission process, straight-through processing, aggregating access via single sign-on, and reducing agent onboarding times. Whatever the ultimate metrics may be, the process of working with agents and business partners to develop the metrics helps bring all parties together.
Understand mobile use cases and value: Mobility for agents has grown beyond calendar and contacts to more of a full agent “mobile office.” Depending on the use case, agents may be looking to access all of their data and applications from any device from anywhere at any time. A well thought-out and well executed IT strategy can support mobile applications by leveraging an open, service-oriented architecture.
Consider the impact of emerging technology: For most carriers, using today’s widely available digital technology and approaches will have the most immediate value in agent automation. But there are several emerging technologies, like gamification and wearables, whose potential values should be considered for inclusion on carriers’ roadmaps for the next few years.
Agents are heavily dependent on automation for every aspect of the engagement and service functions that support the ability and sell and service a client. The more CIOs can enable them through technology and process simplicity, the easier it is for them to do what they do best: develop relationships and provide peace of mind.
This blog entry has been reprinted with permission from
Readers are encouraged to respond using the “Add Your Comments” box below.
The opinions posted in this blog do not necessarily reflect those of Insurance Networking News or SourceMedia.
