And in the on-going battle of man versus machine, there is some friction when it comes to
collaboration. According to a study by Verizon, acceptance of machines is growing. But
brands struggle to get the human-machine interaction right. "Companies in our industry are
good at supporting human interactions with AI and other technologies but have difficulties
making the transition from technology to human agents," says Amy Shore of Nationwide. A
key constraint at many firms, she says, is the legacy technology systems and resulting back-
end complexity that hampers the integration of newer technologies. Her company has
invested heavily in platform modernization across its business lines in the past five years,
which has facilitated easier interfaces with AI in its customer-facing operations.
How Do Insurers Reap the Rewards of AI Moving Forward?
Here are several suggested steps:
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Get your house of data in order.
Most insurers today do not treat data for
what it truly represents -- a corporate
asset, and a very valuable one at that.
Unfortunately, data projects tend to be
neglected as other IT transformation
projects often take priority. To make sure
that AI and data analytic investments are
maximized, the fuel (internal and external
data) for those engines needs to be clean,
accurate, accessible, and usable. Internal
data needs to be organized to support the
development of these IT initiatives.
External data sets need to be available to
enrich the internal data sets. On a higher
level, it means creating a workable data
strategy to procure, manage, and
effectively utilize this crucial asset across
the enterprise.