The Power of Pivot

While for many people, it may have felt that their world has stood still over recent months with unheard of constraints on day-to-day life meaning that their ‘norm’ has disappeared. In reality, our world continues to spin faster than ever.

Consumer needs changed practically overnight and even though we’re well over the initial panic-buying of essential products (how many cupboards are crammed full of loo rolls, I wonder?), online shopping rates have surged. The high street was already facing a tough challenge before Covid-19 struck, but it’s clear that digital commerce is going to drive future revenues and those retailers who aren’t committed to digital are unlikely to emerge intact.

Nor has the insurance industry escaped unscathed. Travel insurers saw their business rug pulled from under their feet overnight while motor insurers saw claims incidents drop off a cliff – and it’s probably best to avoid any discussion about business interruption...

The global pandemic has demonstrated just how quickly world events can have an immediate impact on a business. No industry, least of all the insurance sector, can ignore how frequently or quickly consumer demands and needs can change – and to respond, businesses need to be able to pivot fast.

Unfortunately, when it comes to the world of insurance legacy systems make the fast testing, tweaking and implementation of new products and services almost impossible. These huge, complex jigsaws of systems are hard enough to maintain and upgrade simply to function – but they’re simply not able to cope with the agility that fast change to product lines or the speedy roll-out of new offerings demand. And don’t even think about asking them to cope with delivering or managing something with the level of personalisation that consumers are increasingly expecting as for insurance on demand options ... forget it.

The coronavirus outbreak will accelerate the digital mindset that has been gaining traction within insurance businesses over the past couple of years – and many will realise that not only can the right software make it easy for them but that there are a number of ready-made solutions already out there.

Take the Genasys Technologies Build solution as just one example. It gives brokers, MGAs and insurers the power to pivot, and define products, claims and rating in one place, bring new proposition to market quickly, while its agility allows for rapid changes to product points and pricing – by themselves with no need to ask us to undertake any coding for them.

During lockdown, we’ve successfully completed four different projects on time and on-budget in four different locations around the world – oh, and we’ve done it remotely without any need to get on a plane or step through an office door. It’s hugely exciting to help these forward-thinking companies to transition on to our agile platform giving them access to solutions like Build giving them to pivot fast and adapt to the changing world as it spins faster and faster.