Innovate or Die. Really?

I have been thinking and reading about innovation recently, and I must say there certainly is no shortage of material on the topic—much of it with a critical slant.  That may surprise you, since no matter where you work I am sure your organization talks about innovation, believes it is already innovative, or at least plans to become innovative. Why?  Innovation is a trendy concept, it sounds cool, cutting-edge and entrepreneurial. Business schools have embraced it, and consultants have built practices around it. More importantly, many people believe the phrase “innovate or die” is absolutely true and that it applies to all businesses. So, as Dennis Berman points out in the Wall Street Journal: “Most CEOs now spray the word "innovation" as if it were an air freshener.”

William Taylor, co-founder of Fast Company magazine and blogger on the Harvard Business Review Blog Network, described it this way in his 12/6/13 blog Stop Me Before I “Innovate” Again:

“Words matter — in business and in life. I’ve always found that companies that aspire to do extraordinary things, leaders who aim to challenge the limits of what’s possible in their fields, develop a “vocabulary of competition” that captures the impact they’re trying to have, the difference they’re trying to make, the future they’re hoping to create. Almost none of these companies and leaders use the word “innovation” to describe their strategy — implicitly or explicitly, they understand that it has been sapped of all substance. Instead, they offer rich and vivid descriptions of what they hope to do, where they hope to get, and why it matters.”

Ginanpiero Pteriglieri, an associate professor of organizational behavior at Insead, puts an even sharper point on it in remarks quoted in The Experts blog in the Wall Street Journal:

“Innovation is a strong contender for the crown of business buzzword of the decade. The term has all it takes. It is ubiquitous, mysterious and, like its acolyte "leadership," it works alone and pairs well with many adjectives. Is there a problem that transformational leadership and disruptive innovation aren't invoked to solve? Is there a company whose failure is not explained by a lack of both?”

Business buzzword of the decade? Wow. In that race, the competition is steep, and the contenders are many.  By the way, a great place to check out a good collection of the “jargon monoxide” (a term coined by Polly LaBarre) contenders is The Ridiculous Business Jargon Dictionary where you can browse terms ranging from “above board” to “zero-zero split.” 

Whether or not you believe it is appropriate or well deserved, the property-casualty insurance industry isn’t often described as innovative.  Complacent and risk-averse, stolid, stodgy, and conservative are descriptors more commonly used. But let’s step back a minute—what is innovation, and how critical is it to the success of a property-casualty insurance company?

Innovation is often described as the implementation of something new—a product, a service, a process, an alliance, a market, or an experience—that creates value. So while the innovation process may begin with big ideas, it takes execution and results before it qualifies as innovation. Or, as Dr. Lewis Duncan, president of Rollins College, put it: “Innovation is the ability to convert ideas into invoices.” 

Of course, there are also other flavors of value out there to be harvested through innovation—lower costs, higher margins, new or more attractive products or services, more engaged employees, new customers, new distribution channels, happier customers, more loyal customers, enhanced reputation, etc.  Yet for property-casualty insurers who believe they are operating in essentially closed markets characterized by a high level of maturity and stability, the decision about innovating often turns on their competitive situation.  If they believe they are competing successfully (however they define that term), they may elect to avoid the costs of innovation and to focus instead on engineering incremental operating improvements, tweaking their products and operations and processes so they can continue to function competitively.

But if a company is not competing successfully, or if they aspire to grow and be profitable but that just isn’t happening, they need to step back and analyze what isn’t working, why, and what needs to be done to improve results. That’s an opportunity for innovation, for sure, but it also offers a convenient excuse to avoid or abandon any initiative or process that is new (or unwelcome or costly) and to “get back to basics.”  Getting back to basics means different things to different people, of course, but it usually involves a return to a time-tested and proven method of doing something, like implementation of well-established and widely understood industry methods and best practices. You might characterize it as the converse of innovation. Truth be told--it is much easier and more comfortable to get back to basics than it is to get innovative and develop something new to create value. And it just might be enough for an insurance company to get things back on track if their inability to compete had its roots in substandard or underperforming products, practices, services, or operations.

I do always wonder, when an insurance company goes public with its plans to embark upon an ambitious, multi-year program of operational transformation (first cousin of innovation), just how long it will take before they lose their nerve and push the “back to basics” button. I have experienced it, and I have watched others go through it, and it isn’t really that unexpected.  Innovation is often a costly undertaking that generates uncomfortable, disruptive change with no guarantee of success,  That is particularly true when the “value” that is expected to result is difficult to measure and demonstrate convincingly since it arises from something other than “invoices.”  If you have lived through any type of claims-related transformation or innovation, you know exactly what I mean.

Still, I am not convinced that all property-casualty insurance companies are necessarily entangled in an “innovate or die” predicament, at least not yet. Plenty of companies manage to stick to the basics, focus on execution, play around the edges with incremental improvements, and the market allows them to survive and sometimes even prosper.  Yet we all know there are insurance companies out there who are constantly pushing the envelope and doing whatever it takes to create value—they just don’t spend a lot of time bragging about how innovative they are or broadcasting what they are doing. Instead, they are busy trying to create distinctive marketplace advantages that resonate with customers and to give themselves an edge in pricing, costs, products or services.  Why? So they can operate with higher profit margins and grow by attracting customers away from their competitors. So even though innovation for property casualty insurers probably isn’t really a matter of life and death today, it can impact an insurer’s quality of life and general well being. Kind of like diet and exercise can for humans, I suppose.

Narrow the focus to property casualty claims operations, however, and I think the “innovate or die” predicament becomes a bit more pressing and complicated; but that’s a tale for another day.

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@theclm.org or through www.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/

 
 

 
 
 
 
 

Leadership Toxicity

I was reminiscing with some former colleagues over the holidays and, as often happens in such situations, we were laughing it up as we shared anecdotes about some of the highly placed, handsomely paid, sometimes incompetent and occasionally "toxic" leaders we had worked with over the years.  Of course it's easy and maybe even therapeutic to laugh about such people once they are in your past and no longer part of your daily life experiences, but I think it is fair to say that the truly toxic leaders weren't ever really funny--they were dysfunctional and destructive.  If you have worked with one, you know what I mean.

What is a toxic leader?  Toxicity, like beauty, may be in the eye of the beholder, but when Dr. Marcia Lynn Whicker (Toxic Leaders: When Organizations Go Bad) classified leaders by type, she used three categories:  trustworthy, transitional and toxic. The toxic leaders were described as maladjusted, malcontent, malevolent and malicious enforcers, street fighters and bullies who destroy productivity, operate with a sense of personal inadequacy, and who are selfish and clever at concealing deceit.  It gets worse:  according to Col. George E. Reed, US Army, toxic leaders are viewed as "arrogant, self-serving, inflexible and petty" and they "rise to their stations in life over the carcasses of those who work for them." Andrew Schmidt has even developed a Toxic Leadership Scale that considers five dimensions of toxic leadership:  abusive supervision, authoritarian leadership, narcissism, self-promotion, and unpredictability.

One of my favorite books on this topic is Bad Leadership: What It Is, How It Happens, Why It Matters by Barbara Kellerman.  She describes seven types of bad leadership that are most prevalent--incompetent, rigid, intemperate, callous, corrupt, insular and evil--and illustrates them with stories about public figures from business and politics.  Several years ago, I worked with a group that used Kellerman's categories as a framework to try to articulate what bad leadership looked like in their workplace so they could root it out and eliminate it.  The finished product looked something like this:

 

Incompetent	Lacks knowledge, skill or will to sustain effective action Oblivious to his/her lack of knowledge, skill or will  Focuses on peripheral or unimportant items Gets in the way of direct reports (trips the players on their way out of the dugout) Foolishly and inappropriately confident and arrogant High maintenance
Rigid	Stiff, unyielding, smug Unwilling to consider and adapt to new ideas, new information or changing times Believes he/she has superior knowledge (smartest person in the room) Gets trapped by bad decisions (unwilling to admit mistakes)
Intemperate	Lacks discipline and self control in professional or personal habits and behaviors Has tantrums, screams, throws things, slaps the table, slams the door Substance and/or people abuser Uses inappropriate language or makes unprofessional comments Needlessly hostile and provocative
Callous	Uncaring and/or unkind Ignores or discounts needs, wants and wishes of others Acts without respect Bullies subordinates and/or treats them with contempt Makes disparaging comments about employees to other employees
Corrupt	Lies, cheats, misrepresents, or steals  Takes the credit, avoids the blame Conspires against, demeans and marginalizes others  Deals dishonestly or disingenuously with others Says one thing, does another
Insular	Disregards the health and welfare of others  Fails to listen, or listens to the wrong sources Micromanages Intolerant of alternate viewpoints Ridicules opposing opinions
Evil	Vindictive Intimidates and demoralizes others Hurtful and mean-spirited Uses pain and fear as an instrument of power

Sadly, the CEO at that company was the person exhibiting most of these behaviors, but he was a "kick down, kiss up" kind of guy and the board that had hired him apparently believed he was an outstanding executive.  I have always wondered how people who behave this way ever landed a leadership position, never mind kept it, but I suppose the more interesting question is how and why  such "leaders"  have any followers at all.  Jean Lipman-Blumen, in her book The Allure of Toxic Leaders, points out that people exposed to a toxic leader often come up with excuses to tolerate the abuse--job security, paycheck, prestige--thus the behavior goes unchallenged. So while we usually have three choices when we are facing something we don't like--(1) grin and bear it, (2) change it, or (3) leave it behind--most of us either find a way to put up with it, or we leave it behind, so we generate little or no pressure for change.  Unfortunately, this emboldens toxic leaders and encourages them to stay the course.

Then this week when I read an article in Strategy and Business entitled Are You Your Employees’ Worst Enemy? I realized that while toxic leaders are a problem, a more insidious and prevalent leadership problem might be this:  according to the article, a majority of employees surveyed, even in successful companies, viewed their leaders as an obstacle to their effectiveness.  Apparently many well-intentioned leaders get caught in a "hindrance trap", described as "a cognitive bubble in which leaders erroneously conclude that the success of their teams is a reflection of their good leadership", so they inadvertently derail their employees by:

• communicating purpose and direction poorly
• not considering organizational capacity when rolling out new initiatives
• failing to set policies to help the organization achieve superior performance

Sounds a bit like early stage leadership toxicity to me.  Is it any wonder that leadership consulting, training and coaching have emerged as high profile growth businesses?

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@theclm.org or through www.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/

Claims Success Vision

Many Claims leaders get uncomfortable and move toward the exits when they are asked to contemplate and discuss their "vision", as in the vision statement of a strategic plan.  For most of us, that discomfort originated from participation in ritualized annual strategic planning events, where our company's leadership team got together to participate in intense wordsmithing exercises designed to produce a strategic plan document.  Vision, Mission, Values, Strengths, Weaknesses, Threats, Opportunities, Critical Success Factors, Objectives, Key Performance Indicators--all of these topics were tossed onto the table, to be debated and scrutinized with the assistance of a cadre of skilled facilitators.  I remember these planning events as contentious and dramatic, featuring break-out sessions, flip charts, storyboards, critiques, soliloquies, and of course mandatory camaraderie, all of which culminated in team solidarity and consensus on a newly minted strategic plan. Whew!

While I am an unapologetic strategy fan (I believe it takes both planning and execution to achieve the best result) I am not a fan of the strategic planning process used by many insurance companies.  I think the process itself has become more important than the plan it produces. In other words, getting through the strategic planning ritual and producing a plan that complies with the company's prescribed format/template has become the primary goal--the quality and utility of the plan is secondary.  Which is too bad, but it does help explain why strategic plans at many companies are so irrelevant.  Once completed, they are tucked away like sacred scrolls, not to be seen again until the next year's strategic planning event. So while most insurers have strategic plans, many of those plans have nothing to do with their day to day operations or decision making.

Google the question "Why do strategic plans fail?" and you'll get over 7 million results, although they sort down into a familiar handful of reasons:

·         plan was not communicated effectively

·         company vision, mission, values and value proposition were poorly defined

·         unrealistic goals

·         disconnect between strategic plan, operating plan, individual performance plans

·         invalid assumptions about internal and external environments

·         lack of resources and commitment to implement plan

·         lack of accountability and ownership

·         lack of meaningful performance metrics to track execution

But don't despair. Even if your company's strategic plan is nothing but fluff, you can still use proven planning techniques to help keep your Claims operation focused on what's important.

Years ago I was doing planning work with a motivational expert from the UK.  She told me about a process called "success visioning" in which leaders visualize what success would look like in their operation and then make a list of 8 to 10 things that, if true, would signal success. The concept was familiar to me, as I enjoy Stephen Covey's books and I’ve read my copy of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People so many times it is falling apart. What she was describing was essentially Covey’s second habit:  Begin with the end in mind. If you are setting out to do something, it helps to start with a clear visualization of your objective: an image, a picture, or a description that can serve as a touchstone and frame of reference as you move forward.  And if you keep that visualization in mind, you’ll have a better chance of achieving it.

So I prepared a Claims “success vision” document and adapted it over the years to address challenges at the different companies where I worked.  My final version, prepared about five years ago, looks like this:

1.    Effective, efficient claims management operation producing the best claims outcomes

2.    In control: creating and maintaining a “no surprises” claims operating environment

3.    Known for providing industry leading claims service and expertise

4.    Attentive and responsive to stakeholder needs and concerns

5.    Reliable and consistent in setting accurate and adequate case level loss cost reserves

6.    Sought after source of claims thought leadership and timely, actionable, loss-related      information

7.    Seamless operations, utilizing a single claims system and a shared services operating  environment

8.    Skilled at integrating acquisitions and new programs

9.    Viewed as an employer of choice and a developer of people.

To make the list actionable, I included bullet points to provide details and specifics, and developed metrics to track performance. I used to look at the list every month, and think about what had been done and what else needed to be done to make these statements come true.  Why? Because I knew if we could turn these aspirations into reality, and if we could support improved performance with objective metrics (evidence), and if our stakeholders (individuals or groups who have a vested interest in or dependency upon how well the Claims operation performs) were saying and believing these things, then our Claims operation would be a success.

Give it a try.  It's easier, more useful and considerably less painful than strategic planning, and it will give you most of the raw material you need to talk about your vision at your next strategic planning event.

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@gmail.com or through www.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/

Bashing the Claims Department

As I was sorting through some old reference materials a few weeks ago I came across an article I had written for Best's Review Property Casualty edition way back in February, 1990.  At that time I had been in the Claims business for about sixteen years, and I was in my third year as the Chief Claims Officer at Providence Washington Insurance Company in Providence, RI. Unfortunately, Providence Washington was destined to cease operations and head into runoff mode in 2004, after 205 years in business.  I would be long gone by then, but I wasn't terribly surprised it worked out that way.  We had a CEO who had been a university professor--he was smart and entertaining and engaging, but he had some blind spots about certain parts of the insurance business.  I still remember the time one of our managing directors presented to the executive team a potential MGA program deal involving waste haulers in New York city.  Following the presentation, the CEO went around the table, asking each of us to comment.  The Chief Underwriting Officer was against it, and I was against it, but everyone else thought it was a great opportunity.  Without missing a beat, the CEO announced: "Excellent.  Let's do it."  That deal, and the many others like it that followed, helped seal Providence Washington's fate.

I had written the original draft of the article, "Bashing the Claims Department", in early 1987 when I was working for Commercial Union Insurance Company (CU) in Boston.  Years later CU merged with General Accident (1998) to form CGU Corporation, then White Mountains Insurance Group, Ltd. acquired CGU Corporation in 2001 and changed its name to OneBeacon Insurance Group.  But two things happened in 1987 that influenced the final draft of the article.  First, as a newly minted CPCU I was pondering my career options so I asked our CEO for advice on how I might begin to shift my career path from Claims to general management in a profit center.  His response was that there had never been a claims person born who could run a profit center.  Second, I had to get the article approved by someone in HR or Legal, but it didn't get approved because of the concern that readers might misinterpret it as critical of CU.  So, with the benefit of fresh and vivid clarity on my career path options,  I accepted my first Chief Claims Officer position at Providence Washington Insurance Company a few months later and filed the article away.

I pulled out the article again in 1989 and rewrote it, this time with the full support of my new employer.  It is fascinating for me to re-read it after all these years, because even though it strikes me now as a bit idealistic and shrill, I still remember the angst I felt while writing it.  I was trying to describe situations that didn't seem fair or right, but I really did believe they could be remedied with positive results.  One of the early paragraphs helped set the tone:

Like most people I know in this business, I stumbled out of college and into the employ of a major insurance carrier purely by chance.  Given the opportunity to get involved in either claims or underwriting, I chose claims because it sounded more interesting and, if the truth be known, it included a company car.  It took me only a few years to realize that I had inadvertently become part of what seemed to be a disadvantaged (and frequently maligned) class of insurance company employees.  It took about the same amount of time for me to get promoted to an inside position, at which time I had to turn in the company car.

Denise Gordon at AM Best was kind enough to provide me with a scanned version of the original article, so I hope you enjoy this glimpse into my own personal 1990 Claims time-capsule:  Bashing the Claims Department

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@gmail.com or through www.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/

Five Troublesome Truisms About Claims Management

Originally posted on November 20, 2013

I was driving home from Pennsylvania recently listening to an NPR program about historical misconceptions (http://www.npr.org/2013/11/05/243293489/misconceptions) and I started musing about some of the persistent fallacies concerning claims management that I encountered during my years as a Claims officer.  Here are just a few of my favorites:

1.  A claim is a claim is a claim

No doubt lifted and adapted from Gertrude Stein’s famous quote about roses, this identity platitude asserts that claims always have been and always will be claims, and nothing more.  In other words, claims don’t vary much from period to period so neither should claim costs or resolution approaches. This chestnut regularly surfaces when the Claims department observes that claims of unusual or unexpected frequency or severity are adversely impacting productivity, case reserves, loss payments, and expenses.  If the loss ratio is trending higher than projected (see fallacy 5), this slogan is often used to attempt to redirect the responsibility spotlight from underwriting to claims.

2.  The best claim is a closed claim

Since insurance company claims handler productivity is measured by closed claims, and TPAs usually don’t fully earn their fees until a claim is closed, it’s easy to understand why this one persists.  Of course a claim closed too soon (without proper coverage verification, damage investigation, analysis and evaluation) probably won’t result in the best claim outcome. Most claims people understand that the objective is a bit more complicated, i.e., claims should be closed as promptly as possible consistent with claim handling best practices and regulations.  Yet I still remember standing in a TPA office in New Jersey a few years ago at the end of a month, listening to a manager imploring claims handlers to “close claims now” so they could increase that month’s revenue.

3.  It’s all about claims cycle time

Cycle time refers to the amount of time it takes to resolve a claim, so this assertion is closely related to fallacy 2.  Cycle time is a great example of a performance measure that appears to be valid, yet encourages the wrong behavior if it isn’t balanced appropriately by other objectives.  So while cycle time may be important from a productivity and customer service perspective, it is only one of many claim quality control objectives that are critical to producing the best outcome.  Others include paying the right amount on a claim at the right time, resisting fraudulent claims, denying claims that aren’t covered, managing allocated expenses, pursuing subrogation recovery, complying with regulations and communicating with stakeholders.

4.  Just listen to the voice of the customer

I always get a kick out of this cliché since it sounds so easy and obvious that most people nod in agreement when they hear it.  And in terms of apparent applicability, it transfers effortlessly from industry to industry so even a neophyte COO can feel comfortably righteous when uttering it.  But what on earth does it mean when it is applied to a claims organization? Which customer’s voice is controlling? Claims departments have lots of different customers, although they are commonly called stakeholders.  A stakeholder is any individual or group who has a vested interest in or dependency upon how well the claims operation performs, and stakeholders often help define and influence programs, products, and services offered.  Claims’ stakeholders include business units, underwriters, insureds (premium paying customers), distribution partners, actuaries, employees, investors, and regulators. Their wants and needs are extensive and varied and sometimes in conflict, so they don’t speak with a single voice.  It takes a full-blown stakeholder needs analysis to record all those voices and successfully harmonize them into a balanced plan. Note to self: not easy, not obvious, but necessary.

5.  The loss ratio is the best measure of Claims’ effectiveness

The loss ratio, as the term implies, represents the ratio of net claims incurred (reserves, payments, claims expenses) to net earned premium.  Claims certainly is responsible for the numerator of the loss ratio, but the denominator (net earned premium) is determined by other factors that are not managed by Claims, such as rate levels, policy terms, and risk selection criteria. The two parts of the ratio are basically independent. So if Claims does a fantastic job of managing payments and reserves, but underwriting chooses the wrong risks, at the wrong rates, and with the wrong policy terms, the loss ratio will explode.  It makes no sense, however, to hold Claims solely responsible for the entire loss ratio when it is only responsible for the numerator of that ratio.  That’s not to say that Claims shouldn’t have to demonstrate its effectiveness in managing the magnitude of that numerator, but that’s a story for another day.

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@gmail.com or throughwww.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/

Loss Cost Management in Claims

Originally posted on November 21, 2013

Years ago I joined a large, troubled insurance company and the CEO asked me to do just one thing—fix the Claims department. He wasn’t sure what was wrong with it, but he knew it needed work.

I called the claims management team to a meeting and asked one question:  How does Claims contribute to profitability here? I wrote their answers on a flip chart, dozens of them. After about 15 minutes, I told them they were describing important things that Claims did, but they hadn’t mentioned the most important contribution Claims makes to profitability: loss cost management.  Claims organizations exist to manage loss costs. The puzzled faces looking back at me told me what needed to be done to fix that Claims department.

Loss Cost Management is nothing more than the ability to consistently generate superior claims results and outcomes while nurturing stakeholder relationships and complying with applicable laws and regulations

Loss costs have three components:

• ULAE–unallocated expenses (salaries, rent, etc.)
• ALAE–allocated expenses (outside attorneys, independent adjusters, TPAs, appraisers, etc.)
• Loss–loss dollars paid to insureds or third parties.

At most companies, graphically stacking these three components by dollars spent yields a triangle with ULAE at the top, ALAE in the middle and Loss at the base. This is often called the loss cost triangle.

Managing loss costs means managing all three components of the loss cost triangle.  The costs are interrelated, so fewer dollars spent on ULAE may translate into more dollars in ALAE or Loss, while fewer dollars spent on legal expense may increase Loss dollars paid to third parties, and so on.

The challenge for Claims managers is straightforward: understand how the loss cost components interact, then deploy and incur the most effective combination of allocated and unallocated expenses to produce the most appropriate level of loss payments.

Although as a concept it is often misunderstood, the best gauge of loss cost management effectiveness is the level of loss cost leakage (loss dollars paid in error due to breakdowns in claim handling) identified through closed file reviews. World class claims operations operate with leakage of less than 5% (percentage of loss dollars paid that shouldn’t have been paid.)  As it turned out, the troubled insurance company I mentioned earlier was operating with a leakage rate above 20%.

Here’s a quick primer on loss cost leakage:

• What is loss cost leakage?
• Leakage is the amount paid on a claim above and beyond what should have been paid. 
• Leakage is reported as a % of the total amount paid on a claim (or sample of claims), so if $10,000 was paid on a claim that should have been resolved for $9,000, the leakage % is the amount overpaid ($1,000) divided by the total paid ($10,000) or 10%. 

•  How is leakage measured?
• Usually a calibrated team of claims experts reviews a sample of closed files periodically.  They analyze claim handling decisions and track compliance with best practices, ultimately estimating the amount of loss cost leakage on each claim.

• What causes leakage?
• There are dozens of root causes, but some of the most common involve failure to apply best practices in investigation, evaluation and resolution.  
• Coverage errors, inadequate subrogation investigations, evaluation based upon unverified damages—these are examples of breakdowns that can inflate claims payments.

• How can leakage be reduced?
• Since the closed file review process reveals, by line of business, where in the claims handling process leakage is happening and the root cause analysis reveals why it is happening,  it is actually fairly easy to identify what needs to be done to eliminate causes of leakage. 
• Training, decision support and process improvement aimed at the root causes of leakage usually produce rapid improvement.

• Do leakage reductions improve loss ratios?
• Since leakage reductions imply that overpayments on claims are being reduced, they certainly have a favorable impact on the numerator of the loss ratio (losses.) The denominator of the loss ratio (earned premium) is influenced by other factors, however, including rates charged and policy terms, so there may not always be a direct cause-and-effect relationship between leakage and loss ratios.  The leakage number is a useful indicator of the loss cost management effectiveness of the claims operation since it reveals the extent to which claims are being overpaid.

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@gmail.com or through www.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/

Faster Horses

Originally Posted on November 30, 2013

I read a Capgemini whitepaper a while back which declared that in property casualty insurance, the claims experience is often the “defining moment” in a customer relationship. Although that sounded a bit dramatic to me,  I found a couple of reinforcing definitions in the dictionary:

defining moment (noun)

1)     the point at which the essential nature or character of a person, group, etc., is revealed or identified

2)     an occurrence that typifies or determines all related events that follow

Considering these definitions in the insurance context, it seems reasonable to argue that a customer learns about the nature and character of their insurance company when they file a claim, and that their claim experience influences all related events that follow, including customer satisfaction and retention.  Of course many customers never file a claim, so their defining moment comes second-hand, when they listen to a family member or friend or even their agent or broker describe a claim experience. The problem with that, of course, is that people are twice as likely to share negative (versus positive) customer experiences with others, and resources such as Facebook, Twitter and company or industry-specific on-line discussion boards have made it easier to share those comments with a much larger audience.

But even if insurance companies do have customer relationship “reputations” that are largely driven by customer claims experiences, what’s the impact? According to that Capgemini paper, reputation matters: one out of five customers switches insurers after a negative claim experience, and it costs an insurer five to seven times more to attract new customers than it does to keep existing customers.

I recently reviewed a 2012 Global Insurance Survey report from Ernst and Young  (Voice of the Customer: Time for Insurers to Rethink Their Relationships–accessible here) and I started thinking about that old story about Henry Ford, founder of Ford Motor Company.  As the story goes, when Ford was asked about the customer research he had done before he began production of the Model T automobile, he allegedly harrumphed:  ”If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”   While it’s unclear whether Ford actually said those words, that quote is often used to support the argument that customers really don’t know what they want.

The message about customers in the Ernst and Young paper, however, was quite the contrary.  According to their research, property casualty insurance consumers in 2012 reported very definite expectations about price, product, brand, communication preferences, ease of doing business, accessibility and personal contact.  While price was still cited as the primary determining factor when buying an insurance policy, brand and customer service were right up there with price.

Historically, customers who filed claims (including me, and perhaps you…) tended to approach the claims process with low expectations, bracing themselves for a claim “defining moment” experience that would likely involve trepidation, conflict and disappointment. They didn’t expect or demand an excellent claims experience, and they were so forgiving:  if the experience didn’t turn out to be as bad as they thought it might be, they reported they were satisfied.  In other words, low expectations, exceeded, resulted in satisfied customers! Not exactly a situation that cried out for transformational change.

But customer attitudes and expectations concerning the claims experience are shifting dramatically.  According to Ernst and Young, in the US excellent claims service is now nothing more than marketplace table stakes, a minimum requirement to compete. Consumers expect excellent claims service—anything less will likely drive them to another insurance carrier—yet excellent claims service doesn’t guarantee customer retention.  Half the consumers who reported a poor claims experience indicated they were likely to switch carriers, but so did a third of those who had a good claims experience! What did the respondents say would have improved their claim experience?  Speeding up the claims process, and communicating more effectively.

As shifting customer expectations reshape how customers approach their claim “defining moment”, I think it will be intriguing to watch how insurers deal with customers who know what they want and are willing to change carriers to get it.

Dean K. Harring, CPCU, CIC is a retired Chief Claims Officer and an expert and advisor on Property Casualty insurance claims and operations. He can be reached at dean.harring@gmail.com or through www.linkedin.com/in/deanharring/