Reduce Your Clients’ Risk of a Breach
While the insurance industry gains incredible efficiencies from artificial intelligence, its need for human creativity and empathy is greater than ever. Here, Sharon Emek shares the benefit of balancing technological advancements with the human element.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is arguably the most significant modern influence on the labor economy. Technology that automates and completes tasks previously accomplished by humans, AI can seem like a threat to many positions that countless people rely on for employment and steady income. But the implications of AI aren’t so much that work opportunities are lost, but rather reconfigured.
A Harvard Business Review article, “Collaborative Intelligence,” published last year aptly captures the potential for AI and human workers: collaboration, not competition. In the piece, authors James Wilson and Paul Daugherty perfectly illustrate that complementary dynamic, wherein AI completes tasks that are more difficult for humans to do efficiently and free of error with “speed, scalability, and quantitative capabilities” while humans complete tasks requiring “leadership, teamwork, creativity, and social skills” that are extremely inefficient for AI to attempt: “What comes naturally to people (making a joke, for example) can be tricky for machines, and what’s straightforward for machines (analyzing gigabytes of data) remains virtually impossible for humans. Business requires both kinds of capabilities. “
For the insurance industry, AI’ s proven itself in radically expediting underwriting, fraud detection, processing claims, as well as providing initial customer service. This is especially valuable in our modern society where the expectation for customer service is prompt and on-demand crisis resolution and closure. Then of course, the predictive side of AI means that with the abundance of data regarding claims and incidents, the insurance industry is better able to assess damage and accurately predict repair cost.
Which leaves the interpersonal dynamic creativity of the field to insurance professionals. Insurance benefits handsomely from AI, but it needs voices on the other end of the call that communicate Al’s takeaway in a nuanced, empathic manner. Insurance still needs creative minds to guide AI as it learns to interpret massive amounts of customer data and arrive at accurate, ethical recommendations.
The industry needs the rapid-fire technological ability of AI-its ability to assimilate an abundance of data; and it equally requires the human mind-creativity, innovation, and social ability of its insurance personnel. AI is changing the future of our global economy. But it’s not here to replace humans. It’s here to work with us and help us work smarter.
Sharon Emek, Ph.D., CIC, is founder and CEO of Work At Home Vintage Experts (WAHVE). WAHVE (www.whave.com) is an innovative contract talent solution that matches retiring, experienced career professionals with a company’s talent needs. WAHVE bridges the gap between an employer’s need for highly skilled professional talent and seasoned professionals desiring to extend their career working from home. From screening to placement, WAHVE is a comprehensive solution to qualifying, hiring, and managing experienced remote talent.
This article was published in the February 2020 edition of Colorado Insurance News (COIN). To view more articles and read the whole COIN, click here.
Recent Comments