How can we bridge the human-digital gap | PODCAST

How do we pursue digitalisation without losing the human touch? Christian Brisson, our Head of LATAM, and Nelson Lee, Founder and CEO of iLife, sat down at ITC Vegas to discuss how it's possible to bridge the human-digital gap with insurtech solutions.

The Importance of Human-Digital Interactions

Early in their discussion, Nelson and Christian explore the move towards digitalisation within the insurance sector. Nelson considers that while the move to digital unlocks vast benefits for agents and consumers alike, we must be careful not to forget the human element.

“Human-digital interaction involves on and offline behaviour and digitisation needs to take that into account.” The iLife CEO continued with the example that you may send someone a WhatsApp message or call them on the phone, but that doesn’t mean you never see them in person to grab a coffee.

As humans, we interact both physically and digitally. The insurance industry should mirror this, Nelson attests, instead of completely cutting out personal interactions that are critical to insurance distribution, education, and awareness.

Building Tools with Agents in Mind

Nelson recounted his personal experience as an ex-engineer, observing that many tools are built by engineers for other engineers. In the insurance industry, this practice hinders the development of tools focused on the end user, agents, resulting in lower adoption.

To make agents a vital part of product and service design is to make tools more intuitive for non-engineers. Exemplifying this, Nelson referenced , iLife takes an all-in-one approach. He references the introduction of the iPhone, which combined the capabilities of a cellular phone, laptop, CD player, and camera into one device, as an example of the power of an all-in-one solution.

“How do we impact end users, both agents and consumers alike, so they feel the same way about our product the way we used to feel about the first iPhone?" asked Nelson. iLife seeks to emulate the impact of this innovation by offering agents an all-in-one solution that can replace the multitude of platforms they use to complete their tasks today.

Digital transformation in LATAM

The last topic of discussion for Christian and Nelson was the pace of digitalisation in the LATAM market. Nelson has observed that digital transformation in LATAM is extremely fast, if not faster than it was in the U.S. He identified two reasons for this. First, the technology being introduced in the region is much more mature than it was when the U.S. went through its digital transformation. Second, when compared to the U.S., LATAM is much more under-penetrated when it comes to technology.

"I think that digitalisation is where we are heading,” concluded Christian, “but we are still not [there] yet, at least in LATAM. We need to provide the agents or the sales force with the right tools.”