a very wellknown risk manager told me two or three years ago the WCI is where workers compensation ideas are born and developed that was really high praise for our convention our industry keynote is the point of the spear when it comes to new ideas for the last seven years it's been moderated by two of the most significant influencers in the workers that's by the way the first time I've ever used the word influencers so it should be not it should be noted two of the most significant influencers in the workers compensation Arena the power couple of workers compensation Kimberly George and Mark Walls Kimberly is the global head of innovation and product development for Sedwick and Mark as the vice president of client engagement for safety National this special edition of their well followed program outfront ideas is on the topic of technology transformation to present present their panel in this timely topic please welcome to the stage Kimberly George and Mark [Applause] Walls welcome everyone for those of you standing in the back there's lots of seats over here all right I'm Kimberly George co-host of outfront ideas with Kimberly and Mark we are so happy to be here today WCI is my favorite Conference of the year and it's really because of you and all of those who come to learn and share and collaborate with one another if you're not familiar with outfront ideas Mark and I come together each year and pick 20 topics that we believe the industry needs to focus on these aren't our individual company needs they're the needs of our industry and you've heard us up here for many years talk about being better together if our industry is to evolve to meet the needs of the constituents and each of you as stakeholders we need to think big we need to become comfortable with the uncomfortable and make change happen and in this topic one of our issues to watch for 2023 technology transformation if you don't take note someone else will the chair with which you sit today will be with a disruptor sitting there in the next two three and certainly five years so we selected this topic because it's meaningful to all of us whether you're a physician in a law practice a risk manager a claims man manager a payer a service provider so we hope that today you're able to find some nuggets of inspiration to do just what Steve said take it back to your desk and before I hand it over to mark for introduction of our guests I do want to thank WCI Jim and Steve and Andrew for affording us an opportunity to bring this topic and to you the audience for being here so Mark let's get started all right we've got a great panel joining us today let's start by meeting with them and Scott introduce yourself uh good morning Scott Rogers Chief client officer for Cedric clams Julie good morning Julie Leighton risk management segment leader at Marsh Vin good morning everyone I'm Vin foderingham I'm the CEO of Partners risk strategies I think it's important to point out that both Vin and Julie served in Risk Management mement roles for several years with many different companies before their current position so they bring a quite a variety of background to them and I just want to say Shawn Jackson with panda group sends his regrets he wanted to be here but with 200 retail properties in the midst of hurricane Hillary he needed to be with his company and wasn't able to travel and then they had an earthquake just to top it all off so so much fun all right let's get started our first topic is what is standing in the way of progress the workers compensation industry always seems to lag from a technology standpoint what's getting in the way and Vin let's start with your thoughts yeah well I think when you think about workers comp I think it's a broader issue right so you think about uh the insurance industry as a whole uh you think about how it started you think about Lloyds of London and the coverage that started with Lloyds and the process and going to the box right they still do that today and so from an insurance perspective across all of our Industries process we're rooted in process and it's rooted in Tradition and so as technology comes about we seem to be as an industry seem to be one of the slowest adopters to it you know we were talking earlier about the medical um in medical industry their bill procing processes and other things that happen quicker and faster but when you think about what happens with workers comp um it becomes a burden it's the process is very very burden Laden it's very very manual um you think about the concerns that the injured worker has and it has to do with transparency related to the process think about all the phone calls that all you Adjusters in the room have um that workers call you Injured Workers call you about day in and day out it's about getting paid and making sure that their claims is covered right so if you can go online and order a pizza from dominoes and see the Pizza Tracker and knowing the Pizza Tracker is going to deliver the pizza to your house why couldn't there be something similar where an employee or with an injured worker knowing exactly and having that type of transparency to understand exactly where um he or his or hers claim is in part of the process so how do we leverage the technology and all the things that are available today in order to put a process in place so that the worker has transparency the level of transparency that he or she needs were could result in lower litigation um think about all the Predictive Analytics and the um artificial intelligence that we have now uh for better reserving better claim processes quicker faster processes those are the things that we're so slow to adopt but we we need to get to a point where we're able to leverage that so that we can improve things for ourselves yeah I think those are great points and you heard um Vin speak about a few of the things that we've discussed from this stage in past years uh for this industry keynote bureaucracy in workers comp the need for talent to be engaged we'll hit on some of these topics further as we go along Julie what do you see impeding change well I don't know I like change but you go first right many times that's how we look at it we don't want to be on The Cutting Edge is it fear is it are we afraid to discover something new do we hold ourselves um and create our own barriers potentially is it the control that we like you know we feel that we can um execute it better or we don't want to to give up control because of a variety of different reasons so I think our with the way that we look at change I I think in general is we wait sometimes for others to vet it through or to make it proven or so that we can trust it or we simply don't want to be out there as the Pioneer but technology is coming at such a fast rate that I think without changing and adapting to those changes and embracing it and asking new questions uh seeking discovery on our own and self-starting as it relates to technology we're leaving ourselves behind and we're not recognizing that it can be a competitive Advantage not only for our businesses and our departments for us personally in our careers um there's not much pushing kind of change and innovation in workers compensation inside of our own organizations it's viewed maybe as a necessary evil right we have to take care of our Injured Workers the costs are relatively stable so no one's really pushing us perhaps to ask new questions how do we solve the solutions that are out there that technology you know how do we take discovery of those Solutions you know I sit through many client meetings where maybe they're complaining about their claim performance or they're looking at it's really hard to keep an adjuster on the desk we have a lot of turnover but I very rarely hear us asking new questions about how new technologies might be able to answer kind of some of the old problems we stick to what we're comfortable with and um that's where I think adapting to change uh we can't wait with technology for everyone else to go first first yeah Julie I I want to have a follow-up question you've in your risk management role oftentimes took those risks to move your company's programs along and I know there's Risk Managers in the audience that may think well my business isn't ready for it you personally what drove you and what gave you the confidence to be an early adopter and to to push whether it's your claims model your risk yeah I think for me A lot of times what I did was I didn't look at risk management in my goals I knew what my goals were to elevate risk management in the organization uh create better value and savings and all of that but I looked at what are my organization's goals and I began to take Discovery inside my organization and then translated how could risk and how could claims contribute to what my organization was driving after and that actually made the conversation easier because not only was I asking them what's important to them but I was finding a way for risk management to play a role in that and I would Retreat and really think through that and then I would come back at it and I often talk about how I grew you know when I was at Office Depot I grou a team of 19 people and at Co 32 people because I continuously found the way to add value to the organizational goals and therefore achieved both my personal goals and departmental goals at the same time the last thing that I'll say is I also took tremendous Discovery I always told my team if you want to learn what's Cutting Edge and happening invite every vendor into the room talk to your peers often we shut those things down we're too busy we're dealing with this we're only a party of one um you have to find the time to know what's out there and the possibilities that you might be able to create for your own organization thanks Scott what do you see inhibiting change yeah so so interesting so great points by there the panelists and and Julie has always been a change agent in the industry everyone knew her as a Trailblazer and everything she did we need more people like that that really want to take a risk um it's it's risk management it's not risk aversion right and it feels like there's a little bit of that as set in and I don't know if it's maybe it's the control that people want the process uh bureaucracy uh maybe people just love the predictability of it all but it's just this it's a reluctance or fear of change uh which is frankly frustrating I think you know Vinnie talked about you can track a pizza but you don't want to use technology to get injur worker back to back to health and back to work why would you not want to do that and for me it's it's it's being on the service side the provider side um it's frustrating because the technology does exist The Innovation is there right and time and time again we have these conversation and you you know you have a conversation whether it's you know at the lobby bar or outside this room and you start talking about okay think here's some of the cool stuff that's going on and it's not a competition of you know SED versus others it's really from an industry perspective you know what is out there what is available and when and how do we embrace it uh and people get excited about it but when comes time to actually do it it it it's almost like cold feet it's the strangest thing you know there is great Innovation out there today there's great technology out there today there are ways to do things in a super efficient super effective cool calm way um that if we just embrace it give it a shot and give it a chance we could we could you know roll it out immediately so I think it's just there's a you know Vin point it's the industry it's not comp comp is a subset of the insurance industry which is just slow moving um again they've done it this way for for 100 years we joked about the Titanic being written the book at Lloyd's still there um and and that's kind of funny but it's kind of weird at the same time right you know everything you do is on a little phone right here but we don't want to embrace that to uh get an injured worker back to to health so I just think it's a reluctance to change a little bit too much risk aversion as opposed to risk management not it's not a criticism it's just a thing yeah yeah can I can can I add on to that of course I think one of the things we need to risk management as risk management as technicians yeah we need to embrace that level of change and um when you think about the Comfort level that we all have in our process and we think about what is our value to the organization to your point Julie and if you're rooted and this is my call out for all the Risk Managers right if you're rooted in your worth making the transaction to save premium right that's not where your value is you know so uh I'm assuming assuming that some folks in the room have been you know they've been part of the soft market now they're in the hard market and they're trying to figure out okay well how do I create value embracing the technology and taking the chance whether you do a small pilot on a subset of your employees or your employee group do something and challenge yourself to do something different if you sit around and do the same old same old same old your value is going to come and go right um it the transaction piece of this of what we do as Risk Managers is very is the easiest part of what we have to do it's it's time for us to embrace the change roll up our sleeves embrace the technology and put something different in place that you can show the value to your company um very well said Kim can I jump on top of there back to you keep going all day here we go no I you know something strange happened to Julie's point about um the necessary evil work comps a necessary evil it's a statutory benefit benefits all this other stuff this strange little thing called the pandemic over the last three or four years caused us to behave and think differently we had to embrace in Innovation we had to embrace different kinds of Technology why human beings weren't in the building they were at home we weren't in in the building we were at home and all this different all this technology was infused into the process well tele Med something like that that you know the industry has been reluctant for years to go after all of a sudden it became almost the norm so the pandemic caused us caused us didn't allow us caused us to think differently and as quickly as the pandemic is starting to end we're starting to move back into our old habits and it just it literally frustrates me that we we continue to do that because uh it it is there it does exist today and you know the other great thing that happened throughout the pandemic is people stop worrying about it being workers compensation right they're like we don't care we don't care about the process we don't care about the form the EDI my employee my valuable colleague or or resource for our organization is not healthy and not not at work today what do we do to take care of them they ignored all the process whether it was occupational or not they're like just get my folks healthy and back and we should continue to embrace that mentality the technology and Innovation component of it but looking at people as as human beings not necessarily A a statutory benefit no I think that's a good point and the ecosystem with which we all work bringing the stakeholders to the table is really what it's all about because our technology has so much integration across the system and that's why it's important each of us do our part to transform technology before I go into some use case scenarios and Tech that's being deployed Mark will you share the carrier point of view around change sure you know we see a few things from the carrier point of view getting in the way first and foremost is those fearsome Legacy claim systems you know they've got billions years worth of data and hundreds of billions of claims in there and making changes to those systems is costly and challenging uh part of the challenge comes into the fact that so many carriers are publicly traded companies and so they are evaluated by their shareholders every quarter based on their profitability based on them hitting certain numbers and quite frankly you your your shareholders don't want to hear you say we're going to put a billion dollar investment in technology today and it's going to hurt our bottom line but in 5 years that's going to pay off for you they don't want to hear that all they care about is today's numbers so so just that very structure and that focus of the financials quarter by quarter get in the way quite frankly I think you know one of the trends that we're seeing right now on the carrier side is more and more carriers Outsourcing their claims to third party administrators and I think part of what's driving that is it's a way to get out from under the the the problems of the Legacy claim systems and the problems of that chasing the quarterly goal and you know show a positive Financial impact and hand that off to somebody else but the other thing I have to mention is is quite frankly the regulations inhibit change workers compensation is the most highly regulated line of insurance there is I mean think about it everything we do has has regulations around it what you pay when you pay how you pay the color of the form the font of the form the color and the font of the posters you can go on and on and on and all of these things make change very difficult and I'll give you an example I was at the the Saka conference which is a regulatory conference about three weeks ago and there was an extensive discussion around the fact that there's still several states that require paper checks to be sent to Injured Workers so think about that for a second think about when's the last time you received a paper paycheck it's probably been 20 plus years for me but there are several states that mandate a paper check and so you know what should be a fairly simple Innovation allowing different forms of payment allowing debit cards allowing direct deposit into a bank account some states flat out prohibit it in their regulations and then some states where they've allowed that flexibility they'll still have language in their statutes that require an anti-f frud warning to be printed on the back of a check which is kind of impossible to do with a direct deposit into a a bank account so the regulations themselves get in the way of change yeah at that same conference there was a discussion around artificial intelligence and some of the Regulators had no idea that AI is a part of nearly every payer today many of us have already deployed Tech tools whether it's RPA robotic process automation AI machine learning and chat GPT we're down that path it's a matter of adoption and how does the industry Embrace that to move forward and so with that Scott you referenced the Technology's here so tell us a little bit about your thoughts around using data AI machine learning and new ways what are some of the ways in which your team's working on that yeah so I you know I um probably take the long way to the answer on that so um I've been at this for 30 plus years now uh been at Cedric over 25 years but I started on a desk I'm a claims guy right actually happen to sit next to that gentleman down there back in the day um but you know when when I joined the cedri organization what we set out to do and I don't I think that's really changed is there were kind of these three pillars of what we were focused on one was creating a great experience for the person that we were trying to help right uh that was the first thing the second was there was this whole focus on total cost of risk so we get caught up in a lot of this other stuff but there's this big number out there called the total cost of risk and you all know what that is then the third is we're representing companies and Brands so you know the third being focused on their brand so those three pillars continue to exist today at Sedwick um but they've evolved um and they had to evolve because things have changed technology has changed so uh the mark point about you know some of the states that still require paper it's kind of funny by the way the welcome packets that we still have to send out in certain states do you think anyone reads those I don't know I mean it's just a bunch of paper does anyone even still go to their mailbox I mean things like that but so there's been a lot of evolution so those pillars of focus in what we're trying to do as an industry and as our in our organization um continue to be the same but of evolved but when I think of technology and again a lot of it's there and to Mark's point about you know the ability to invest in Tech and that is challenging for publicly traded organizations Cedric being privately held I think we have a uh maybe a different approach and focus um so we do invest hundreds of millions of dollars every year because of this we're trying to create a a better everything right and the three things I focus on I say it all the time it's kind of the three e if you're going to invest a bunch of money you know seven eight nine figures uh you have to achieve three things what whatever you're doing the first is um is about the efficiency of the process right and everyone wants to buzz about that so chat GPT you know Sidekick is our product but everyone wants to talk about making the process more efficient give an examiners cleanance professionals the opportunity to be great at what they do by getting rid of some of the process and making them more efficient check agree that should do that uh the next is Effectiveness so end of the day again we're trying to drive down a total cost of risk we're trying to we're trying to spend less money great health care healthy return to work but it's really about trying to control cost so more effective Solutions so the efficiency of the the process the effectiveness of of the result of the process right very important then the third is the experience and again I said that started 25 years ago when I uh was pushing claims for Cedric and today I don't think there's anything more important than the experience of the person we're trying to help so I know there are a lot of folks that think man if you bring in technology all this AI cool stuff that you're going to be able to you know eliminate adjusters and you know we're going to automate the process and all this other stuff no no you're not that's not what it's about it's not about that at all it's actually about those other three things creating a better engagement you know creating efficiency and Effectiveness because we're still going to need cleans professionals to do the things that they're great at right and at the same time somebody who got hurt that didn't want to call you today is going to call you and they want to talk to a human being right they want to have an experience with you that you're there to help them have compassion the whole car and counts thing so if you accomplish if you invest technology and you go after those three three things and keep them in mind I think it will be effective the last thing I will say uh around the experience and I mentioned it you know a couple minutes ago about the pandemic changed us changed our Behavior it changed how we viewed people um we started thinking of people as you know people we were trying to help right they were injured or whatever the reason was that they weren't at work they were concerned about the experience so we were leveraging all this technology to say hey it's going to be all right right if you could deliver if you could deliver that message to every single workers compensation claim the first thing you do that it's going to be all right and I'm here to help you things are going to go all right all the things that the adverse the the effects of of uh you know a claim going a RI or whatever all those things go away if they trust you're trying to be you're trying to help them and do the right thing so long-winded way Kimberly I think if you're going to invest Tech and you should and everyone is uh it's got to focus on uh the efficiency of the process which again exists today uh the effectiveness of the process Auto adjudication all that stuff it exists today and then the last thing which I personally think is the most important is the experience of the person we're trying to help so that was really great Scott there's one other area I want you to touch on I feel like um over the last three years for sure moving from data analytics to data science and building out data lakes and use of third party data what's your take on the importance of that or how it's evolving yeah I mean uh yeah I mean data data is is going to be a good predictor and indicator of what's next right and it can drive with proper Ai and again Rich captured quality data it can drive a different performance a different result um I think a different experience uh but again that's one of those things where you know there was a lot of data out there and you know we live in this world of interfaces and apis and all this stuff so the data is Rich and actually is captured right so and I think about what we're doing with chat GTP right the sidekick so we're actually not only using AI to read medical notes and legal documents and summarize it for the adjusters creating efficiency for them but it's making that data Rich we're now able to capture data so that's kind of like the the the you know like the Holy Holy Grail right is that's what you want to get to so I think again a lot of the data exists I think predictive and all that other stuff is there but I think if you can really capitalize on all the data it can drive a different underwriting performance I think a different claim result just about a different everything so it's there again it's I think data and analytics and and data science and all the predictive stuff has been embraced uh for the most part I just think it's uh we're just on the cusp of it really being leveraged yeah and for those of you squirming in your seat when we talk chat GPT or the cloud keep in mind and I say this where I wherever I am in the world Ai and these Tech tools help our humans be more human we are not in the business of taking out adjusters or nurses stakeholders will be here what we need to do is drive efficiencies and our topic last year on Talent that's one of the reasons we have to do it we're in the business of caring for Injured Workers and these Tech tools help our humans be more human Julie Julie what would you add around the topic of data AI modeling that sort yeah what I would say is there's two things like you know number one we have to recognize the relevance and then I think we recognize a lot more of how technology can help execute in our industry the other is we have to be ready for it technology has always been like ahead of us I remember being at Kohl's and someone talking about we have the ability if somebody hovers you know looking at jeans we can throw them a coupon and they're like oh no don't do that because they'll think big brother is watching you know and now that's become a regular regular part of everything that we do we can't search online without our Facebook everything popping up of that same product or theme that we we are looking at so technology is always ahead excuse me of where we're thinking and what we're able to do so I think it's how do we start to get more in line and I think to the more technology advances I'm the first one when I call on a phone and I get AI I'm like z0000 representative representative you know I don't want to I don't want to interact with that but as connectivity and the Machine learning gets more refined and we're able to actually simulate a better experience more and more of us will I think adopt and and and align with technology but for our industry for us to not become you know EXT stin or for us to close down on opportunities I think we have to start to get ahead of or at least matching where technology capabilities are to again solve some of the big challenges Vin what would you add yeah I think it's really tactical right um when you think about process and think about uh let's take medical only claims for example um light touch bills come in bills get paid if we're able to use technology to make that a very easy transaction um we allow adjusters to focus on those claims that actually matter you know this you know let's face it we're war on talent and um in my past roles as a risk manager um we always struggled with making sure that we had the right number of adjusters that were handling the claim volume and if we continue to see these problems or these issues ues with having the Adjusters in the seat handling our claims why can't we lean on technology to be able to process those claims that are very very extremely light touch in order to use that opportunity for the the claims that really really matter right so if we're able to focus on the process itself and how do we leverage technology with the process that gets us to um you know to to get to a point where we can manage claims outcomes a bit better particularly those claims that matter which are the Lost Time claims yeah right so um and when I think also about the issues around cost stabilization right we all know that this cost escalation there's all these things that are happening uh with respect to uh claims not only with workers comp but also with liability and auto but how can we use that technology and there's a ton of data out there right so so you know a back inury claim is a back inury claim is a back inury claim right we all know kind of in our own minds how much is going to cost so how come we're not using that technology to be much more predictive particularly with a uh you know if you're a risk manager and you have a captive insurance company and you have to you know really kind of understand um where you're going to wind up with your acrs versus what you know what you put aside you know yeah and uh using the the Predictive Analytics technology to know whether or not if there's specific factors related to that claim are going to put you over or under is going to be critically important to you to manage you know your claim acrs as well yeah I think too we look at technology today as helping to improve a process and I guess in part it's related to that across the board but think about equipment or we get in a vehicle and that vehicle can now tell us maybe the safest route to take uh not just the quickest route if we were um unfortunate to have an accident maybe that that vehicle can now report back specifically where it's injured or where how it's been impacted creating a Time an opportunity for faster appraisals faster pay less fraud all of those things could be potentials very in the very short or near future future there's already technology that could help us to achieve those things and reduce even overall you know fraud speed um cost in our industry you know it's interesting Julie so that the whole telematics thing right that does exist right where the car you literally the car will tell you what happened when the accident occurred right if you have cameras you can pretty much recreate the entire event that t that technology has been out there for years and all the stuff we keep talking about has been out there for a while and Vinnie talked you know about you know the the kind of the low severity Medical Only files um you kind of you you kind of know what the outcome is going to be right right couple visits to a doctor prescription here get them back to work healthy right that's you kind of know what's going to happen and maybe the reluctance on our part as an industry to embrace technology is because of the human element right because you're talking to a human being maybe that's why because we do it in Auto we do it in property you know we do it credit card programs and stuff like that we do automation all over the place but in comp we're just kind of a little bit slow walking into it and maybe rightfully um people just worry about that experience that that injured worker and you want to make sure they're taking care of because you know it goes even further I mean it's not just Auto adjudicating a medical only file but you you know we have clients probably in this room that want to treat them with you know um White Glove service so call them 14 times do all this different stuff and we know it's a file that will resolve itself in 16 days so there's there's that again that's maybe maybe I could get behind the fact that it's a human being you're caring about them a lot you're in their experience I get that but at the same time uh being an adjuster now is hard it's like super hard so the days back in way back when you had 150 or 175 files and you scribbled on a bill and you threw it in a bucket and it was it was stuff like that and those days are over right I mean you you you got you got adjusters that you know are pushing 110 120 files and it is the hardest job out there it really is challenging right there's so many things firing at them all this world of data and interface it's like there was so much information coming out an adjuster and they still have to do all those expert things and take care of a human being so um again rambling a little bit but it almost is it's almost a a requirement as we move forward that we have to embrace technology to allow claim professionals to be excellent at what they do and it's not going to be uh it's not going to cause an adversary experience for the injur worker so Kim really anything else you want to add on this before I go to the next topic yeah when we think about process because we've spoken a lot around process and that we're very process driven you know a number of years ago and I may have even said it from this stage I was a little over the black belts just leaning a process and leaning a process and leaning a process and really began to think more about the journey and now we talk about experience all the time and so your companies have some form of a Digi digitization road map your company is thinking about technology and that's true if you're a startup probably more so than others but we're all on this digitization journey and what I would say is from the chair with which you sit how would technology move your customer base your employee experience the service of the Injured Workers The Regulators you work with you're an attorney getting the information back to your payer and you know I could sit here and say utilization review could benefit reserves the way we have our legal plans Scott mentioned unstructured data being able to now have n um natural language processing to pull out words and be able to make those key elements in claims decisions utilization review decisions medical return to work it is here and and and I think that sometimes because of the massive data people don't know where to go but you have experts in your company that are already working with your data and Tech if not you so get a seat at the table get your friction points what's not working in that journey and and work with the people in your organization or as Julie said others that can come in and give you suggestions all right let's let's move now to a discussion of what we can and should be doing I mean there's many different reasons to embrace change right now in technology including Talent shortages and enhancing the injured worker experience Julie I've heard you talk about the fifth industrial re Revolution tell us about that and why you think that should be pushing us towards change yeah well I think you know the fourth Industrial Revolution was a lot about how can we bring together technology to improve processes and automate the fifth Industrial Revolution will be more about how do we work together human to computer or human to technology and be become more efficient there's three kind of main components I think to this next Industrial Revolution the first is really trust we see companies right now trying to figure out can we trust applications like chat GPD and what they're doing is trying to also look at how does that technology that learning capability um how do we make sure that that's so refined that we can rely upon the information that's coming the other part of trust is how we vet trust all the time in every situation we don't believe everything we hear and see so I saw even a commercial this morning about voting and making sure that what pops up as images and um things like that how do you vet those to make sure that they're truly accurate statements the same thing is happening with how we're going to look at these different technologies that really can think or Garner information we're going to be testing it how refined is that information how much can I trust it so that's the first part the second is really about training so today I think many of us and I know I do like I get this thing and I give it to my teenage daughter and say please set it up for me we can no longer do that we have to be self-starters we don't have to learn how to um How It Was Made we don't have to code we don't have to invent AI or different methodologies but we really have to learn how it's used because in our careers we can't pass off to another generation or to another person that has interest something that could be really relevant to us the other thing about training which I found really interesting as I was thinking about this is that um according to the future of jobs reports 65% of the jobs that we know today will be different in the future for kids that are in school today when we look back at some of the Industrial revolutions around training we actually find that like when Machinery was coming into place they created just the kids in school to start to learn in classroom row settings that way when they got into the world of working they were used to working in a row in an assembly line it's really interesting that our training as an organization as ourselves and as a community we really need to look at how accepting we are of different types of training that will prepare us for the future of how we will interact and engage with technology and then the last is together with technology and you know together is again I've talked about it a little bit is the refinement of all these things where we can greater trust it we know what the possibilities are and I think toward Scott's point point you know sometimes we maintain the control because we think the human element or whatever but how much more significant can it be when you really recognize how much faster you can make decisions how you can have that person side by side years ago when medical management came into place I remember you know all the tpas would make a big deal about hey my adjuster sits right next to the nurse and they can work in conjunction we'll think about that in terms of technology and that again is now our seat next to us in all of our jobs helping us to be better decision makers bring more relevance to our organization and potentially speed in how we're doing things so that's the future I think of the fifth Industrial Revolution and um thank you a little bit Insight I love that technology sits next to us then Vin what are your thoughts about what we can and should be doing right now yeah I I think it's really time to get to a point where um we have this Consciousness around continuous Improvement um during my time when I was risk manager at Ron I was trained in Six Sigma while I was there so there's this cycle of constant Improvement and so how do we bring this back to the process right I always I'm always circling back to process right so know that the process that we have is within a construct of what has been put together by Regulators so why isn't it time now that we get the right people with the right Minds from all sides of the business together to sit down at the table and think through what the status quo what the what the current state is and build out the future state so if we're thinking about using technology in order to improve processes in do all these other things but the construct is rooted in a very manual paper driven heavy laden process Guess what at some point in time it's going to break so the entire process needs to be reviewed and so that um there's the opportunity to optimize the process the end to end process needs to get optimized in that way now you can bring think through um end to end processes with respect to AI the billing pieces how employees receive their money electronically um the transparency that we talked about with the Domino's Pizza Tracker right um other things that are specifically related to improving the injured worker employee experience because when we think about high litigation rates what drives you know now I know there are a lot of attorneys in the room but hopefully all of you are on our side right but think about the things that drive employees to attorneys right it's a frustration with the process there's a distrust with the process if we can change the construct of the process as a whole and use technology to provide the level of transparency that's needed then I think we might be able to get somewhere I like that Kimberly what are your thoughts on what we can and should be doing well first we need to think bigger and I think within our area of the business do bring those stakeholders together know your friction points what are the opportunities to not only sell your business but the business that you have internally and so you've got to have a voice and a seat at the table and don't give up if you're not curious you won't know so learn from others think bigger and I think ultimately the time is now I remember being on this stage a number of years ago and we talked about the evolution of workers comp and rethinking workers comp and you know what the items we talked about then and shared it's here because of the technology transformation so I think we need to individually spend time if we haven't recently revisit that dusted off and maybe next year this time we'll be talking about how we've seen significant change over the last 12 months Scott after hearing from everybody else what are your thoughts on what we can and should be working on right now yeah so I actually chuckled that you're commment about when you call customer service I do that every time all you have to do is talk two more words and you're going to be fine but no I need to talk to a human being which is crazy right but it that's a perfect example of of the challenge right so we what would we have five generations still in the workforce four for sure um the fifth one the the greatest generation is kind of moving out but they all are they have a different approach to how they want to communicate and how they want to be communicated with right so I think um I just I find it interesting and that we're trying to embrace all this but at the same time I think the the the challenge or what I think we should do next is is kind of a ground game approach right we can cause change you can cause change as an employer as a service provider as a carrier you can cause change boiling the ocean is changing the construct that that Vinnie was talking about right this whole process in this system that's that's that's a bigger effort but I think think right now you can Embrace Innovation and Technology you can cause change inside your your program your company or what have you because it does exist uh but it's going to just take a little bit of effort it just takes individually each person embracing what's available to them uh and doing it for the right reasons right we're trying to create a a a better place a better experience you know a better world if you will um so yeah I think everyone just needs to take on to their their piece and run with it it's there Scott what are some of the communication tools back to the injured worker experience that you think about deploying or are using in the process yeah I mean so all the old stuff's there right the old old school stuff of phone calls and um emails maybe people still send letters don't know um but but the idea of chatting and texting that's a that's a now thing it's a today thing we do it all right and everyone does it and I think there's needs to be a i again if we do more and more of that it's this whole world of immediate gratification and your world operates off of a phone which is what everyone wants everyone's got a phone in here you probably looked at it couple times just now but you know the idea that you have all this available immediate gratification instant resolution that's where that that's where we are now we just need to do more of it so chatting texting emailing sh all that stuff exists you can use AI driven chat Bots to actually answer most of the questions that we know are coming we know what the questions are um so yeah it's just it's really about you know embracing the stuff that is available to us um and you know trying to communicate with those different uh those different uh demographics in different generations and you know Cedric is a good example Millennials are now our largest demographic you know population wise in in our organization so they are very different than me the Gen X guy and uh but I I think you have to have all the the the the methods available to them um but I think the more and more we Embrace things like you know that are driven through apps and through phones I think the better off we are what's an interesting statistic is so we do a lot of uh at Cedric we do obviously a ton of comp claims but we also do a ton of nonoc stuff and the utilization levels of our apps and chat and text in the non-oc world is just around 90% in the work comp world it's about 30 why is that why is that I mean it's the same technology effectively the same process as an employee benefit granted it's a direct access to your benefits that way but it's about Healthcare it's about getting back to work it's about Indemnity payments it's the same thing but for some reason over here in benefits it's a 90% lift that people want to communicate that way that's the way they do but in workers compensation it's almost shunned it's and for those of you that might be thinking well there's medical and it's complex the majority of claims are medical only and resolving very quickly so keep that in mind when Scott references the 30% utilization on the comp side did you have something you wanted to add well what I would add is you know finding the place to start is probably one of the hardest things so you know one of my S just talking about what I what I uh alluded to in the very beginning is there is not a company out there today that is not looking for um or worried about their talent base and workers compensation can play really well into that so it's looking at okay as it relates to workers comp then what helps us as an organization related to some of the goals we have in our organization so let's just take talent for a minute so we know return to work is important communication with that injured worker the experience of that injured worker also they'll come back to full Duty so maybe you start with what are my organizational goals and how can I connect there and then the next part is how do I go take Discovery you all most of you are working with a carrier or a TPA or you're here at WCI go to the vendor show and start looking at different things that would help drive after some goals that you might have for improving the employee injured worker experience that can be communication and all the tools that are out there that could enhance communication and it can be other Technologies and things but focus on one goal that you're trying to achieve in your program and then discover what are all the possibilities of how we can deliver something new Innovative but help your program related to you know cost and driving after that that Talent piece I want to Circle back to you for a minute you had mentioned um some not necessarily straight through through process automation but opportunities to maybe have light touch and there is I just mentioned the medical only so high frequency low severity will you just expand on your thinking around that because I know you spent time at Amazon um really working in that area yeah we we we thought through first we had uh we talked about data Lakes earlier right so one of the big incentives that we had was to build out this huge data Lake that had all of this information in not only for claims but um for Renewal information and other data as well that was accumulated across the business so that was an effort to streamline the process but when you think about um the large volume of workers comp claims you know that Amazon you had millions of employees right so I think globally you had uh two or three million but within the United States was almost a million so you can think about the claim volume that occurs as a result of that you have to figure out ways of how these claims can be self- adjudicated or else you'll be mirrored down in process you know so um the claims team that was part of my department was over 130 odd people one of the largest out there um but found that uh that a lot of those folks came into our claims department from HR from safety so they weren't they weren't technically claims experts so how do you get them up to speed and move them quickly so that they can get to a level to handle claims with a light touch and the ability to use AI predictive modeling and all of those things within a construct of a decision-making model helps mve things along faster gives the employees that may not have had the claims background the opportunity to learn until they get more comfortable into a point where they can handle things a bit better and more efficiently yeah so the opportunity here is to create straight line processes with why no decision making based on the characteristics of what occurred what the medical bill is and we talked about earlier about um you know the the medical community the nonot community having the technology in place to make that same decision making it's no different yeahh it's the same same so how come that can't be applied in the workers comp side with respect to these high severity I mean s I'm sorry high volume low severity type places that should be that should be something that's automatic yeah thank you I just given your vision and I know we've hit on it a few different ways um this morning so thank you for digging in Scott you want to give your final thoughts before we let Kimberly wrap us yeah I uh I uh it's interesting Vinnie the stuff you talking about it made me think that um you know this whole idea we're trying to talk about Innovation and Ai and using technology and all this other stuff the reality is like I said it exists in all the things you want to ask the question about today it exists today you know one of the things we were talking about in prep was how a lot of other Industries actually already embrace it they just don't talk about it they just don't talk about so whether it's Auto adjudicating ano or a car accident a credit card claim whatever it is all that that stuff exists today it's just for some reason we we pause at the last moment when it comes to a human being and it's it just I just find that interesting but no I think we are um you know we talked about the fifth Industrial Revolution right we were we're right now in the age of AI you think of the Age of Enlightenment back you know the 16th 17th century where you know one of the greatest inventions ever the printing press allowed information to be shared and knowledge to be built on that was then we're now in this world of AI where that's going to happen exponentially but it's right in front of us it's just we can't fear it uh we have to have parameters and rules around it but we all need to embrace it especially in the worlds that we control kber believe wrap us up all right hard to believe we are already wrapping up such a wonderful conversation today I think we all can take away we could be a little more Curious than maybe we are even if you're the most curious person in the room we could probably assess our risk aversion or risk appetite mindset matters and so much of what we do and coming out of the pandemic it's a really good time for us to reset personally with our teams and our partners I like what Scott was saying around when you're looking at Investments what are your priorities and I think we all could say what he chose efficient effective and improving the experience with that you'll drive outcomes you'll drive outcomes for your customers regardless of the stakeholder part of the industry that you're in I really enjoyed Julie's trust training and together with technology we've spent time on this stage talking about training knowledge transfer from our more seniors adjusters to new entrance training around the technology being advocates for our Injured Workers and helping them on their Journey that's part of the training but we need to be more cognizant thoughtful and intentional around the use of Technology there and I think at the end I'll say it again this isn't to get rid of our people our people are at the heart of everything we do the Injured Workers are at the heart of every employer we all are here for them and so if we can Embrace technology transformation and be better together our industry will begin to see that pendulum swits uh shift from an industry that isn't technology focused to one that's leading the pack in insurance thank you again to WCI we actually will be broadcasting this session via outfront ideas and so we're thankful to WCI for filming at outfront ideas.com we'll have the video coming up in the next probably 6 to8 weeks and outfront ideas is sponsored by Cedric and safety National so many thanks to them for supporting us over the years and thank you to our great guests today who without we wouldn't have had such a rich conv hand for the panel
2023-10-16