Full automation of something, by definition, does not require humans to do anything as part of that something. According to a recent survey by Gallagher Bassett, 43% of UK insurers have implemented AI to some extent within their claims processing models. From this we can clearly infer that there remain some processes within claims handling that currently rely on human input. So, while the insurance sector has a strong focus on automation within their innovation pipelines, there is still room for claims innovations aimed at human usage, both in the present and near future.
The merit of each idea in an innovation pipeline might be simply defined as:
£ Value Generated / £ Effort to Build & Maintain
Providing us with a sense of £’s generated per £ spent for each proposed innovation.
For innovations aimed at human usage, much of the value generated is only generated by end users actually using the innovation. Organisations can design and build solutions that appear to tick all the boxes in terms of solving a problem, only to find that the designated end users barely use (or don't use at all) said solution. An important rule of innovation is, from the outset of an idea, not to assume that every designated end user will automatically use the innovation.
This begs the question; How do we get end users to use our innovations?
Organisations might try to force usage – through usage measurement, identifying poor compliance, taking steps to make the poor compliers comply (through consequences, if necessary) and so on. There is a lot of effort required, with no guaranteed positive outcome, and potentially unintended consequences.
Organisations might try to repeatedly encourage usage through many different means – verbal encouragement through team meetings, internal communications campaigns, at performance reviews and so on. This is preferable to forcing, though it still requires effort and doesn't guarantee a positive outcome. There's also a fine line between encouragement and forcing usage.
The reality is that if you have to use one of the above strategies, the innovation concerned probably isn't all that.
The key to achieving high User Adoption for your innovation, and thereby increasing the value that innovation generates for your organisation, is to make end users want to use your innovation.
What factors make an end user want to use the innovation?
There are many, but they can be consolidated into just two:
- It solves a problem for the individual user
- It provides a good (enough) User Experience (UX)
UX relates to how an end user interacts with a product, service or system and includes their perceptions of usefulness, ease of use and efficiency of use. We will discuss the importance of UX in a later article.
Is a problem for your organisation automatically a problem for every individual working for the organisation or at least, a problem for a specific set of people who the problem concerns? The answer should be 'yes' but the reality may be different.
Let's take the problem of an insurer wanting to create an innovation to identify more suspect claims to increase the volume (and value) of detected fraud. The insurer wants this to be a fully automated process within their core operating systems, but establishes that not all the data points they need as inputs are captured within their structured data.
Therefore, they need their 'not fraud' claim handlers to manually input x pieces of claims data into a form within their system, to generate an output that will guide them as to whether they need to refer to their fraud team or not.
Why, outside of a poor UX, might some 'not fraud' claim handler end users choose to not follow that process? It could be that:
- They feel that they are good enough at fraud detection themselves
- They do not have performance goals relating to fraud referral quantity or quality and so don't see it as a priority or even important to them (even if they know it's important to the business)
- They might have to complete a lengthy fraud referral document as a result and don't have the time or inclination for whatever reason(s)
How, then, do you mitigate against these risks so that your organisation does not spend a lot of resource and capital to deploy an innovation?
Involving end user representatives throughout the innovation process – from first evaluation of idea through design, build and testing – is critical. This will ensure that their concerns and desires are taken into account, resulting in a solution that is more ‘empathetic’ and tailored for their use. Those representatives are then far more likely to use the solution once it is live and are also likely to evangelise to peers about the solution and how useful it is.
The worst case scenario for an innovation is not just that it fails, but that it fails slowly, as this means there has been a large investment of resource which ultimately has not produced the desired return. Focusing the design on end-user empathy helps to mitigate this major risk, not only because your solution is a lot more enjoyable to use, but because the end users will feel more listened to, and that the solution is more ‘theirs’ than if someone just came along without involving them at all and said “Here you go, use this!”.
So, in a world of increasing attempts to automate, there is still a place for humans in the innovation process, and a group of humans diverse of role and of thought will likely get the best outcomes.
Please contact Simon White for further information.
