Next-gen leaders: The independent channel needs your help

The insurance industry needs cooperation to solve the costly inefficiency and vulnerability of credential management.

Passwords were once the solution to data security. But they’re not that secure. And the pain of credential management also affects carrier partners and technology vendors, whose most frequent help-desk calls are for password problems. (Photo: metamorworks/Shutterstock)

A manifesto is typically introduced by young visionaries with the goal of converting or overcoming those who cling to the status quo.

In the insurance industry, it’s the opposite.

The old guard in the independent agency channel has written the manifesto, and it is urging up-and-coming insurance leaders to step up and push change forward — because changing the status quo will literally be good for everybody.

In fact, it’s time for leaders among carriers, agencies, trade associations and technology providers to step outside their comfort zone and (proverbially) hug a stranger.

The goals? To eliminate a major industry pain point, maximize digital security, and save hundreds of thousands of hours per year.

Our history of cooperative revolution

The willingness to embrace strangers for the greater good has been the foundation of every truly game-changing technological advance in the independent insurance industry. IVANS, ACORD forms and standards, download, and real-time all were the result of face-to-face conversations. Collaborations such as ACT and AUGIE were borne of a need to make business better for everyone.

Who remembers:

Lately, that’s been put on pause. And until we get back to that, it’s incumbent on the rising stars in business and technology to reach out to others who have gone before you.

Those acronyms — ACT, AUGIE, ACORD, IVANS — don’t stand for products. Rather, they signify massive changes to standards and workflows that made business more efficient for all players in the independent channel.

Passwords, the industry’s greatest vulnerability

The industry needs another change of the same magnitude, requiring yet again the cooperation of all for the common good. We address our plea to the next generation of insurance leaders. The subject of our manifesto? The costly inefficiency and vulnerability of credential management.

The annual waste of time due to password problems is massive across the industry. Every agency user, every day, must log in one by one to every individual insurance carrier and vendor. Additional time is lost to password expiration and change processes and to activating and deactivating credentials.

Passwords were once the solution to data security. But they’re not that secure. In attempts to save time, agency users share passwords, write them down, and leave them in plain view. They make them as simple as possible to enter and remember, and they are prone to using one password to log in to 30, 40, or more websites. And when users leave an agency, that agency is liable for deleting that person’s accounts across the same websites.

By one estimate, password issues result in lost productivity costs of up to $150 per incident.

And the pain of credential management also affects carrier partners and technology vendors, whose most frequent help-desk calls are for password problems.

Most importantly, our industry’s password problems endanger customers and prospects, whose sensitive personal information we make vulnerable to hackers in our efforts to save time.

One of the world’s oldest industries needs another peaceful revolution. We need InsurTech leaders, entrepreneurs, and up-and-comers to help push this revolution forward for the common good of the independent agency system.

Collaborative initiative representing every industry sector

Serving as board members for the nonprofit organization ID Federation, we helped to create a trust framework that revolutionizes credential management for the independent channel. As a collection of policies, technical specifications, and interoperable criteria accepted by organization participants, the trust framework allows carriers, agency management systems, and agencies to collaborate seamlessly, efficiently and securely. It’s already working beautifully for two carriers and their agency users.

As enabled by the ID Federation framework, SignOn Once users log in only once per day to access all participating carriers.

Will you join the ongoing collaboration for the benefit of your business and your business partners? We think the virtual hugs you give to industry strangers (and friends) will be among the most productive actions you take in 2021.

Steve Aronson is president of Aronson Insurance, an Acrisure Agency Partner in Needham, Mass., and a board member of ID Federation, the nonprofit organization that created SignOn Once.

Keith Savino is managing partner of Broadfield Insurance, a member of PCF Insurance Services. 

The opinions expressed here are the authors’ own. 

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