Standards and Business Solutions: Can your office do this? Best Practices - A Solution Provider s View Morgan Underwood, Vice President, Product Development
Agenda E-Z Data Overview Opportunities for Competitive Advantage Insurance vs. Other Industries Standards Based Data Movement
E-Z Z Data Company Snapshot Founded in 1986 Committed solely to the insurance and financial services industry 300 employees in California, Virginia, two development centers in India, and in various sales offices around the world
E-Z Z Data Customers (partial list) (Partial List)
E-Z Z Data Products Windows Web Enterprise Client Data System Commerce Enterprise SmartOffice / SmartOffice Enterprise for Practice Management for Agency Management for Broker-Dealers for Wholesalers for Banks & Credit Unions DataXchange Enterprise Server Retail Client Data System Commerce Agency SmartOffice for Practice Management for Agency Management for Broker-Dealers for Wholesalers for Banks & Credit Unions SmartOffice Online for Practice Management for Agency Management DataXchange Online Service
Our Focus: CRM for Financial Services Distribution Career Distribution Wholesale Distribution Contact / Service Center
At the core of SmartOffice is Enterprise Contact Management At the center of SmartOffice is a contact management system specifically tailored for financial services. It includes: Tracking of Individuals, Companies, Producers Household / Economic Groups Relationships & Hierarchies Tracking of Insurance and Investment products Call & Activity History Document Creation & Tracking Call Scripting Ad-hoc & Static Reporting And much more.
At the core of SmartOffice is Enterprise Contact Management Career Distribution Wholesale Distribution Contact / Service Center
SmartOffice Supports Career Distribution Configured for the field, SmartOffice is ideally suited to support career agents and advisors: Career Distribution Sales Leads Management Recruit Tracking Group Benefits Mobile Editions for Laptops and PDAs One Card System Edition Wholesale Distribution Contact / Service Center
SmartOffice Supports Wholesale Distribution SmartOffice also support the unique needs of financial services wholesalers: Career Distribution Wholesale Distribution Sales Leads Management Sales Opportunity Management Territory Management Producer License, Contracts & Education Tracking Sales Production Reporting Contact / Service Center
SmartOffice Supports the Contact Center Career Distribution Wholesale Distribution For a service center that supports career or independent producers, or the end client directly, SmartOffice offers features designed for the service center: Contact / Service Center Service Incident tracking Service Level Agreements Call Resolution Workflow and Escalation Sales Leads Management Call Center Performance Reporting
Opportunities for Competitive Advantage Product Price Service Technology
Competing with Service Service Differentiation Service Success Factors Relationship People Are Key Speed Why So Long? Simplification Make it Easy For Me Accuracy Just Get it Right Reliability Keep Your Promises
Competing with Technology Technology Technology Success Factors Sustainable Competitive Advantage Customer Impact I Feel... Core Process Impact Changes Insurance Business Extensible Anticipates Trends Reliability New Productivity Layers Prophetic It Works...
Insurance vs. Other Industries Technology used to improve service levels Technology used to improve operational efficiency Inside Existing business process Relationships with outside organizations Suppliers Distributors
Dell Computers and Southwest Airlines Both known as low price leaders Both are also profitable Can we learn anything from them?
Dell Computers Systems built on demand Take advantage of existing systems Shipping Internet Let users design their own systems With the help of smart configuration applications Inventory management moved to suppliers Cut to average of 8 days from industry average >30 Aggressive supply chain management resulting in strong vendor partnerships
Southwest Airlines Against the grain Focus on consumers not business Point to point travel not hubs Standardized hardware Use of smaller airports Transparent fare structure One of the first with e-tickets Planes spend more time flying Quick turnaround (average 30 minutes vs. industry average >1 hour Better relationship with employees Lowest personnel cost in the industry
Common Denominators Challenged conventional wisdom Took advantage of opportunities that others could not easily reproduce (legacy issues) Leveraged internal and external systems
So you want to be a Southwest Airlines Internal Factors Human capital Products Funding Technology Standards External Factors Brand Supply chain Distribution options Technology Standards
Buy vs. Build? Standards Developing Market Mature Market In a mature market, adoption of existing standards speeds time to market
Buy vs. Build? Technology Developing Market Mature Market In a mature market, adoption of existing technology speeds time to market
Technology & Standards: Means or Ends? Use of existing technology and standards as a means rather than an end allows your company to focus on their ENABLING effects to differentiate yourself on service. Ultimately your ability to implement a service plan is what differentiates your company. Reinventing technology and/or standards in a mature market distracts your organization on the end goal.
Enterprise application integration (EAI) and supply chain management (SCM) are two of the terms people use to describe the work of linking e-business systems together across the supply chain. Whether they realize it or not, financial services enterprises have been in the EAI business for a long time. The banking industry s longstanding attempts to automate payments for checks though automated clearinghouses and credit cards are familiar examples. The securities industry s quests for STP (straightthrough processing) and T+1 (trade date + one day) settlement are others. Michael Jackman, Interlinq
SCM = STP Why you should care: Average inventory levels have dropped by nearly 30% in the last 10 years. Productivity rates have gone up by 70% when we compare the last 10 years with the 30 years before that. That comes to nearly 700B$ of value that supply chain initiatives have created on top of a reduction of 50B$ per year of inventory carrying costs. Kelly Thomas SVP, i2 (Feb 20, 2005)
Current State of Insurance Industry Straight Thru Processing??! Life Carriers General Agents, BGAs, Outbrokerage
DataXchange Online Standards Based Data Movement Life Carriers General Agents, BGAs, Outbrokerage
DataXchange Online Standards Based Data Movement DataXchange Online Pending Case Status Inforce Updates Commission Downloads License and Appointments Service Provider Applications Plan Descriptions Forms Underwriting Guidelines Life Carriers SmartOffice for Agency Management (General Agents, BGAs, Outbrokerage) Service Providers
Standards in Action Pending Case Genworth, MONY, Mutual of Omaha, JPF, and Nationwide Inforce Policy MassMutual License and Appointment Testing with Mutual of Omaha and Prudential Commissions Testing with Genworth, Prudential, JPF Service Providers Hooper Homes (Portamedic), EMSI (older standards) Applications Working with JPF, AIG
E-Z Z Data Working with ACORD Producer Working Group Support Licensing and Appointment business messages Producer Commission Team Develop a detailed Commission Implementation Guide Architecture Working Group Identify and resolve technical issues within the Acord XMLife standard Life Products Working Group Develop Life Product administration information and enhance Illustration information Policy Lifecycle Working Group Develop a detailed Application Upload Implementation Guide Maintenance Review Working Group Review all Maintenance Requests (MR's) submitted during the current Acord change cycle.
Summary Service is the main differentiator Exemplary service requires technology CRM is a critical part of the technology decision Using industry standards provides increased options and quicker integrations Focus on implementing improved services not enabling your technology
Standards and Business Solutions: Can your office do this? Best Practices A Solution Provider s View Morgan Underwood, Vice President, Product Development