A new report from LIMRA and the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) details findings from the researcher’s latest survey of industry executives in the United States showing profitable growth and talent management are the most important challenges on the minds of C-suite leaders.
“When the same study was conducted in 2019, change management was what kept executives up at night. By 2021, as companies were forced to meet customers’ changing needs, executives’ focus shifted to technology,” the groups state in an announcement about the publication’s release. Entitled What’s on the Minds of Life Insurance Executives 2023: Six Big Opportunities in an Evolving Market, the report details challenges, external forces affecting businesses and priorities.
One third, 33 per cent of those surveyed say profitable growth was their company’s greatest challenge, 66 per cent say investments in customer service technologies is a priority, and 60 per cent of executives said helping advisors and advisor enablement is a top distribution challenge.
In 2019 change management was cited as a top concern by 32 per cent of those surveyed. That concern has dropped into fourth place in the 2023 survey with only 24 per cent saying it is a top challenge. Second to growth challenges in first place, 28 per cent said technology was a top challenge, followed by talent management according to 26 per cent of respondents.
In talent management, new roles needed, they say, include data scientists, product managers, user experience specialists and digital marketers. Key actions they say insurers can take today include reassessing the hiring process and reassessing job requirements, developing programs to reskill and upskill talent, building ecosystems of shared, temporary talent and building strategy and infrastructure for remote work.
About 74 per cent said data science and data analytics were crucial for success, followed by 66 per cent who said the same about customer service technologies.
