How Can Insurers Bridge the Growing Talent Gap?
Blog: Insurance Support World - Blog
The insurance industry is facing resource shortages while workloads are high. Amid all that, insures need to find optimal solutions to bridge the talent gap.
Resource shortage is one of the significant challenges for the insurance business in the current times. The talent gap is not only growing due to the great resignation; it is also affected by the difficulties in recruiting new employees. A report from the Deloitte Center for Financial Services found that “attracting the right talent may be the biggest challenge insurers face in 2022.”
Many insurance companies and agencies are finding it difficult to fill a considerable number of vacant positions. Sales personnel, underwriters, policy checkers, and claims adjusters are the backbone of any insurance business. All these resources are high in demand but not available easily, further increasing the talent gap.
For more insights, let’s take a quick look at a couple of key points from Vertafore’s survey (in which 1300+ insurance professionals participated) report named “The insurance agency workforce | Evolving into the next normal.”
- 1 in 5 survey respondents reported changing their employer in 2021; salary and bonuses were key drivers.
- Nearly 80% of agency owners reported they will make certain changes to boost employee retention; including compensation increment, offering flexible work schedules, and providing remote work options.
All things considered, bridging the talent gap requires insurers to take an innovative approach and go beyond general staffing solutions. As an insurance business owner, you might also need to create effective sourcing plans and strategies to ensure smooth and consistent operations.
Although insurance companies and agencies have been leveraging outsourcing services to fulfill their human resource requirements for decades, insurance BPO has become a more common and popular solution over the recent few years, especially since the recent pandemic struck.
Outsourcing – The Best Way to Fill Talent Gap
Insurance back-office providers have come a long way helping insurers manage almost all insurance business processes efficiently. From policy checking to underwriting, you can outsource almost anything that your insurance firm does in the back office. In fact, outsourcing firms are gaining the industry’s confidence and trust as they can not only meet insurance businesses’ requirements but also help them streamline operating workflow and maximize processes. Let’s get further discussing some of the great ways insurance BPO firms can help insurers regarding talent shortages.
7 Ways Outsourcing Helps Insurers Bridge Talent Gap
Workload Managed Well & Fast
With almost everything going digital, the need to provide a simplified user experience is more important than ever. Your customers might be happy with your online portal that allows them to file a claim easily and quickly. But with a shortage of insurance back-office specialists, you might not be able to speed up claims processing. Back office providers can fill this gap and handle the necessary management of claims as their volume increases. It can also help streamline the overall operational workflow and customer journey.
Access to Latest Technology
Insurance firms can leverage technology in the best manner with the help of reliable BPO firms providing quality insurance back-office services. With this approach, your in-house team will collaborate with the outsourced team to utilize technology systems in the best manner. Apart from that, an experienced BPO firm can also help you select the most suitable, industry-standard tech tools for better execution of your insurance business operations.
Operational Flexibility
Insurance business processes are comprehensive and fairly complex, requiring a sizable workforce. This usually become a challenge for insurers, especially in times of sheer need. For instance, during the recent pandemic, policyholders were increasingly filing claims while insurance companies were dealing with staff shortages. At that time, many insurers outsourced back-office services to ensure business continuity. Hence, in case of talent gaps or seasonal fluctuations, insurance back-office providers can help overcome resource shortage challenges by providing timely and quality back-office management services.
Strengthen Office Administration
Due to the shortage of workforce and inexperienced employees, the best way to tackle the high turnover rate is to outsource administrative work. With their years of experience and niche expertise, insurance BPO firms can help lower the turnaround time by taking over tedious work, and time-consuming tasks such as document management, policy review, etc.
Reduce Recruitment & Training Costs
You no longer need to invest significant amounts in resources such as staff training development programs or the onboarding process. Outsourcing firms have worked with insurance businesses across lines, making them have a realistic industry perspective and diverse work experience. When you outsource, there is no need for job posting, candidate shortlisting, or interviewing hassles.
Also, you’re not bound to offer other employee benefits like retirement benefits and bonuses. You only need to pay for the work done for your firm as you will be charged on a project or hourly basis. All of this helps you considerably reduce overhead costs.
Higher Customer Satisfaction
As an insurance business owner, you don’t want to face high turnaround times as it lowers morale, stresses out employees, and leads to a high customer churn rate. With several negative factors coming into play in one go, it’s not easy to maintain pace with the market.
Outsourcing helps you come up against all these odds. You access a skilled workforce that will prevent high turnaround time. When back-office tasks such as policy issuance and claims processing are done well in time, your customers will be satisfied and stick to you in the long run.
Get More Time for Core Business
When you have outsourced operations, you and your staff free up a good amount of time to focus on core competencies. This would give you and your employees the much-needed time to relay focus on value-driven assignments. Individuals would attempt to finish projects in a short period as they aren’t bogged down with other assignments.
Conclusion
The talent gap is a major challenge that insurance companies are facing right now and this is likely to continue to get worse with time. Seasoned professionals are retiring, and the younger generation is the least bit interested in working within the insurance sector. Turning to reliable and widely trusted back-office providers is the best solution in such a situation.
How ISW’s Outsourcing Model Helps Bridge the Talent Gap
Insurance Support World is one of the leading providers of insurance outsourcing services. We are in the insurance BPO business since 2008 and have satisfied hundreds of insurance clients across the world. We help insurance carriers, agencies, MGAs, and brokers by providing a team of specialized staff with tons of experience working with multiple insurance companies. Our trained insurance specialists can help you keep up with the customers’ changing demands, catch up with industry trends, streamline operating processes, and reduce costs.
Choose the right partner to tap into a bigger market share, explore new business opportunities, and obtain sustainable business growth. Choose Insurance Support World for insurance back-office outsourcing. Call us at +1 646 688 2821 or send an email at info@insurancesupportworld.com.
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