If you’re considering replacing your medical professional liability (MPL) core insurance system, you know you’ve got a challenge ahead of you. That’s because insurance system implementation is a complex project requiring considerable effort and resources. The rewards for getting it right are many: increased speed to market, enhanced flexibility, improved workflow, reduced IT demand for routine maintenance, strengthened security, and more.
A new MPL core cloud system is the foundation of your MPL insurance operations and includes your policy administration system. It is designed to fulfill core policy management and processing including rating, quoting, issuance, endorsements, and renewals. Cloud core systems offer the advantages of access across platforms while streamlining the introduction of new services and capabilities, enhancing productivity, increasing security, and cutting costs over time.
Once you’ve selected a vendor, you’ll want to collaborate closely to stay within scope and under budget while meeting project deadlines. Yet despite this shared objective, the Boston Consulting Group estimates that 70% of digital transformations fail to meet or exceed expectations.
To ensure that your MPL cloud core system implementation meets your objectives, your internal stakeholders must have a clear vision of what the overall project is designed to achieve. Then, your IT Department must translate that vision into a tactical and strategic plan of action. To that end, here are four strategies you can follow to set your project up for the highest possible level of success.
Strategy #1: Build a Clear Vision and Strategy
Before engaging a cloud core system vendor, work with your internal team to build consensus for a clear vision and strategy. These definitions can include high-level concepts as well as specific functions deemed business-critical.
Start out with the why behind the implementation of a new cloud core solution. Clear communication with all of your front-line operational teams will ensure alignment between key business drivers and ongoing decisions regarding the functionalities and capabilities of the new system. You are likely to face trade-offs that require manual processes or other adjustments, so preparing your team for this will maintain the collaborative atmosphere with your software vendor and systems integrator resources. A systems integrator, if you choose to involve one, assists with integrating software, hardware, and networking components to ensure a cohesive system.
Failure to do this often results in requirements bottlenecks or stalls in the project until clarity of purpose can be resolved.
Strategy #2: Balance Speed vs. Quality
Be careful about prioritizing speed over quality. While many projects can accommodate a faster pace, adequate resources must be allocated to testing your configured solution before you go live. Skip this step at your peril. That’s because shortchanging the testing phase in a push to go live can negatively impact future velocity.
If your key driver is getting to market, for example, decide whether certain features or capabilities should be implemented before the system goes live, or if those functions should be prioritized after the initial release. If you decide to postpone certain capabilities to later in the project, you may need to utilize manual processes as the implementation is fully scoped. Commit to writing your and your vendor’s shared definition of success and realistic timelines for achieving it, even if that requires a staggered or phased approach.
Strategy #3: Embrace Change Management
Keep in mind that a cloud migration project is not merely a technology project—it is also a change management strategy. Such projects affect your entire ecosystem from leadership and top-line executives to employees and users of the technology, including customers, agents, brokers, and third-party partners.
Consider what success looks like for each of your key stakeholders, internally and externally. Keep that in mind to guide you and your tech vendor through the implementation processes. Your vendor should offer systems integrator service offerings specifically tailored to develop and execute a best-in-class operational change management approach.
Strategy #4: Define Scope and Deliverables
The vision and strategy you establish for the project must align the requirements and objectives of the implementation, providing a blueprint for action. For example, do you have business requirements for how you need to track locum tenens, or documentation needs for retro and tail endorsements?
You’ll find that a detailed outline will encompass all the work needed to deliver the product or service while ensuring that your team, software vendor, and systems integrator, if involved, are all moving in the same direction. The scope of deliverables can be defined within the jurisdictions, product lines, integrations, data conversion, and configuration categories. This document will then be available for referencing throughout the project.
Establish a Platform for Success
You can’t build a strong house on a shaky foundation, and you can’t set your cloud platform implementation up for success without a shared, documented vision and strategy. By cultivating and documenting these critical elements from the outset of your project, you will be prepared for the best possible results.