14 May, 2018 | Blogs
The insurance industry has been seeing many challenges in the past decade with globalization, the financial crisis and the advent of new innovations and business models in this sector.
Regionally, in the past decade, the GCC insurance market experienced a double digit growth rate and the insurance industry in the Gulf is expected to expand at a CAGR of 18% by 2017 to reach a size of $37.5 billion (TradeArabia).
However, to continue driving growth and profitability, insurance companies must be innovative and keep up with the upcoming trends by thinking like a disruptor yet acting like a startup.
Nowadays, insurance leaders are focusing on four imperatives to drive competitive advantage and differentiation:
1. Creating a customer focused enterprise
2. Optimizing enterprise risk management
3. Increasing flexibility and streamlining operations
4. Optimizing multi-channel interaction
One of the biggest challenges facing insurance companies and getting in the way of driving growth and achieving the above imperatives are their fragmented IT and operation structures which raise complexity and cost, along with the adoption of digital technology.
Digital Insurance has become a business imperative; it provides solutions to Insurance companies’ long-standing business challenges. Big data is especially promising and differentiating for insurance companies; with no physical products to manufacture, data is arguably one of their most important assets.
With the Insurance sector becoming heavily reliant on information and digital communication, ensuring that the company’s IT capability is in line with its goals is of the essence. One of the ways in which insurance companies can cut cost, become more competitive and meet customers’ rising demands is by capitalizing on the opportunities that their IT functions provide.
To help companies overcome this challenge and leverage on their IT capabilities, an IT audit and roadmap development are of essence.
Nuummite’s IT Audit and roadmap development
An IT audit plays a major role in writing a company’s future strategy and in driving its growth. Looking at a company’s IT functions is not only looking at the IT department itself, it extends beyond that to assessing the IT function in each department and in the company as a whole. Learn more
Taking a holistic overview of the IT functions in the company and assessing their strengths, weaknesses and identifying any gaps will help in the development of a successful comprehensive future roadmap that will help the company in achieving economies of scale through streamlining processes, sharing common tasks, reducing unwanted costs and achieving higher efficiencies.
Our comprehensive IT audit provides an insight into the alignment the alignment between the current IT function, spend and resources with the business requirements and recommends the necessary actions that can take the client to be ahead of the competition in the insurance market through positioning IT into the company strategy.
Our IT Audit covers the following:
• IT / Business Alignment Assessment: Assess existing systems’ alignment with the business needs of the organization
• IT HR Audit: Assess the IT Organization with respect to size, cost, skills and career development
• IT Security Assessment: Assess IT’s policies and systems against security standards
• IT Structure and Procedures: Evaluate IT as an entity including an in-depth assessment of Organization structure, Strategy and Plans, Operating and Capital Budget, Decision Making Process and IT Policies and procedures.
• IT readiness for change and emergencies: Assess the IT organization’s ability to handle and manage change. In addition, assess its ability to handle emergencies.
• Future IT investment requirements: Develop a roadmap of future IT investment.
• IT Security: Evaluate IT security and risks.
• IT Procurement: Evaluate IT procurement practices.
The IT audit will result in a board level summary of findings and recommendations in addition to detailed audit results with recommendations to be implemented by the IT team.
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