Category: Strategy

Insurance / Quantum Computing / Strategy

Five Use Cases of Quantum Computing for Life Insurance Companies to be ready for the Quantum Future

As quantum computing continues to advance rapidly, life insurance companies must proactively prepare for the transformative impact it will have on their operations and industry as a whole. This article aims to provide strategies and recommendations for life insurance companies to navigate the quantum future successfully. 1. Embracing Quantum-Resistant Cryptography: Quantum computers pose a significant threat to traditional cryptographic algorithms used to secure sensitive data. Life insurance companies should invest in quantum-resistant encryption methods to safeguard customer information and policy data. Here are three key aspects to consider when exploring quantum-resistant cryptography: By proactively exploring and implementing quantum-resistant cryptography, life...

Cloud Computing / Modernizations / Strategy

A 10-step guide to a reliable, repeatable & risk-optimized approach to cloud migration

A 10-step guide to a reliable, repeatable & risk-optimized approach to cloud migration. 1. Define business goals & KPIs to layout a clear definition of success. 2. Identify current-state roadblocks to the above goals. 3. Consider technology as table stake. Focus on people, processes, culture, and value of the existing IT landscape. 4. Set up a COE made up of reps from business, leadership, technology, cross-functional teams, to play the change agent within the organization. 5. Establish inventory of existing applications. Leverage 6R framework (Retain, Retire, Re-host, Re-architect, Re-platform, Rewrite) to identify what can stay on, what needs to change...

Cloud Computing / Data Strategy / Digital Transformation / Modernizations / Strategy

What is the future of RDBMS?

Serverless philosophy came a long way & likely to be the default architecture paradigm of the future. Currently, there are heavy uses of “serverless” for websites, applications, APIs, workflows & CDNs. In contrast, serverless RDBMSs are still not so widely used. While there are offerings like AWS Aurora (for MySQL), there are concerns in terms of security, access control, transaction mgmt, etc. As a result, RDBMSs still mostly get deployed either as on-prem or in VPC private subnets. But such deployments fail to align well with serverless apps & front-ends? Should then lambda functions with infinite scalability be allowed to...

Artificial Intelligence / Big Data / Cloud Computing / Data Strategy / Digital Transformation / Insurance / Integrations / Leadership / Machine Learning / Modernizations / NOSQL / Strategy

A “member enrollment” challenge in group employee benefits that is far deep-rooted than was thought to be, and how a “next-gen” solution can fix it.

Why member enrollment is an area of concern! Member enrollment is a crucial business function in healthcare and insurance group benefits and is directly associated with customer experience. It influences the experiences of all major external personas in the following way: Eligible employees start receiving coverage protection only when successfully enrolled in the carrier’s system Employers depend on the successful completion of the enrollment process for determining premium installments and accounting Plan administrators get paid only when the enrollment process is complete Brokers receive commission only on successful completion of the enrollment process as the way to determine employee participation...

Management / Strategy

An HBR tool to gauge effectiveness of teams for success

This HBR format of surveying effectiveness of teams looks relevant not just from a standpoint of small & dedicated teams but also from a risk mitigation perspective for massive enterprise-scale digital initiatives. This risk is in the fact that digital transformation projects are largely cross-functional. They span many functional areas or customer journeys within an enterprise. Thus, while such a digital initiative may have its own dedicated team, it also needs support from business leaders, analysts, IT teams, large-program managers, enterprise architects, infrastructure managers, executives, etc. from other functional areas. Data shows that 60-70% of digital transformation projects fail due...

Cloud Computing / Strategy

Why a Cloud COE is so critical for a successful cloud strategy!

A Cloud COE is critical for a successful cloud strategy. I have seen cloud migrations fail because they lacked a COE that could champion those. If we look at its nature, Cloud is not meant to be tactical, in contrast, it needs a strong strategic alignment with the enterprise with long-term implications. Any cloud adoption brings in a slice of digital transformation with new operating models & reusability that impact the whole enterprise. Thus there is a cross-functional aspect to it, meaning it needs active support from other functional teams. Cloud implementation, when done in a silo, would be a...

Leadership / Strategy

Is IT the driver or order-taker?

Is IT the driver or order-taker? I came across this interesting article, the link of which is at the end of this article, that looks back through the IT evolution over the last decade about how that once perceived to be true & infallible became overtly irrelevant today! What were the best practices a decade ago are roadblocks now! Here are some major ones. A decade ago it was IT that ran the show & business did as IT instructed, but today it is Business that runs the show & IT must deliver what business asks for. Back then IT...

Digital Transformation / Strategy

Nine best practices for microservices deployments

What best practices do you follow in deploying microservices in AWS? Assume an AI/ML model needs to be deployed in AWS & exposed as an API endpoint. What are the best practices? Is any guardrail available? While not a standard procedure & not limited to these, here is what I follow at minimum when I deploy an app service, for example, a Python ML model in AWS. Please share your thoughts. 1. Ensuring the right VPC for network isolation 2. Containerized hosting of the app service in ECS cluster spun in private subnets for access control 3. ECS cluster spanning...

Digital Transformation / Strategy

What 4 things if not addressed can kill your microservices strategy?

Microservices provide freedom from the clutches of the “spaghetti monster” and lets us to the world of flexibility, scalability & agility, but they don’t come free. Here are 4 reasons why! 1. While microservices reduce the “impact” of IT changes through the separation of concerns they can increase the “frequency” of changes that can impact business in the absence of a right level of DevOps maturity, the severity of which rises exponentially as they grow in number. 2. Microservices are founded on the principles of “separation”. This means “isolation” is important in their management from people, process & technology standpoints....

Cloud Computing / Legacy / Migrations / Modernizations / Strategy

What workloads you must move to the Cloud – Part 3 (for Batch workloads)

Batch workloads date back to the early days of computation when mainframes dominated the computing world.  They still play a significant role in different disciplines including business, engineering, medical, healthcare, and other areas. Batch workloads are normally designed to run in the background and are meant to process huge amounts of data. What are the challenges of running batch workloads on-premise? 1. Poor customer experience Less availability of business functionality On-premise IT ecosystems typically have batch workloads that need an extensive amount of computing and storage provisioning. This is why real-time workloads cannot share environments with batch workloads due to...