Joe McKendrick

Marketing and IT people actually stand on common ground, looking to support customer data and interactions.

Insurers have always been at the forefront of in-house training and development, but will this carry over to tech and big data skills?

Lessons in agile development and data security were reinforced; mobile and cloud became as commonplace as telephones.

Tablet computers are becoming standard client computers, but there's still work to be done on the back end.

Coming to an insurance business near you: predictive analytics.

At least 75 percent of CIOs in a recent survey report having a clear understanding of what their businesses need in terms of innovation — now companies need them to be able to act on that understanding.

Insurers understand enterprise risk more than anyone else, and that understanding should apply to their own IT operations as well.

New figures state that 59 percent of the Fortune 500 still have at least 1.6 hours of data center downtime per week, which translates to at least $8.5 million per year in losses.

A recent interview of two IT leaders from Nationwide makes it clear that insurers, which need to speed up product delivery, are particularly good candidates for DevOps.

A nasty new "ransomware" virus is reminding corporations that you can't educate users enough when it comes to IT security.

There are several generational, technological distinctions that could drastically affect how your data operations are run in the future.

There are several examples of where algorithms can and should take over for human decision-making, but experience is starting to spotlight strategic decisions that can't be taken over by big data.

Applications and software-defined infrastructures will likely highlight future, hopefully more successful, data consolidation projects.

In a recent survey, the majority of mobile consumers said they would switch companies for a more accessible mobile channel.

The industry's absence from a pair of recent rankings serve as a reminder that in order to attract the best IT talent, insurers need to appear open to innovation and experimentation.

Insurers may have tons of data about a customer's lifestyle and requirements, but agents provide a depth of understanding that algorithms will never crack.

Knowing file sizes, the volume of your application network, and plans for the future are on a list of tips and questions insurers should know and ask when considering a move to the cloud.

Most enterprises with mainframe computers are quite happy with their systems, and have plans for their expansion. Still, mainframes have an achilles heel – the diminishing pool of talent that can write programs and run these machines.

Many insurers already had counter-measures against such competitors in place, in the form of strong web-based offerings and strong agent networks.

Many app developers fear the mainframe, and mainframe operators are suspicious of apps — here's how to bring these two worlds together.