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Robert Clark is the founder and CEO of Cloverleaf Analytics, a leading provider of insurance intelligence solutions.
In the ongoing debate about AI’s impact on employment, a surprising twist could emerge in the workers’ compensation (workers’ comp) insurance sector.
While many fear AI will replace jobs, I believe we’re entering an era where AI will provide greater protection to workers through more intelligent workers’ comp insurance interactions. This shift would represent a significant evolution in how we approach workplace safety and insurance.
Understanding Human Behavior In The Workplace
Manual, intensive work has been changing with the gradual introduction of robots in industrial environments. These robots aim to improve production, reduce downtime and minimize employee exposure to hazardous jobs.
While these are positive outcomes, the technologists behind robotics are focused on workflows, not necessarily on understanding human behavior to ensure employees working alongside robots are more productive, happier and less likely to file a workers’ comp claim.
A new “smart” age, however, should augment humans and improve their lives, not just boost revenue and profitability.
One major aspect of this human-centric approach could mean using AI to analyze and better understand common and outlier human behavior. By doing so, we can create safer work environments and more effective insurance models that truly serve the needs of workers.
A recent example of this approach was a joint project by MIT and the University of Washington (UW). Researchers built a model to analyze irrational behaviors in humans related to suboptimal problem-solving. The goal of the study was to better understand human behavior to improve collaboration with AI.
Worker Safety: Leveraging Insurance Analytics Is As Important As AI
In industrial settings, workers often make decisions that robots or AI systems might find irrational. If these actions lead to workers’ comp claims, how can corporations and insurers safeguard against unusual claims or those their AI models haven’t encountered before?
By studying outliers, as with the recent MIT and UW project, corporations and workers’ comp insurers can better track predictable and unusual human behavior. This approach provides a more holistic understanding of potential human errors or accidents, allowing for more nuanced and effective insurance models.
With more efficient software development for creating ML or AI models, insurance analytics systems connected to unified data architecture can provide meaningful real-time insights into normal and outlier behaviors leading to claims. While predicting normal behavior is relatively easy (many companies already do this with computer vision), certain industries have unique intricacies requiring custom models to accurately support employee workflows.
These data insights should inform the ML or AI models serving as the OS for robots or AI assistants in industrial environments. This would allow proactive recommendations to companies on how to achieve higher levels of employee efficiency, happiness and safety. For instance, AI could identify unique patterns in worker behavior that precede accidents, allowing for preventive measures to be implemented before an incident occurs.
Transforming Workers’ Comp: From Reactive To Proactive Service
The benefits of this approach for workers’ comp insurers are clear: fewer claims and reduced recurrence of costly unexpected claims. This represents a future where workers’ comp transforms from a reactive to a proactive service.
This is a real promise of how AI can transform a well-established industry by having access to meaningful data insights coupled with a commitment to better understand and support humans. As claims and fraud are reduced in the coming years, turning insurance into a proactive service becomes the major promise of AI.
The integration of AI into workers’ comp insurance represents a paradigm shift in workplace safety and employee well-being. Far from replacing workers, AI should become their silent protector, working behind the scenes to create safer, more productive work environments.
Achieving this vision requires strong insurance-centric analytics and a commitment to understanding and supporting human workers in all their complexity. By embracing this approach, we’re ushering in a new era of intelligent and proactive workers’ comp insurance.
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