“We have marked a significant increase in productivity and collaboration in a WFH environment,” Shanai Ghosh, Edelweiss General Insurance

The four day BFSI track of the Digital Technology Senate culminated with talks from Shanai Ghosh, CEO and Executive Director, Edelweiss General Insurance Company; Tapan Singhel, MD & CEO, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance and a panel discussion on How emerging technologies can help the BFSI sector lead the future.

Shanai Ghosh spoke on ‘The cascading effects of WFH and the importance of Digital’, She said, Productivity and collaboration were two primary misgivings around remote working in India however, “We have marked a significant increase in productivity and collaboration in a WFH environment,” and at the same time We have marked a significant increase in productivity and collaboration in a WFH environment. WFH has exposed the digital divide between employees, thus they had to change their notions around WFH overnight to ensure business continuity. Covid-19 has busted a lot of myths around remote working. Organisations are trying hard to build a sense of community and connectivity in a physically distant world.

Digital enablement of organisation is crucial for WFH to be effective and efficient. Maturity of the external ecosystem is important for building digital business models and Covid-19 has enabled that. Regulatory authorities have made a conducive external environment amidst Covid-19 crisis. Remote working has brought added attention to cybersecurity protocols. The adoption of cybersecurity practices has to be more widespread now. In this transformation, companies need to reflect empathy through the design of products and experiences.

Tapan Singhel, MD & CEO, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance spoke on ‘How BFSI sector will evolve with digitization gaining importance and WFH becoming the new norm’ Customers’ adoption of digital mediums was low before Covid crisis however in the times of COVID, digital adoption in the insurance industry has accelerated. “The Grievance ratio dropped by a whopping 90 percent during the Covid crisis,” said Singhel. Digital tools have to put on place to ensure enhanced customer experience in terms of claims. 

Tips for growth in the times of COVID-19

• The process systems need to be realigned digitally for a remote working environment
• Instead of looking at digital tools, organisations must define the problem and envision the expected result, then look for relevant digital tools
• Gig workforce and project based economy will become the new normal

A Panel Discussion was organised on, ‘How emerging technologies can help the BFSI sector lead the future’ attended by Rajendra Mhalsekar, Head Wholesale Banking Technology, Innovation & Architecture, IDFC FIRST Bank; Prasanna Lohar, Head Digital, Innovation, Architecture, DCB Bank; Byju Joseph, CIO, Future Generali Life Insurance; Indraneel Sharma, VP and Lead Data Scientist – Retail Liabilities and Third Party Products, HDFC Bank; Anuj Gupta, CEO, Hitachi Systems Micro Clinic;   Ronald Raffensperger, Senior Transformation Expert, Financial Industry, Huawei. “We are already in a digital world and the Covid-19 crisis has further presented new opportunities,” said Rajendra Mhalsekar. Digital delivery of services is the biggest opportunity for the financial services industry. Banks were already moving to mobile channels and hybrid cloud. Banks must harness the technology for the right direction and the services must be calibrated.

In the last 3 months, Hitachi Systems Micro Clinic has seen a massive shift to digital technologies. The next 6 to 9 months will define how we connect with our customers,” said Anuj Gupta.

Information security is a key element to manage the work from home scenario. “Today identity theft is the main concern with remote working, and we need to address that,” said Anuj Gupta.

Tausif Siddiqui, SE Manager, Enterprise, NetApp India presented on the importance of data service in a cloud environment. IT has been the backbone for business continuity in these times. “We are a key player for data services in hybrid, multi cloud environment. We simplify the complexities of hybrid cloud through our Data Fabric framework and ensure seamless data management through the Data Fabric. Our Cloud Insights tool prevents 80 percent of cloud issues from impacting end users. Cloud Insights scales up automatically as the customer’s on premise or cloud resources grow,” said Siddique.

Amit Luthra, Director and General Manager for Data Center Solutions – India at Dell Technologies, spoke about Driving Innovation in the Data Era. “In this data era, rapid and continuous change will never cease. Emerging technologies will allow organisations to innovate with data in a way we never expected before. Dell Technologies helps organisations to convert data into insights into actions that drive business outcomes,” said Luthra.