DEEP DIVE
A company like Western & Southern, managing billions of dollars of assets, doesn’t surpass a century of success without innovation, Fitzgerald acknowledges, but 134 years of success can breed some amount of rigidity in terms of “how things are done.” Reassessing and streamlining are always in order. “So we’ve changed some processes and removed some processes that were just a burden,” he says. “It can be amazing, when you ask the question, Hey, why are we doing this? Is it helping us? that often our people will respond, No, no, no. So we need to have the right mindset to say, OK, let’s stop doing that.” Maintaining the company’s focus on individual customers is the next immediate step for Western & Southern, says Fitzgerald. “The biggest innovation is happening around the direct-to-consumer product space,” he says. “We have a product called IncomeSense that’s aimed at folks who are younger and who don’t necessarily know about insurance or want to buy a large insurance policy. IncomeSense is perfect for them because it can replace their income if something unfortunate were to happen.”
WESTERN & SOUTHERN CIO JIM FITZGERALD SAYS HE ALWAYS ASKS HIS TEAM, “IF YOU COULD CHANGE SOMETHING, WHAT WOULD IT BE? THE ANSWERS OFTEN DON’T INVOLVE BIG, GRANDIOSE IDEAS.”
42 REALM SUMMER 2022
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INET TIX IS A BLUE Ash-based IT field services organization serving a wide swath of clients across the globe, and like Western & Southern its innovation focus is centered on the end user. The company uses technology to solve problems for clients, says Vice President of Strategic Design Lisa Cook. “ The market we’re in is highly commoditized, so we’re always looking for the angle of, What makes us different than any other IT field services provider?” she says. “In the last two years with the pandemic and higher fuel expenses, a looming recession, and higher costs everywhere, we figured out that the most expensive part of our
transaction is the technician himself who’s on the ground solving our client’s problem.” The company now allows clients to directly engage with a Kinettix technician, while “wraparound services” from the office make sure that each technician does exactly what he or she is supposed to do to complete the job. Cook says it isn’t all that difficult to come up with innovative ideas, but the challenge usually comes in implementing those ideas. That’s where she sees the natural evolution of the company’s direct engagement solution—decentralizing control and empowering clients is the key to business expansion and client retention. “We want to take a not-as-skilled field technician, send them onsite to H E A D S H O T C O U R T E SYP HWOETSOTGERRANP H& BY S O UT TKHT EKRT NK
