IN Insurance Agency is a, young, ambitious and growing Chinese-Canadian insurance brokerage located in Richmond, BC. IN Insurance aims to provide friendly yet professional insurance consultation and supervision for the Chinese-speaking population in the lower mainland.

Insurance management was an oblivious and obscure topic for us. Our team spent 3 weeks conducting an in-field study on IN Insurance Agency through observing their daily processes, interviewing key stakeholders, and conducting online research.

The internal insurance network in IN Insurance Agency involves four stakeholders. IN Insurance Agency collaborates with external insurance agents and insurance providers to deliver the final insurance products to customers. In the majority cases, IN Insurance Agency doesn’t need to contact with customers directly, but serves as a bridge between the insurance providers and the insurance agents to organize, manage, and deliver insurance products.

Beyond understanding the insurance network, another challenge we encountered was communicating our investigation to the instructor and the class, who do not have any much knowledge in the insurance field. As I always believe, discussing my design considerations with other people effectively is as important as conducting a good design. I created the diagram below to graphically explain the complex insurance network to the lay audience.

Going further in the research, we discovered that the current insurance process involved 3 different systems to manage the insurance data. IN insurance brokers used folders to storage physical documents, window system to save digital files, and wechat/email system to transfer these files.

Based on the user journey maps, we noticed that IN insurance brokers used these 3 systems in a high frequency and the pain points are usually around the moments that they tried to switch between different systems. To address this issue, we explored the possibility of creating an all-in-one system for IN insurance brokers to access all the datas they need.

While synthesizing our findings from key stakeholder interviews into personas, we found the relationship between the IN insurance brokers, who work in IN Insurance Agency, and the external insurance agents is crucial in the insurance network. Therefore, we decided to choose IN Insurance brokers and their partnering insurance agents as our focus groups.

We designed and conducted a participatory workshops that identified top three common constraints in the insurance network.

1.Misplaced or lost of important files and documents

2.Messy process for the transfer of files between IN insurance brokers and external insurance agents

3.Heavy reliance on the agents and their personal relationships with the clients

Based on our findings, we framed our design challenge as below:

In-Client Book is a cloud-based file organization system personalized for IN Insurance Agency Ltd. With In-Client Book, IN insurance brokers can better manage the insurance documents and client information in a single centralized location while collaborating with their collegial brokers and external insurance agents.

Automated Case Filing System

When creating a new case, IN insurance brokers are asked to select attributes like insurance category, expiring date, and family members. Cases will be filed into relevant folders automatically based on their corresponding attributes.

Clients Profiling System

Clients’ basic information and personal preference can be saved in In-Client Book for IN insurance brokers’ reference. They can review clients’ information anytime, find a case within a client’s profile, and pin to specific profiles for timely notifications.

Mimicking Windows system for application

General manager Michael mentioned that the over-complexity of the current insurance systems in the market made them to rather stay in the simple and familiar Microsoft Windows system. Keefe gave the suggestion to mimic the Microsoft Windows system in order to enlarge the level of learnability. We stimulated the Windows system by using the similar color theme, icons, and grid layouts.

Utilizing technological capabilities in the original flow

After finishing the initial prototype of In-Client Book, we conducted user test with IN insurance brokers. All brokers appreciated that they were able to experience a similar flow to what they currently do in In-Client Book. The user testing also encouraged them to give more details about their working flow and habits for us to optimize the customization and functionality in In-Client Book.

Working with a client in an unfamiliar field gave me a chance to work outside of comfort my zone. I developed a better capacity to understand a new topic and communicate effectively to the lay audience. The other insight I gained from this project is prioritizing. We decided to leave out a fancy but complicated interface and decided to go for a simple Windows-looking interface so that the users could learn it fast and easily. I left this project inspired and truly understanding what it means when my professors tell me: “design is more than making things pretty”.