June 2017 - Novarica’s sixth annual best practices case study compendium includes more than 30 detailed examples of recent IT initiatives that delivered real business impact. Each case details business goals, project sponsor, team structure, project timeline, tools and technology used, challenges faced, success factors, and business results delivered.

The diverse group of winners shared the common characteristics of all impactful projects: clear articulation of target value and benefits, consistent executive support, effective multi-stakeholder communications during the project, and swift resolution of inevitable challenges.

2017 Winners

• AF Group for its core systems project (core)
• American Family for its self-service analytics initiative (data)
• COUNTRY for automating life underwriting (core)
• EMC Insurance for drone image recognition
• Grange for its Amazon Alexa initiative (digital)
• Homesite for its sales portal (digital)
• MetLife for its enterprise analytics program (practice and infrastructure)
• The Doctors Company for its M&A integration framework (practice and infrastructure)

Key Points

Core systems projects, whether they’re replacements or expansions, are creating real value in speed-to-issue, straight-through processing, and improved service levels.
Data and analytics initiatives are mostly focused on creating better and faster access to insight for knowledge workers, but emerging technologies and AI are starting to be used as well.
Digital initiatives are streamlining and improving communication and access to information for all stakeholders, primarily through effective usage of well-proven technologies.
IT Practices and Infrastructure, while challenging to secure funding for due to indirectly realized benefits, can be the key to unlocking value and enabling future innovation.