Throughout my career I’ve studied and worked at organisations where there was a real sense of being “the other”.
At university, I had to walk 40 minutes, up a long hill, to go to the technology buildings where our lab was in the basement. In banking, the IT team sat in a different building down the road, cementing the sense of throwing things over the fence to be built and thrown back. In government, despite being responsible for public facing services, I was on the outside of policy – the “important people”.
Over the last 25 years we’ve seen a complete shift in the way we live our lives, with technology now firmly ingrained in almost everything we do. Whether it’s managing prescriptions or money, buying groceries or clothes, watching TV or ordering a cab, our experiences are shaped by technology.
The way we work and do business has also shifted significantly. In today’s world, the quality of your technology and data is central to the quality of your service. I’ve been to several market events recently where the picture of the future being painted recognises this. From underwriters working hand in glove with digital agents, to automation driving speed, dynamic pricing, and smart lead models, it’s a vision of a faster, more data-driven market. A vision in which technology, data and humans come together to power success.
I was therefore surprised to feel that sense of being “the other” again. I kept hearing people refer to IT in ways that felt dismissive – comments like, “I work in the business, not IT,” or “the business wants,” as if people believed IT were somehow a separate entity. The kind of language that suggests that technology teams aren’t truly part of the business, but something apart from it.
To be honest, it irked me somewhat. Once upon a time, the IT team might have been the people that sat in the basement or down the road in a separate building. But that time is long gone. And if we don’t recognise that, we risk holding ourselves back. It’s hard to have a serious conversation about transforming how capacity is deployed, how risk is assessed, or about AI-led innovation and technology as a differentiator, if others insist on drawing lines around who counts as “the business”.
I believe the success of our market is increasingly dependent on how well we combine human expertise, data insight, and modern delivery, not in separate silos, but through real collaboration and shared accountability. That starts with mindset, and with language.
We are the business.
By Gina Gill, Chief Information Officer