Risk Management (WEB ONLY)
App Addresses Workers' Compensation, Safety and COVID-19 Issues

• Tom Davis
• April 2022
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Some risk managers may believe the insurtech movement can better address the issues affecting workers' compensation and the millions of essential workers whose safety matters. The Foresight Group says it's setting out to change that by proving innovations and efficiencies brought about by new technologies—including a safety culture and behavior-improvement focused app—can help save lives, spur safe workplace practices and provide more cost-effective policies.

The Foresight Group is a workers' compensation and workplace safety insurtech that provides Safesite, an online risk management platform and virtual safety coaching service. Centering around the Safesite Score—which functions like a credit score or safe driver rewards program—the online platform incentivizes safe work practices by removing costs as a prohibitor for businesses on a journey toward eliminating workplace incidents. Following is an edited transcript of an interview with Peter Grant, CEO of Safesite and co-founder of Foresight.

What served as inspiration for the app?

The archaic paper-based processes were not effectively treating the risk and driving down incident rates and, as a result, I was witness to a lot of severe injuries and, unfortunately, deaths within my organization. At the same time, my best friend passed away in a workplace accident, which I believe was completely preventable if the safety protocols were in place and they were followed.

Related:Risk Managers Walk a Tightrope as COVID-19 Challenges Remain

How does the platform work?

It includes the mobile application, which facilitates all of your traditional safety compliance activities with a good, slick user interface. We understand that not everyone out in the field in high-risk environments is technology savvy, necessarily. We want to make sure that user experiences remove as many barriers to technology adoption as possible.

Then, because our technology or the app is in the hands of everyone out in the field, we have something that is far more powerful than just a way to complete compliance activities. It is a tool for us to modify or enhance behaviors in a way that is safer for them and for their businesses.

How has it helped integrate work safety with app-enabled technology?

The majority of our customers need assistance in going from zero-to-one in terms of digitization and need to understand how to do that with best practice. You don't just pick up an app and go, “We digitized our safety programs.” We have a safety success team that works with every account to review their claims history, identify the risks that their team and their employees are exposed to, and make sure that we design what we call safety campaigns that target those risks on a cadence that makes sense for the exposure that is present.

How has it or how can it impact the overall process of management around COVID-19? In that regard, how has it improved safety and risk management?

We had a massive influx of customers downloading the Safesite app and our technology and engaging with us, based off COVID. We were always ready to go for COVID. Our system is set up for a lot of the COVID protocols that have been pushed out—things as simple as vaccine status tracking. A supervisor can tell instantly who has their vaccine cards in or [if they're] out of date or [identify a] negative test result.

How do you see the insurance space adopting these new types of technologies in the future?

Related:Insurtech Exec: 'Holistic' Approach Is Key for Risk Managers as Offices Reopen

We've been thinking about the insurance space for a long time now. With our technology and our case studies, we've been able to demonstrate that through the Safesite technology and safety success services, we're able to drive down incident frequency by up to 57%. Fantastic result, obviously.