Pioneering progress and prioritising care in 2024

As the year comes to an end, we're reflecting on a momentous year.

Many of our customers tell us that 2024 was once again full of change and challenge. While the dust has settled from the pandemic, we're still adjusting to the new normal. This is especially true in the workplace.

Employers are facing new hybrid and Return to Office policies, workplace pressures appear to be on the rise, and organisations are adapting to disruptive technologies. Throughout the year, we’ve focussed on the needs of these diverse and evolving workplaces, and the people that work in them. We’ve also concentrated on using innovation and technology to better support those involved in motor vehicle crashes. As the world’s #1 insurance brand, as ranked by Interbrand, we don’t take the responsibility to care for our customers lightly. 

In 2025, we’ll continue our journey to create caring, thriving workplaces and make a difference for our customers.

In this update, we'll discuss how we're prioritising mental health in the workplace through various initiatives. This includes our partnerships with SuperFriend and the Corporate Mental Health Allianz Australia (CMHAA). We’ll also highlight how we’ve invested in data insights, people, and capabilities to continuously improve our claims management and service.

We’ll continue our commitment to care for all our customers, no matter what 2025 brings.

What can ten years and 70,000 voices tell us about mental health in the workplace?

Earlier this year, we partnered with SuperFriend to unlock a decade of insights and trends in workplace mental health. SuperFriend’s Indicators of a Thriving Workplace (ITW) survey captured the voices of over 70,000 workers. Allianz then contributed data from a further 12,000, pulling from our 5 years of workplace mental health research.

This resulted in the comprehensive Decade of Data report. 

While large-scale data collection is valuable, each data point represents a personal story. To delve deeper, we also partnered on a series of Think Tanks involving experts and individuals with lived experiences.

The data underscores the need for continued investment in mental health initiatives in the right places, to prevent issues and build thriving workplaces. We also need to look at contradictions in the data. For example, mental health claims are rising, even though bullying reports are experiencing a downward trend.

We also need to address any gaps between mental health programs and positive outcomes. Employees still find it hard to overcome the stigma.

Our research indicates that 34% of neurodiverse employees believe their manager harbours some kind of unconscious bias toward their ability to perform in their role. Given this alarming statistic, it’s unsurprising that 42% of neurodiverse employees surveyed have withheld information about their personal situation to their manager or organisation due to fear of negative perceptions. 

Using the insights from our research alongside their survey data, SuperFriend have identified five domains of a thriving workplace:

1. Connectedness
2. Leadership
3. Safety
4. Work design
5. Capability

At Allianz, we’re using this research to guide our approach to supporting employee mental health and resilience. By continuing to prioritise mental health, we’re ensuring our own workplace is healthy and supportive. 

We want to empower our people to support those experiencing mental injuries with empathy, understanding and care.

We’re also continuing the mental health conversation with our partnership with the Corporate Mental Health Alliance Australia (CMHAA). This alliance dedicates itself to helping leaders focus on mental health and wellbeing in the workplace. 

This year, we partnered together to deliver a ten-part webinar series, Return to Work from Mental Injury. By attracting over 1000 attendees, it confirmed to us the importance of these discussions.

Over the ten sessions, we explored the whole claims journey. We looked at important pre-claim moments and discussed how we connect with injured workers. We wrapped up the series by setting goals to track progress and creating sustainable recovery strategies. 

The recorded series is now available to watch in our webinar library.

Creating meaningful experiences for customers starts with an in-depth understanding of trends and performance. For us, data analytics plays a huge role in obtaining these insights.

To improve injury prevention insights, claims management, and service delivery, we combined data models and machine learning (ML) into one platform. 

This lets us analyse workers’ compensation portfolios in greater detail and drive data-informed decisions under expert guidance. The new approach also improves efficiency by reducing manual tasks. This frees up our teams to redirect their time towards where it’s going to most benefit our customers. 

Our ML triage model also uses data and analytics to optimise our biopsychosocial approach for the recovery journey of injured workers. It does this by classifying the worker based on predicted recovery barriers and offering early insights and actions. This lets our claims team support the worker with the right level of expertise, at the right time. 

Finally, these newfound data insights have let us focus on injury prevention initiatives. For example, we’ve recently partnered with InCheq to create the Mindful Edge program. 

It pairs InCheq’s psychosocial hazard management technology with our own expertise to promote mentally healthy workplaces. It helps us meet the new code for psychological harm management as well as offer tools to enhance insights and collaboration. 

Ultimately, our data-driven insights empower us to understand risk factors and spot new trends. It also lets us proactively tackle potential issues and strengthen our prevention initiatives. 

By supporting our customers with increasingly personalised services, efficiency, and insight, we’re achieving our ultimate goal: improved customer outcomes and service delivery.

No one expects to leave their home and loved ones to experience an injury at work. 

Suffering a workplace injury or illness can render the most resilient of us suddenly vulnerable. At these times, our claims teams view it as their responsibility – and privilege – to help people return to work and life.

In 2020, Covid-19 acted as the first domino in a series of challenges for the Victorian scheme. From the impacts of Covid on returning workers, to the exit of a key WorkCover Agent that caused market shifts and talent gaps. Amidst these disruptions, new reforms reshaped how we managed claims.

The pandemic acted as our catalyst for change. 

Our Victorian team responded quickly to support workers in Victoria. We focused on safe and sustainable return-to-work outcomes and improved service to employers. 

We recognised early on that to stay ahead, we needed to invest in our people, structure, and processes. We also started delivering differentiated services and programs. 

Over the past two years, we've made significant strides to optimise our service offering. Key investments have bolstered our performance and cemented our standing as a reliable agent and partner. Several key initiatives have helped us achieve this: 

• An organisational restructure – we strengthened our claims specialisation by centralising our teams with role and function.
• Investment in additional resources – we reduced our portfolio sizes and workloads to enable higher quality customer interactions. 
• CM Trainee Development team – introduced in 2021, this enabled us to grow our own pool of talent. We also resourced ourselves to create a group of skilled Case Managers that are ready to fill any vacancies. This minimises the impact on customers of any Case Manager changes. 
• Mental Injury - Early Intervention Program – In 2023, we found new pathways to proactively support injured workers with timely access to treatment and recovery. This approach allowed us to better assess and influence recovery and return-to-work trajectories pre-claim liability.
• Mobile Case Management Team – We assembled a recovery-first mobile team to help workers and employers navigate return to work planning.

These changes led to impressive improvement. As of 20th November 2024, we are now sustainably outperforming the scheme in core service and recovery outcomes. In 2024 alone, we’ve seen increased staff engagement, reduced turnover, and have been recognised with three WorkSafe Victoria awards. 

Supporting the recovery of injured workers was, and always will be, what drives us. But it’s validating to see some of the positive by-products from this journey of improvement. 

Our recovery-first approach has provided the base from which we’ve built a robust framework that supports our long-term goals. Most importantly, we’re helping injured workers across Victoria to recover and return to work and life.

In late October, we proudly served as a gold-level sponsor at the 2024 PIEF Conference in Perth. 

Hosted by the Personal Injury Education Foundation (PIEF), this event never fails to deliver. This year, it centred around the principles of “work, drive and be well”. It featured top-tier international and Australian keynote speakers and engaging breakout sessions. 

What really resonated with me across the three days was the sense of purpose and vulnerability from the speakers. I felt a strong connection of head to heart as they shared personal stories around neurodiversity, mental health and injury. For me, purpose at its core is reminding ourselves why we do this work and what options exist to do it better. 

I had the privilege of participating in two thought-provoking panels at PIEF, while my team showcased how we’re moving the dial in personal injury. This included our research on mental health at work, biopsychosocial risk management, early intervention programs, and the innovative use of virtual reality to address driving phobias. 

This article has been prepared by Allianz Australia Insurance Limited ABN 15 000 122 850 AFSL234708 ("Allianz"). In some cases, information has been provided to us by third parties and while that information is believed to be accurate and reliable, its accuracy is not guaranteed in any way. 

Any opinions expressed constitute our views at the time of issue and are subject to change. Neither Allianz, nor its employees or directors give any warranty of accuracy or accept responsibility for any loss or liability incurred by you in respect of any error, omission or misrepresentation in this article.