Better late than never. Long lambasted as a technology laggard, the property/casualty insurance industry appears to be following the lead of other financial services companies like banks, accounting firms and stock brokerages in appointing two new “chiefs,” albeit both with the unfortunate acronym of CDO.

We write “unfortunate” only because the two new members of the C-suite—the chief data officer and the chief digital officer—perform very different functions. The former is focused primarily on the use of predictive data analytics, while the latter looks predominantly at digital marketing and other digital strategies. In a few paragraphs, we will outline the full functionalities of these new roles.