Justin Harper, Chief Marketing Officer at LifeSearch, offers a grounded perspective on what AI really means for protection today. Rather than hype or hyperbole, he focuses on practical application and the balance between technological capability and human judgment, arguing that AI’s greatest contribution will be strengthening, and not sidelining, the experts and conversations at the heart of the industry.
In protection, we talk a lot about AI shaping the future. But AI is already here, and it’s already helping us help more people. It’s a bit like when smartphones first arrived. Impressive and overwhelming at times, yet soon indispensable.
Our challenge is not to let AI become our master, but to use it in ways that are responsible, practical and genuinely useful for real customers and real advisers.
I can guarantee you now that AI will transform protection, but it will only do so for the better if we keep it human‑led and human‑centred.
Where can AI already save time or improve efficiency?
Right now, the biggest AI wins are in the incremental gains. The minutes (and hours) that AI quietly saves our teams and advisers. Across LifeSearch, AI is speeding up research, tidying up reports and case notes, organising thinking, structuring compliance evidence and easing the ongoing load of administrative tasks that drain our time and energy.
We’re also seeing the early benefits of AI‑supported quality monitoring. With the volume of calls we handle, technology is helping spot patterns that humans alone can’t consistently track. Things like missing clarifications, disclosures, or potential vulnerabilities. It doesn’t replace judgment, but it sharpens it.
None of this steals an adviser’s job. Quite the opposite. AI takes away the parts advisers never enjoyed in the first place. The result is more time for meaningful conversations, and less time grappling with bl**dy admin.
How can professionals use AI safely in research, reporting or client communications?
Used well, AI is a brilliant co‑pilot (hmmm, has somebody used that?). It helps you prepare faster, digest information more accurately and communicate more clearly. But it must be treated for what it is: a starting point, not a finished product.
At LifeSearch, nothing leaves the building without human eyes. AI can simplify or clarify, but the nuances around regulated language, reassurance, suitability and tone are always be handled by people.
What are the Consumer Duty and compliance considerations when introducing AI?
There’s a misconception that Consumer Duty and AI are at odds. If anything, Consumer Duty strengthens AI adoption because it forces us to be more transparent, more disciplined and more deliberate about how we use new tools.
Our approach is to treat AI with the same seriousness we’d apply to a new advice process: clear boundaries, proper oversight, consistent explanation and human accountability. Customers should never be left wondering whether an AI tool recommended something, or why. If a customer asks, ‘How did you arrive at that recommendation?’, we must be able to answer, plainly. If AI can’t pass the test of clarity, fairness and good outcomes, it doesn’t belong in the journey.
Where is AI being overestimated and where is it genuinely adding value?
There’s much noise about fully automated advice journeys or algorithms that can somehow replace deep human understanding. As Tom Baigrie, our LifeSearch founder, would say, ‘Protection is wrapped in emotion, fear, hope, health and family… and fate’. No model can listen as an adviser can.
Where AI is truly reshaping the landscape is in consumer discovery. Search engines are becoming answer engines. AI‑generated summaries increasingly sit above traditional SEO. Consumers are typing questions, often long, conversational ones. And the first explanation they see may not be human at all.
That creates both a challenge and an opportunity. Insurers are experts in their own products. Price comparison websites are brilliant at… well, comparing prices.
The gap in the middle is where consumers ask, ‘What do I actually need?’ and ‘Who can I trust to help me?’ Which then opens more doors for advisers to do their human thing – ask, listen, reassure and interpret.
How will AI reshape roles, teams and skills?
AI won’t take away advisers. It will take away the admin, stress and inefficiency that frustrates and distracts them. Quality control leaders will coach more and check less. And even marketers like me will spend more time storytelling and sense‑checking, and less time wrestling with copy.
The skills that will rise in value aren’t technical; they’re human. Our empathy, clarity, listening, curiosity and judgement.
So how should protection professionals get on board?
AI will change protection, that’s unavoidable. But whether it changes your business for the better, or leaves it behind, is your call.
Use AI to become faster, clearer and more customer‑centred, and never let it replace the human moments that matter.
