Article at a glance:

Manufacturing lessons for service industries: An interview with AXA's Claude Brunet

For many years, insurance companies could count on investments to shore up their profits. But when equity markets cooled at the end of the 1990s, insurers were under pressure to deliver profits from selling products and serving customers—in other words, from their operations. In response, several global insurance giants are overhauling their service and operating strategies.

The take-away

Insurers can adopt tools and practices pioneered by manufacturers to help them improve how they deliver value to customers. Here's how one insurer is trying to do so.