Thursday, November 29, 2018

iPRO Demos for Shedd and Lincoln Park Zoo in the Crown Studio at Kaplan Institute

Truism - Clear

Truism - Innovators

Truism - Trumps

Truism - Rules

Truism - See

Truism - Racing

Snapsheet and Zurich Insurance Group collaborate, bringing innovative claims software to international businesses


Strategic collaboration will set new standards for Zurich's customer claims experience and accelerate Snapsheet's global expansion

08:00 ET

CHICAGONov. 27, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Snapsheet, the leading provider of virtual claims technology for the personal and commercial insurance marketplace, today announced a new strategic agreement with Zurich Insurance Group. The collaboration marks a global expansion for Snapsheet, allowing its innovative digital services platform to be available in multiple countries across Zurich's operations in EuropeLatin America and Asia Pacific. 
"The collaboration with Snapsheet will allow Zurich to further streamline the claims journey for our customers and provide additional innovative services," said Ian ThompsonZurich's Group Chief Claims Officer. "Our customers will have additional options to report claims and communicate with Zurich to speed up and simplify the claims experience. As we build a culture of innovation and greater agility into our business, we are very excited to enter into this strategic relationship with an insurtech that is paving the way for new innovation in the insurance industry."
Snapsheet's software as a service (SaaS) platform allows intake of information from various customer channels, including e-mail, text, or a web and mobile app, allowing insurance carriers to better engage customers and process claims more quickly. It also enables them to directly deposit payments into customers' bank accounts, easing the claims process while providing superior customer engagement and workflow optimization. The software covers auto, property and injury for personal and commercial claims, and incorporates automation derived from data collected from 1M+ processed claims across 70+ blue-chip carriers and non-traditional innovators.
"Snapsheet has already processed more than $2.5B worth of claims in the U.S. through our software platform. We continually leverage our own claims data to provide real-time R&D that enhances the functionality and automation of our claims processing software," said CJ Przybyl, co-founder of Snapsheet. "Zurich recognized the tremendous value to be gained from the Snapsheet suite of software across multiple lines of their P&C business. Our ability to capture claims information from any medium, coupled with pro-active workflows, will help augment Zurich's existing systems – ultimately providing a higher level of service for their customers."
The enhanced Snapsheet services will be available to Zurich customers in Ireland first, with plans to expand to additional countries across Zurich's operations in EuropeLatin America and Asia Pacific.
For more information about Snapsheet's digital services platform, visit
About SnapsheetSnapsheet is the leading provider of virtual claims solutions. Using powerful technology to improve workflows for more than 70 insurance carriers around the world, Snapsheet creates a simple claims process starting with virtual estimations and continuing through final repairs and payment. By streamlining communication between consumers, shops, and carriers, Snapsheet takes complicated processes and makes them fast and simple for everyone involved. For more information, please visit



Executive Director of the Kaplan Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship, 

Illinois Institute of Technology

In this issue of Catalyst, we sit down with the Executive Director of the Kaplan Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship at the Illinois Institute of Technology. We discuss goals for the new Institute, the role of universities in entrepreneurship, and the new tech district emerging from Chicago’s South Side.

The new Kaplan Institute at Illinois Tech had its grand opening last month. Tell us about the vision for the Institute and what attracted you to take on this new challenge.
At the Kaplan Institute, our primary objectives are (1) to create a new interactive and inter-disciplinary space where Illinois Tech students and faculty can initiate, develop and iterate their ideas for new businesses and civic/social solutions, (2) provide students instruction in the basics of innovation, entrepreneurship and human-centered design, and (3) to be a new front door for business and industry to better access the university’s resources in order to assist them in developing solutions for the kinds of next-generation problems which will increasingly cross domains, silos and specialties and require multi-school and/or multiple department solution teams.
I was particularly attracted to the Kaplan Institute by the fact that 30% or more of each year’s incoming freshman at Illinois Tech are highly-diverse and the first in their families to attend college. If we are going to solve the critical technical talent shortages and the associated diversity issues in the tech sector in Chicago and extend the economic and social benefits of new tech to the entire city, it will start by improving industry’s access to the kinds of students and graduates we are turning out at Illinois Tech.

What new opportunities does the space present for students and faculty? How will the Kaplan Institute enhance and grow Illinois Tech’s entrepreneurship initiatives? 
The building is intended to encourage collaborations, interactions, lateral learning, collisions and inspiration by assuring that all of the occupants will be exposed to and learn from whatever is taking place inside. True innovation largely takes place at the edges of business and standard practices and in unexpected ways especially as new technologies and applications continue to jump quickly from industry to industry and across traditional boundaries.
The building will contain new equipment and tools in leading-edge tech areas like 3D maker spaces, AR/MR/VR labs and demo spaces, robotics, etc. as well as a large variety of alternative work spaces, presentation rooms and assembly areas. The wide-open building is designed to morph over time based on the changing demands of its occupants and users. This will assure that we are best able to adapt to everything coming down the pipeline including new teaching methods, new equipment and technology requirements, differing industry requirements, online delivery and learning systems, etc.

In the data we collect through our Illinois Innovation Index, we’ve seen significant growth in the number of startups created by students and faculty at Illinois universities, and the intentional efforts of many universities to create spaces and programming to nurture this activity. Why do you think more people across campus are choosing to pursue entrepreneurial activities?
We expect that a very large portion of the population (maybe over 50%) will be “self-employed” within the next ten years and all of these individuals will have figured out that they will need training in entrepreneurial skills (whether they ultimately begin and build their own businesses or not) as well as some basic experience using what we call “new” collar skill sets to solve problems, work in teams, and create new and disruptive solutions.
The majority of universities are responding (somewhat belatedly) to these changed needs to better prepare their graduates, but most of their efforts are somewhat cosmetic and not as committed and intentional as what we are doing with the Kaplan Institute. Cultures and long-standing systems don’t change because you talk about change; they change when you take concrete steps to commit to the necessary changes and to creating a new and better future for your students.

Kaplan Institute, Illinois Institute of Technology Campus

As someone who’s viewed entrepreneurship from multiple perspectives—as a startup founder, CEO of 1871, and as an educator—what do you view as the best approach to entrepreneurship education at the university-level?
I always say that you can’t teach someone to be an entrepreneur (it’s in their DNA or it’s not), but you can help someone who is inclined to be a far better and more successful entrepreneur by equipping them with a known set of skills, behaviors and tactics that have been developed and consistently used for many years by experienced business builders. The necessary concepts and strategies include simple storytelling and selling, iteration and continual improvement, pattern recognition and triage, focus and prioritization, and failing forward. The critical behaviors include hard work, thorough preparation, fierce perseverance, a measure of patience and a set of clear values.
We also believe that you want seasoned educators who have both been there and built businesses, and have synthesized their experiences into transferable lessons and tactics rather than one-off war stories. If you can’t tell whether someone was smart or just lucky in their success, they most likely don’t have much of value to share with our students. Finally, we think that hands-on, practical experience is essential, but it needs to be highly-structured, and grounded in the realities of what it takes today to start and scale a successful new enterprise.

In a recent report, we highlighted the importance of collaborations between industry and academia and the growth of business-funded academic research in Illinois over the last 5 years. How are you thinking about corporate engagement more broadly at Illinois Tech and what are some of the ways the corporate community can plug into the Kaplan Institute?
Although there have been some advances in business-funded academic research, the aggregate expenditures still remain woefully short of the potential in part because it hasn’t been easy for interested industry leaders to determine how best to interact with the universities and how to successfully navigate the silos, turf and funding issues and other barriers that have existed in the past so that they can more easily and cost-effectively access the talents and resources there.

You’ve written about the Kaplan Institute as one part of a new tech district emerging on the city’s South Side, which includes resources at the University of Chicago, University of Illinois at Chicago, and the proposed Discovery Partners Institute led by the University of Illinois. What will this growing tech district mean to Chicago’s status as a tech hub? 
The explosion and rapid job and company growth in the River North area (surrounding the 1871 hub at the Mart) as a center for tech startups and then the West Fulton dramatic expansion (anchored by Google) are both great starts, but they’re already suffering from space and support limitations whereas the area immediately south of the Loop is virtually a greenfield opportunity and an area just beginning the kind of renaissance and redevelopment that is a central part of Chicago’s DNA.
We expect that the Farpoint redevelopment of the Michael Reese property along with the other initiatives you mention will quickly remake large and readily accessible parts of the South Side into the next tech hub just as we’ve seen similar non-central expansions in other geographic areas like South San Francisco, Brooklyn, etc.

As one of Chicago’s tech leaders, how do you view the city’s progress as a tech hub in recent years? In what areas does the city still need to make progress to further grow its tech ecosystem?
As I said above, we need to educate and attract and recruit and retain great and diverse tech talent in the city. We already have great schools, many important corporate headquarters, and ample venture funding. We also need a new Mayor who is tech- and business-focused.

Tuesday, November 27, 2018

New INC Magazine Blog Post by Kaplan Exec Director Howard Tullman

Is There Any Way Through Mobile Phone Mayhem?
Those few square inches on your screen represent the most valuable real estate ever created. You can try to wedge your way in--and you'd better bring something extra special-- or take a different approach, like Upshow.

For many years, I've maintained that, when a startup is trying to influence long-established consumer behaviors, it's always smarter to design any new required actions so that they move in the same directions the prospective customers and existing users are already headed.  It's simply not practical or cost-effective to try to redirect people's ingrained actions and then find that you're required to spend great gobs of time and money, which you typically don't have, in a struggle to change millions of minds. Better to build on my behavior; help me do what I'm already doing faster; start with incremental adjustments that make me more productive; or provide the easy wins and successive rewards that save me time or money.  Don't try to bully me into behaving or beat me over the head with your message.

 We won't change because we're basically lazy and really stuck in our ruts. And the biggest rut, and most pervasive tether of all, is our mobile phone. Yet those very phones also represent a game-changing and fundamental shift in the way that brands, bars and businesses are going to have to reach out to customers.

Today, 95% of U.S. adults have a cell phone (75% of them are smart phones) and 80% of us check our phones within 15 minutes of waking. The others are just too embarrassed to admit it. We're all looking for that daily dose of dopamine along with our morning caffeine and things accelerate rapidly from there. On a typical weekday, you'll look at your phone more than 160 times, which equates to about 3.5 hours a day. Nothing in human history has ever rivaled the emotional and psychological attachment which we have to our phones and the degree of dependence is growing across all ages and across the world.

Likewise, there's never been a more powerful and ubiquitous marketing platform. Our phones possess three characteristics that are essentially superpowers: they're intimate, immediate and interruptive. Simply stated, they're omnipresent, they're always on, and they're impossible to ignore. They're much more of a buddy, an accomplice and a sidekick today than any of our BFFs. And, for marketers and merchants, they're the keys to the kingdom and the best way for anyone to break through the clutter in our lives. That said, the barriers to ready access continue to increase.

This is in part because, while the digital world continues to expand, our own personal worlds are shrinking especially given our limited ability to manage and focus our attention amidst the endless stream of fluff and flutter. We're more apt to try to shut down and shut off the outside world these days than to openly and excitedly embrace it. And, we're increasingly sticking to our familiar ways; visiting the same few sites and platforms; using the same small number of apps; and largely loath to change or look elsewhere.

As a result, effective engagement is hard to achieve these days. If you want my attention, meet me where I'm at, go with the flow, and don't bust my bubble or mangle my mood. Trying to launch a brand-new app today is like trying to teach a fish to ride a bicycle. Even if you could, why would you?

An equally significant barrier to new entry is the fact that the scarcest and most precious real estate anywhere these days are the screens on our phones. They're jammed with excess icons that we barely remember (and never use) because we're hoarders and lousy housekeepers. There's no more room for anything new. And, just as we've learned about friends on Facebook and connections on LinkedIn; more itself isn't better - only better is better.

So, if you can't pry my phone out of my hands, and I'd rather die of hunger or thirst than download another app for my phone at some bar or restaurant, both you (and whatever venue I happen to be in) better figure out fast how to get my attention and get your messages in front of me.

One emerging and elegant solution is to hitch a ride on that phone without requiring the user to do much of anything--including loading anything new. That's the premise behind Upshow. If you're on the premises -- restaurant, bar, doctor's office -- you can be on Upshow. And it's a two-way street.

If you're sitting at a restaurant table, Upshow more than replaces some greasy and beat-up table tent or fills in if the server is too busy table-hopping to tell you about tonight's special anythings. It all just pops up on my phone. And frankly, even if you give me a terrific and shiny new tablet to order from, I don't really want to spend my time learning all about your system in order to order. But my phone's a whole 'nother thing.

I'm already an expert on Twitter and Instagram. I've already got those apps sitting open on my mobile. And I've been taking selfies and other goofy shots of my buddies all night long while I'm trying to watch a dozen different games on the video screens stuck on every wall. But suddenly, I'm starting to see something else going on in the place as other tables start to point excitedly at the monitors because their selfies are starting to show up in real-time for everyone to see.  And I think, what am I: "chopped liver"?  So, I ask because I'm actually interested, and it turns out that I just add a hashtag with the bar or restaurant's name to my IG posts or my tweets and it's a done deal.  All of a sudden, I'm "dualing".    

There may be fancier names for this phenomenon - like screen convergence or shared media - but I like my word, dualing, because that's what's really happening. My content, my experience, and my attention are now in two places at once (and shared with the whole place) and I'm paying rapt attention to both because I'm in charge and I'm driving the show. I'm engaged, I'm open to offers, suggestions, contests, coupons, etc. because there's now a direct two-way channel to my phone. And I'm willing to listen as well.

This is a whole new game and the next big thing in digital in-venue engagement and entertainment. And it's basically "free" to everyone. 100% free to the user. And whatever modest investment the venue might make in the Upshow backend system and software is peanuts compared with what they've already spent installing a zillion monitors everywhere. And did I mention that the vast majority of this "authentic" content is created for zero cost by the users themselves and then sent (along with the venue's branding) to everyone on their social media networks.

The best promotion is word of mouth and a picture is worth a thousand words. Catch up with Upshow. 

Sunday, November 25, 2018

Truism - Elephant

Truism - No

Truism - Blame

Truism - Win

Truism - Interested

Truism - Wait

Truism - Expectations

Truism - Yesterday

Truism - Anything

Truism - Critical Mass

Words of Wisdom - Y and Z

YAHOO – Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle (Yang & Filo)

Yard by yard is hard, inch by inch is a cinch

Yawns are contagious.

Yeah, but you won’t be for long.


Yesterday's miracle is today's intolerable condition.


Yogi:  What time is it?  You mean now?

You aim for the palace and get drowned in the sewer.




You always push away that which you want to come closest.

You are the light that shines on me
you always were and you’ll always be
and I had to let you know
just this once before I go.

You are never beaten until you think you are.



You are only as happy as your unhappiest child.

You are remembered for the rules you break

You are responsible for the condition you are in.


You are well known, but not known well.



You are what your record says you are.  Bill Parcells



You barely remember yesterday because you’re so focused on tomorrow.


You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.



You belong to a small, select group of confused people.

You came to the melting pot and melted.

You campaign in poetry; you govern in prose.



You can always work harder.


You can be sincere and still be stupid.

You can be thinking your shit smells like ice cream.



You can eat us, but you can’t beat us.




You can get by on charm for about 15 minutes.


You can have many different jobs and still be lazy.


You can have too much of a good thing.

You can keep going long after you think you can't.

You can lead from anywhere.

You can lead horticulture, but you can't make her think.


You can love someone and still not like him very much.


You can never jump higher than your behind.

You can never plan the future by the past.

You cannot get the ring without the finger.
You cannot go with your pitcher to this fountain.
You cannot see it, but through.



You can plan plans, but you can’t plan results.









You can slap my fanny and call me Sally.

You can teach technology but you can’t teach talent.

You can teach television, you can’t teach curiosity.



You can turn a phrase into a weapon or a drug.



You cannot create experience.  You must undergo it.


You cannot spend your life preparing for future losses.

You can’t accomplish your goal if you don’t believe in yourself.


You can't add value unless you have values.

You can't "ape" your way to excellence.



You can’t be great on the side.

You can’t be sloppy and you can’t be slow.

You can’t be what you can’t see.
You can’t beat something with nothing.

You can’t break a losing streak on your own.

You can't build a reputation on what you're going to do.

You can't change a man unless he's in diapers.

You can’t change the physics of time.


You can't cross a chasm in two small jumps.


You can’t evolve yourself into radical change.

You can’t expect people to be something they’re not.

You can't fall off the floor.

You can’t fatten a chicken by weighing it.


You can’t fill a pothole with data. (Tolva)

You can’t fool others if you’re fooling yourself.

You can't give a child what you weren't given yourself.

You can’t grow your way out of bad economics.


You can’t have everything.  Where would you put it?

You can’t keep a bad shrimp down.

You can't lead a charge from the rear.

You can’t learn anything unless you have something at stake.

You can’t make a living, you can only get rich.

You can't make the shot if you don't take the shot.

You can’t out-ape the monkey.


You can't overcommunicate.


You can't play poker until you get to the table.


You can't polish a turd.

You can't pray a lie.

You can't put new wine in old bottles.

You can’t really dust for vomit.

You can't run with the hare and hunt with the hounds.

You can't save your way to success.

You can’t selectively numb emotions.

You can't sell anything sitting on your ass.

You can’t serve if you don’t get elected

You can’t shoot the deal.

You can’t solve a problem that you can’t quantify.

You cannot spend your life preparing for future losses.

You can’t steal second with one foot on first.


You can't stuff a genie back in the bottle.

You can't talk yourself out of problems you behave yourself into.

what it wants to do.

You can’t teach entrepreneurship, but you can learn it.

You can't teach height.




You can’t un-GOOGLE yourself

You can't water last year's crops.

You can’t win a fight with a measuring tape.

You can’t win a race if you’re in the barn.

You can't win a race with your mouth.

You could have been talking to a wrench.

You couldn't afford me.

You couldn’t run a bath.




You do what you gotta do.

You do what you have to do.




You don’t choose your passions, your passions choose you.

You don’t finish a work of art – you abandon it.


You don’t get harmony when everyone sings the same song.

You don't get something for nothing.

how you're going to live.

You don’t get to move Election Day back.

You don't have to be big to be great.

You don't have to be cruel to be tough.

You don’t have to be straight to shoot straight.


You don’t have to be ugly to be dumb.






You don’t know what you’re capable of until you have children.



You don’t make the club in the tub.


You don't save time by hurrying.



You don’t shoot a man who’s committing suicide.

You don't talk about it, you just do it.


You don’t want to be the peak investor.

You don’t win until the customer says you do.


You eat what you kill.


You either give up or get up.



You feel like home.

You forgot to work for nothing.

You gave yourself an out.

You get a bad king every once in a while.

You get eaten up from the bottom. (Innovator’s Dilemma)


You get killed in the middle in the movie business.

You get the face you deserve.

You get what you get when you go for it.

You get what you give.

You Get What You Work for, Not What You Wish for

You get your learnin' from your burnin'.

You go from eating poorly to losing your appetite.


You gotta be part gangster.

You gotta wanna.

become no one at all.



You have this in common with the rest of humanity.






You have to believe in happiness or happiness never comes.

You have to believe in something greater than yourself.

You have to design and build your strategy into your product.

You have to get rid of the notion of retention.




You have to listen to the little man inside you.



You have to think anyway, why not think big?

You have to wield the truth with care.

You have to write faster than they can steal.

You haven’t learned to live until you’ve learned to give.


You know every day that you're alive.

You know, that hooker really likes me.

You know to the dollar

You live life looking forward, you understand life looking backward.

You live the results of old plans.


You make the rest of your kind look vaguely human.







You meet twice.

You meet your must.
You rarely do what you “should”.
You always do what you “must”.
Make success a fucking “must”.

You might as well put your balls in her teeth.

your mind.

anvil or the hammer.


You must have one grand passion.

You must know where you stop and the world begins.


You must live on the offensive.




You need love to light the shadows on your face.
You need new vistas.
You need to believe in something greater than yourself.



You never forget your first unreliable narrator.

You rarely get in trouble for what you don’t say.





You never know when you’re making a memory.

You never know who's going to bring you your future.

You never know who’s swimming naked until the tide goes out.

You never learn anything by talking.

You never learn things the way you want to.


You only get one good dog in a life.




You only sell your equity once.

You ought to have more dreams than memories.

You ought to take the bull between the teeth.

You owe the world not the other way around.

like to know.

You play basketball against yourself; your opponent is your potential.

You play like you practice.

You punch up, not down.



You say I’m a bitch like it’s a bad thing.

You see a lot by looking.



You should never agree to surrender your dreams.


You should never stand between your enemy and a firing squad.

You spend your whole life learning and then you die.

You started but you didn’t up.

You take money from the people who offer it to you.

the situation just changed.


You train your dog, you educate your people.



You waited for its return with impatience and mounting unease.

You want it bad, you get it bad.





You will go most safely by the middle way.

You will never fail if you never give up.






You would never imagine a future without them.

You wouldn’t have won if we’d beaten you.



You write what you see.

You'll always miss 100% of the shots you don't take.



You’ll never get anything straighter than from a customer.




You'll see it when you believe it.



Your actions are pointless if no one notices.

Your attitude determines your altitude.

Your best teacher is your last mistake.

Your brand is your promise.


Your data shouldn’t show up in your creative.


Your Dog Doesn’t Need Email – Inevitable Feature Glut

Your dream isn’t big enough if it doesn’t scare you.

Your ears will never get you in trouble.

Your faith needs to be stronger than your fear.


Your first mistake is your cheapest.



Your lies often reveal who you wish you were.

Your margin is my opportunity.

Your mind is for having ideas, not holding ideas.

Your oldest fears are the worst ones.

Your salary is your motivation.

Your second act may not be your own.

Your silence will not protect you.


Your values are a competitive advantage.


Your web/mobile presence is your brand

Your work should make you happy

You’re a clever one.  Only comparatively.

You're a cookie full of arsenic.

You’re as sick as your secrets.







You’re not thinking, you’re just being logical.

You're nothing if you're not excited by what you're doing.

You're nothing in this town unless someone wants you dead.

You're only young once, but you can be immature forever.

You’re only young once, but you remember forever.



You've got to be prepared to step on other people's throats.



Zen has no goals, it’s always on its way.


Total Pageviews


Blog Archive