Executive Vice President, Public Policy, and President, The Travelers Institute, Travelers Companies (The)
Desert Living now: Joan Woodward
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About Joan Woodward
Joan Woodward, President of the Travelers Institute, has been active in public discussions on mental health, cybersecurity, and distracted driving. In a May 2025 podcast, Woodward stated that the United States is "in a mental health crisis," citing a National Institutes of Health report that one in five adults experiences mental illness. She argued that a manager has "more influence on your mental health than your primary care physician" and said that well-being can be taught to managers to help them identify struggling employees. In a July 2025 appearance, Woodward described her own career risk of leaving Capitol Hill for the financial services industry, advising others to "take a risk on yourself" and "be confident in yourself." Woodward has also addressed cybersecurity risks for businesses. In an October 2024 podcast, she said that "a cyber event can cause a major operational and financial disruption" and that "most people believe you've either been hacked already or you're going to be hacked." She has promoted the Travelers Institute's "Wednesdays with Woodward" webinar series, which she said draws thousands of participants. On distracted driving, Woodward cited a Travelers risk survey finding that 70% of respondents see it as a bigger problem than a few years ago, with more than a quarter admitting to using social media while driving.
Transcript (14 segments)
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Host0:22
Autonomous vehicle technology is advancing every day with nearly every major auto manufacturer and tech company getting involved. In fact, the very first fully driverless vehicles are already beginning to appear on public streets in some cities. With this technology at our doorstep, what will it mean for drivers today and in the future? Well, here to discuss this is Joan Woodward, the executive vice president of public policy for Travelers, president of the Travelers Institute. Welcome, Joan.
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Joan Woodward0:53
Well, thank you for having me. Appreciate it. Of course, you know, this really is a whole new world that we're entering, isn't it, with the driverless vehicles? Yeah, it is, and you know the AV industry, as you said, has grown really dramatically over the last couple of years and will continue to grow with all these new players coming into the marketplace. But right now, what's going on is testing, lots of testing is being rolled out through different cities in the United States and around the world, frankly. And this testing is really critically important to understanding how this technology is going to work, how we as citizens are going to work with it is even more important, which raises some other questions around kind of regulation of them, the safety of them, which we're really focused on, and then the insurability: what's the insurance marketplace going to look like for AVs going forward? So it's a really exciting time, I think, for the industry.
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Host1:48
It is, and you bring up two points that jump out right at me: of course, safety and insurance. So how are you sort of deciding that the safety factors are implemented in something that is still so brand new and exotic?
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Joan Woodward2:06
Yeah, and this is a critically important component to AVs. I mean, we really do think ultimately it will benefit society by reducing the number of crashes and fatalities we see. Look, right now, 94% of all crashes are because of human error, and so if you think about taking out the human decision-making component and think about the distracted driving — a driver who's eating, walking the dog, you know, driving down the road, or putting on makeup, or you know, shopping — we found in a Travelers survey that people are actually buying things while they're driving, pulling the trigger on a purchase. And so you take out that human error, 94% of crashes that are caused by that, we really feel there's great hope for society and potentially safer roadways, less fatalities, and that's really the goal of all of us.
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Host2:55
Yeah, that certainly sounds intriguing and very hopeful. But what about the insurance element? You know, how are the insurance agencies dealing with this new concept?
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Joan Woodward3:06
Yeah, we think the insurance industry has a critical role to play, which is why we've really taken the lead here. We've recently produced a very large research paper talking about different components of the AV world, you know, facts and figures — you can go to our website and check it out. But policymakers and regulators are really looking to us to help them figure out how to insure this new technology on our roads, because we're going to have the traditional vehicles — the average American holds onto their car for 12 years — so we're going to have this messy middle where you have the regular cars driving down the road alongside autonomous vehicles. But the insurance industry really has some innovative tools to be able to handle how to insure this. The question is, you know, assigning liability: is that manufacturer responsible for that crash, or the driver sitting behind the seat?
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Host3:56
Yeah, that obviously is a huge question. And have you addressed that? I mean, in a driverless vehicle, who is liable and who is at fault?
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Joan Woodward4:05
Yeah, yeah, there's going to be confusion over whether the manufacturer or the driver. And the good news is, it's likely that every one of these situations will be unique, and so those AV technologies have what I'm going to call a black box, if you will. So they're capturing data: exactly what happened at the second the crash happened, so we will have some pretty good information to ascertain who's at fault, whether it's a manufacturer error in the computer error, or human error, maybe a human intervened in that AV technology and that was what was going to happen on that road in that second when the crash happened. Maybe a human intervened, and then that would be the human driver's fault. So liability will take a while to figure out for the insurance company, but the good news is, under the current structure, what we're proposing here and what is current law, frankly, is the insured person who has insurance on that car will immediately get a check from their insurance company to resolve that claim, and then we on the back end will go look at that data within the AV and ascertain again who's at fault: the manufacturer for that error or human error.
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Host5:10
Interesting. Well, you said that most people hold on to cars for 12 years, so looking forward, what do you project as far as seeing more driverless vehicles than the traditional vehicle on the road?
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Joan Woodward5:24
There's definitely going to be more driverless vehicles. The question is, are the American consumers ready to buy those fully autonomous cars? They are out there now, and again, they're being tested. Regulations, roadway improvements — so think about smart roads, smart bridges, smart pedestrian crosswalks — and again, having more upgraded systems for that AV technology to work more smoothly would be desirable. So perhaps in this new administration, we're going to see a focus on infrastructure investment going forward.
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Host5:55
Excellent, well that sounds great, Joan. Thank you for bringing all this interesting new information. Where can our viewers go for more information?
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Joan Woodward6:04
Yeah, to look at our research report and view some other interesting facts around AVs, they could go to travelersinstitute.org.
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Host6:12
Perfect, that sounds great. Well, thank you so much for your time, and it sounds really, really fabulous to know that this is a new technology coming out to help all of us. Thanks so much.
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Joan Woodward6:24
Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.