$694B
Disclosure Dollar Loss in 2025, a record high
$17M
Median D&O settlement, a 10-year high
61%
Increase in DDL from 2024 to 2025
Sources: Cornerstone Research 2026; NERA 2026
The underwriting blind spot
A well-governed company and one heading toward a major D&O or EPLI claim look identical on paper.
What underwriters see today
- Financial statements
- Claims history
- Governance assessments
- Company disclosures
What underwriters miss
- Discrimination patterns across the workforce
- Compliance failures employees describe publicly
- Management misconduct signals
- Cultures of silence that suppress internal reporting
These are precisely the conditions that precede D&O and EPLI claims, and they are visible in public employee voice before they appear in any formal report, regulatory finding, or litigation filing.
Three use cases
Primary
Underwriting signal
Add employee voice as a predictive data layer for D&O and EPLI risk selection. Score companies against risk indices calibrated for underwriting and distinguish well-governed organizations from those heading toward claims.
Secondary
Claims intelligence
Use workforce sentiment data during claims investigation to understand the organizational conditions that preceded a D&O or EPLI claim. Validate or challenge claimant narratives with independent external evidence.
Internal
Internal workforce monitor
Monitor your own organization's workforce across global operations. Detect emerging culture risks, retention signals, and governance blind spots across business units before they become material.
What the output looks like
Scored risk indices designed to sit alongside financials and claims history in underwriting workflows.
Risk scores calibrated for D&O/EPLI underwriting
Discrimination and harassment pattern detection
Compliance failure signals described publicly by employees
Management misconduct and conduct risk patterns
Culture of silence indicators: suppression of internal reporting
Trend data and alerts as patterns shift over time
The evidence base
Peer-reviewed research (Green, Huang & Wen, Journal of Financial Economics, 2019) demonstrates that public employee review data is predictive of organizational performance, particularly effective at detecting negative events before they surface through conventional reporting.
Top-rated employers outperform the market by 10-16% annually (UK study). Employee outlook predicts bad news events more strongly than good news, making public employee voice especially valuable as a risk signal.
Disclosure Dollar Loss increased 61% from 2024 to 2025, reaching a record $694B. The conditions behind these events were visible in workforce data before they reached litigation.