‘Digital Transformation’ is hot on the agenda and whilst we have endless technological resources why are we still struggling to move forward?
Transform: To change completely the appearance or character of something or someone, especially so that thing or person is improved.
‘Digital Transformation’ – everyone in financial services, especially in the UK is on a pilgrimage to the promised land. The ‘promised land’ is a banking environment where clients are using the latest technology, AI is maximising revenues and regulations are just the status quo. The economy as a whole is predicted to boom and the financial institutions in the UK will lead the charge to success. The goal is to be the transformation poster boys for the rest of world.
In terms of technology, we can source the best developers from around the globe and create anything we want – imagination is our only boundary. However, the barriers to successfully implementing new solutions remain high, we continue to wallow in a swamp of legacy systems, of which every part, currently is integral to uphold the existing ecosystem – and if we break just one weed, the entire banking infrastructure could implode. If you’re starting afresh on your pilgrimage – then the chances are you will have already circumvented the swamp and will reach the promised land long before many of long established banking giants. To survive and prosper, these institutions need to find a way to use the legacy swamp to their advantage so they do not have to spend years and huge chunks of cash dredging the murk to start afresh.
But there is another way, there is always a way.
But, whilst we are a generation completely dependent on Megabytes and Servers, ultimately humans have control. While we have all of the technological resources and know-how we could possibly need at our disposal, why have we not figured it out yet? Why are we so many of us still in the swamp, tirelessly but ineffectively trying to wade our way through?
We need to build a bridge.
It sounds very straightforward and to succeed requires a completely new way of thinking. And whilst we can make technology do whatever we want it to, to make things work, people have to change the way they think and the way they behave.
We are creatures of habit and routine, learning behaviours from our predecessors. Somehow we need to ‘unlearn’ what we know, regroup and move forward with a different strategy and a different approach – whilst established knowledge and practical experience is invaluable, we must to apply that knowledge in a different way. Only by unlearning habits and routine we can start on the journey to true transformation.
We recently conducted an independent survey entitled ‘The impact of Digital in global financial services’ and despite everything that has been said or written in the past, culture remains high on everyone’s agenda and was by far the over-riding issue, and major concern, voiced throughout all the conversations we conducted. Click here to read more Resources.
In order to ‘completely change the appearance or character of something’ we need to unlearn, not learn.