Innovation

We seemingly spend all of our time bashing banks these days, me included.  They’re either slow, unresponsive and ignorant of change, or they’re greedy, arrogant and screwing the economy. You can’t win. That’s why my new book was going to be called: “don’t tell my mum I work for a …

We seemingly spend all of our time bashing banks these days, me included.  They’re either slow, unresponsive and ignorant of change, or they’re greedy, arrogant and screwing the economy. You can’t win. That’s why my new book was going to be called: “don’t tell my mum I work for a …

Apologies but it’s that time of year where my nerve endings jangle with tension as I get into another crappy debate about multichannel strategies. “We’ve got our contact centre, then there’s our internet banking division and now we have to integrate these mobile thingymyjigs.  These channels are never-ending, wail, wail, …

I was asked to chair a panel at the end of a one day conference on the future of payments. I therefore listened to every presentation carefully and, in opening the panel, was asked to give a ten minute summation of what I had heard that day. Here’s what I …

This week's UK Computing magazine has an interesting interview with Barclays retail COO Shaygan Kheradpir.  In a pure scrape of the entire article, I thought it worth reproducing here: Enabling customer-facing staff to access bespoke financial services apps using tablet computers is just one of several ways in which COO Shaygan Kheradpir is …

I’m at a payments conference today – and so will finish off the TEDx Wall Street story tomorrow – but wanted to post a quick update for those who are looking at mobile versus proximity payments. Here are two stories. The first is about the London Olympics, which will be …

I’m at a payments conference today – and so will finish off the TEDx Wall Street story tomorrow – but wanted to post a quick update for those who are looking at mobile versus proximity payments. Here are two stories. The first is about the London Olympics, which will be …

I did a speech about innovation yesterday. As usual, the opening question was: “which is the most innovative company in the world?” and, as usual, the answer shouted back was: “Apple”. Apple. The firm everyone wants to be like because they are cool, successful, the world’s most valuable company by market capitalisation …

Spent most of this week at a payments conference. The theme was relentlessly around mobile payments, as this area of the market has truly kicked off as a major focal point for banks, telecommunications firms, retailers and merchants. There was a particularly interesting debate about contactless payments, as this is …

Several people pinged me yesterday to highlight the fact that Bitcoin has now become a target of the major payments processors. Not for acquisition. Not for partnership. Not for joint ventures. Not for support. No. Bitcoin is obviously becoming a threat to mainstream operations as it is now an active …

Several people pinged me yesterday to highlight the fact that Bitcoin has now become a target of the major payments processors. Not for acquisition. Not for partnership. Not for joint ventures. Not for support. No. Bitcoin is obviously becoming a threat to mainstream operations as it is now an active …

The Financial Services Club is one of the major media partners with Finovate Europe, which took place last week. Last year I chaired the event, but my Ricky Gervais edginess proved too much for the American organisers at NetBanker, so this year was a slightly more dry affair, with a beauty …

I haven’t written much about social media lately.  The reason is that it’s now mainstream and dull.  When you're scanning future views, you’re not as bothered about Facebook and Twitter when everyone’s familiar with and using such services. Facebook's pervasiveness is well illustrated by the Facebook IPO  announcement, which gave a …

I haven’t written much about social media lately.  The reason is that it’s now mainstream and dull.  When you're scanning future views, you’re not as bothered about Facebook and Twitter when everyone’s familiar with and using such services. Facebook's pervasiveness is well illustrated by the Facebook IPO  announcement, which gave a …

Following on from my discussions of solutions versus product people and vertical alignment versus horizontal, the question came up as to how to think strategically. How can you really get inside the customer’s head? What keeps the CEO awake at night (literally in the case of Lloyds Banking Group)? And all …