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I was having a debate the other day with two bank CEOs. One runs a direct bank that is going digital and the other runs a branch based bank that is investing in digital. At one point in the conversation, we got into a discussion about coders and, in a surprisingly frank dialogue, both CEOs…

Returning to the subject of cloud computing, I mentioned that it is starting to succeed by being more relevant through a vertical focus, but there is still more to be done for cloud to truly take off in banking. In particular, most banks have a concern about the risk of cloud and who is accountable. …

I often hear the lament from bankers that their business is designed around products, rather than customers. They have been built upon product silo’s, where customer consistency of experience and interaction falls through cracks. As you look at processes, the hand-off between a customer with a deposit account to their mortgage account, their cards, their…

We had another fine evening at the Financial Services Club the other night, debating customer focus in banking: where is it? with a debate between: Owen Woodley, Managing Director, Retail Banking, Lloyds Banking Group; Derek French, Head of the Campaign for Community Banking Services (CCBS); and Anthony Thomson, co-Founder Metro Bank and Atom Bank. Owen…

I organised a fascinating dinner focused upon what banks could learn from retailers the other night. As the evening transpired, various thoughts popped into my head and felt it worth recording them here. On the one hand, we are in awe of technology retail brands, especially Amazon; on the other, retailers have no idea about…

I spent some time with a digital bank this week (yes, they do exist!), and one of their slides really caught my attention. The slide was showing what online banking looked like in the 1990s … … and the point being made was that most banks are still stuck in the 1990s. They may have…

Building on yesterday’s discussion of Marmite banking, it’s not a simple question of should we be digital? nor a question of where does digital sit? but a question of all digital. Those who ask the first two questions are thinking of digital banking as a channel; those who get the last point, understand. For example,…

Bearing in mind that we have Financial Services Club Nordic Region, as I left the Stockholm meeting last week I picked up a fascinating book at the airport about the Nordic countries. Called The Almost Nearly Perfect People by Michael Booth, it caught my attention with facts like Denmark actually has brothels with animals (seven percent…