Case Study

How a bank boosted customers 35% in one year by embracing an Agile mindset

THE CLIENT

The digital retail banking space is both highly competitive and fast moving. So, when a leading Australian investment bank sought to enter the already crowded market, it had two problems to solve.

Firstly, the bank needed to differentiate its online banking services from its competitors with a strong focus on customer experience. Secondly, the bank needed to ensure its services stayed competitive into the future – and that meant finding ways to keep up with the frenetic pace of innovation.

THE CHALLENGE

In 2015, the bank’s approach to developing and delivering new services relied heavily on slow and cumbersome traditional methods. Delivery was further hampered by regulations and compliance processes that sometimes could take months to achieve the necessary approvals.

Such a slow delivery process meant opportunities were often missed. And if the bank did eventually launch a new product or service, there was a very real risk it may already be out of date.

But to enter the digital retail banking space, the bank needed to design, build and deploy its first mobile banking app. And this would be followed by a number of other web products, all of which needed to be high quality and delivered fast – with continuous iteration and improvement as well.

To stay competitive, the bank had to undergo an Agile transformation.

THE TRANSFORMATION

The bank partnered with UST to lead the necessary transformation inside the organisation – minimising risk, breaking down silos and dramatically speeding up time to market.

But for an Agile transformation to work, there first needs to be a cultural transformation.

UST began by addressing the team structure, bringing cross-functional groups together. For the first time in the bank’s history, thousands of people across multiple departments – Technology, Legal, Business and more – were connected by the same vision, working towards the same goals.

To implement new Agile ways of working across the business, UST’s Agile coaches conducted training sessions with the development team. The bank’s leadership team also received guidance and training, as they would play a major role in supporting the scrum teams.

Meanwhile, UST ran Business Prioritisation workshops to identify, train and scale multiple scrum teams. Each scrum team included an experienced UST scrum master to help turn workshop theory into BAU practice, ensuring these new ways of working became fully established. Monthly assessments also identified areas for potential improvement or further training.

As for the new mobile banking app and e-banking portals, these were designed using a human-centred design framework to create the kind of user experience customers expect.

Agile ways of working = fast delivery and high quality.

This was one opportunity the bank did not miss.

IMPACT